Denis Villeneuve’s film adaptation of Frank Herbert’s novel Dune has been in German cinemas since last week. Ever since the first reviews after the world premiere at the Venice Film Festival, it seemed certain: Dune awaits us Exceptional blockbusters. Some headings even have the Lord of the Rings for a new generation promised.
This mood prevails in Germany even after the starting weekend. Dune gets around me and also from the Moviepilot community (8.2 average after 500 ratings) mostly celebrated as a blockbuster masterpiece that everyone has to see.
After the two and a half hours of Denis Villeneuve’s film, I came out of the cinema strangely untouched and almost frustrated. Dune mediates me hardly any sense of the size this fundamentally fascinating science fiction universe from the novel series that I haven’t read – and in the end I didn’t care about almost any of the characters. Not a good sign for a film that is supposed to arouse desire for part 2 as the first half.
Reason 1: Dune has larger-than-life pictures and still feels strangely small
It is constantly said that Dune as a novel unfilmed may be. After the remake of Denis Villeneuve, it seems that this statement is pretty appropriate. The blockbuster builds one fascinating future, in which different parties fight for control of the desert planet Arrakis, where the drug called Spice can be harvested as a valuable raw material.
Check out our enthusiastic video review of Dune here:
Dune: the best movie of the year? | Review
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We experience the universe in Dune above all through many dialogues that take place in social mechanisms as well as peculiar occurrences huge sandworms lurking underground introduce. The problem with that: we really don’t get to see much of the gigantic Dune universe in this first film.
After seeing Dune, I had a lot of dark rooms in my head in which figures are making plans, or vast desert landscapes in which even a struggle for survival towards the end strangely small and lost works. Dune hurls around with dialogues full of exposition and constantly explains what is going on – but there is little to see.
As natives of the desert planet, they stay Fremen For example, marginal figures that are only occasionally interspersed without us getting a feel for their situation. It is similar with the threatening one Harkonnen-Familywho wants to take control of Arrakis with murderous intrigues. Stellan Skarsgård’s bloated Baron Harkonnen remains little more than a bizarre figure. As a big Dune villain, he rarely becomes tangible.