Dune 2021 Lives Under The Shadow of Dune 1984

Denis Villeneuve Can’t Seem to Separate His Vision from The Original

There are certain films that are considered classics. Sometimes these films that become classics are based on the characters, the story, the scenery, and in most cases, the fact that there aren’t any sequels attached to them. Films like The Wizard of Oz, Casablanca, Old Yeller, A Clockworks Orange, and Blade Runner fall into that category with an asterisk attached to Blade Runner. Blade Runner on its own is a classic but the sequel is not. What the sequel has in common with Dune 2021 is the director, Denis Villeneuve. He has tasked himself to remake the sci-fi classic, Dune, a film originally made in 1984. There will be a line of demarcation with these films. One will be called Dune 1984 and the other as Dune 2021 muck like Ghostbusters 2016 because we know what that is. Dune 2021, is a visual exception when it comes to special effects. It should because it eclipse the original special effects ten-fold. But the special effects aren’t the problem. It’s the ghost of the original that you can’t escape plus there is a major twist at the end of this film.

We get a refresher course and we are reintroduced to these characters in Dune 2021. Oscar Issacs does an admirable and more fleshed-out representation of Duke Leto Atreides. Timothée Chalamet plays

Paul Atreides with a purpose mixed with an air of ambivalence. As each character is reintroduced to us, you get the sense that there was an unwritten rule to totally divorce themselves from the acting style of Dune 1984. You can sense the purpose and intent to steer far and away from those roles. But that becomes an issue because their intent to remove themselves from those roles only amplifies what they are trying to avoid.

One of the most memorable roles in the Dune 1984 film was that of musician/actor, Sting. He portrayed Feyd-Rautha. What I remembered most about Sting’s portrayal was just how bad his acting was/ In just about every scene Sting was in, he chewed up the scenery with bad acting and bad over-acting. How could he screw up a line of “I will kill him,….. I WILL KILL HIM” in such a way that it’s a meme. His line is followed up by Paul Atreides’ “I will bend like a reed in the wind”. 

To this day, people still quote these lines and that quotability factor is what permeates into Dune 2021. There isn’t anything that is memorably quotable with Dune 2021. This remake clocks in at 2 hours and 35 minutes. Visually, Villeneuve does a yeoman’s job on the camera work just like he did with Blade Runner 2046. Where he misses the mark is not separating these characters from the 1984 version by giving the Dune 2021 characters more gravitas. As the film went on, the characters were starting to fill like cardboard cutouts.

When Zendaya's character, Chani, finally appears, she says very little while trying to be aloof. Of late, a lot of her roles seem to highlight her being aloof to some degree. Her appearance though is only an appetizer. Just as you start to get to the main course, the film ends. WHAT???? Yep, that’s the twist, it abruptly ends. Was this always in the cards? Was this movie suppose to be a continuation? I saw or heard no press that this would be the case. Shouldn’t this be part of the film’s hype?

Dune 1984 clocked in at 2 hours and 17 minutes. Everything was contained in that film. Dune 2021, at 2 hours and 35 minutes, has very long scenes that feel like you’re driving across the country looking at the cows grazing on grass. Where are we going? What’s the point of the travel if there is no payoff to the journey.? The film did not end on a cliffhanger, it just ended to the point where it’s forgettable. You’re cut off guard by this abrupt ending. Furthermore, there is no desire to see this film should there be a second part. Dune 2021 is just bloated It’s bloated like a blue whale washed ashore on the beach that’s been lying there for ten days.

This film is not like the original Star Wars or the Avengers film where there are cliffhangers just hook you into wanting these sequels. Dune 2021 is missing the Avengers formula of enticing viewers with its cliffhangers. I don’t know why Denis Villeneuve chose Dune 2021 as his next film following Blade Runner 2046 because he just repeated himself in tome and style without giving anything to the characters and substance. If this was a battle for supremacy, Dune 1984 would win for the camp, the style, and even the bad overacting because it was memorable substance.

2 out of 5 stars