BEFORE: OK, I just watched the posted video of this morning's reading of the Oscar nominations for 2024's films, and even though I'm a day behind watching movies, I'm kind of right where I should be. "Dune: Part Two" got FIVE Oscar nominations, it may not be the most this year but hey, it's something. Nominated for Best Sound, Best Visual Effects, Best Cinematography, Best Production Design AND Best Picture, though 10 films were nominated and really, who knows which way that one's gonna go. I think the only other nominated film, out of all the categories, that I've seen in "Inside Out 2", so I guess I don't really have my finger on the pulse after all, except where animation and FX are concerned. In the other categories, big goose-egg for me, and with the romance chain coming up, there's really not a lot of time for me to change that, all I can do is keep a list of the nominees and get to them all somewhere down the road. But, you know, I've got nominated films from the last three years that I haven't watched yet, like "Living" and "Aftersun" and "Poor Things", really, I can only do what I can do.
I guess I'm all in on "Dune", like I can add the Elton John doc to my list but I won't get to it until June probably. "Nosferatu" is a vampire movie so that's October for sure, that could link up with "Renfield" via Nicholas Hoult, but we'll have to wait and see. Even films like "Alien: Romulus" and "Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes", which are probably right up my alley seem to be very, very difficult to link to, so they're just going to have to wait. Sorry. If it feels like I'm always playing "catch up", it's only because I am.
Anyway, Anya Taylor-Joy carries over from "Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga", she's in here somewhere playing Paul Atreides' sister in a flash-forward or something. It's a cameo or an uncredited role, but my spies are everywhere and reported this back to me, let's hope they're right. Oh, and Timothee Chalamet got an Oscar nom today, too, but for a different movie. I was a few feet away from him outside the premiere of "A Complete Unknown", but I was working and there was someone who needed an ambulance, so that kind of took priority.
THE PLOT: Paul Atreides unites with the Fremen while on a warpath of revenge against the conspirators who destroyed his family. Facing a choice between the love of his life and the fate of the universe, he endeavors to prevent a terrible future.
AFTER: I could really have gotten here any number of ways, I could have linked here from "Brothers" or from "The Bikeriders", heck, I could have watched this last October between those other Dave Bautista movies like "Knock on the Cabin" and "Army of the Dead" - but consider there was just one path that got me here the way I wanted, and only one path that got me here on Oscar nomination day, and that's really something, I don't know exactly what it is, but it's what I've become used to after making these movie chains for so long. I can just kind of FEEL when the chain is right, or at least I imagine that it's right. Signs along the way, even the bad movies are reference points - but are there really "bad" and "good" movies, or just movies that are my thing and those that are not?
"Dune" may not be my all-time favorite sci-fi franchise, but I did read the original book when I was a kid, so for that reason alone, I definitely want to see this storyline play out. What's great is that I remember how cool and twisty this plot was, but not well enough to remember every plot point, so even though I kind of know what's coming, the memories are not detailed enough to count as spoilers. I'm right in that pocket of knowing this is cool and still able to be surprised.
Too long in the middle - in fact this whole film is the middle part, which covers the training with the Fremen, learning how the sandworms work, and Paul planning his revenge on the Emperor for allowing the Harkonnens to take over the planet and kill Paul's father. So this is all the boring stuff between the initial fight with the Harkonnens and the payback, which will be in the next film. So there's a lot that happens here, but it's mostly at a snail's pace, unfortunately. They could have thrown more than two battle scenes in here, the whole thing in the arena was some good action, but that was way too short. It's a pacing problem more than anything else, because I think once all three movies are done it will take nine hours to watch them all in a row, and couldn't we cut that down just a bit?
I know, I know, David Lynch once thought along those lines when he made the first adaptation back in the 1980's, and that turned out to be a very bad idea. SHOUT-out to the late David Lynch, because if he hadn't made (anonymously) such a bad, campy version of "Dune" then we might not have been able to appreciate the better one when it finally came along...
Maybe it's me, I'm just coming off of "Furiosa" which was wall-to-wall action scenes, one after the other, but MORE action crammed into a smaller space with less exposition. Now today's film is mostly exposition and training stuff, with a couple action scenes over a longer period of time. Surely there must be some kind of proper ratio, maybe somewhere in-between?
Wait, I'm wrong, there is no "Dune: Part Three" in the works. This film apparently covers the whole second half of the first book, but the director is talking about maybe adapting "Dune: Messiah" next, which I did NOT read, so if there is a third film, it will be full of surprises for me. I guess we'll find out in a couple years if that's going to happen, since Part Two made over the $500 million it needed to break even, it's certainly possible. If not, they're going to kind of leave us hanging here, with Paul Atreideis taking down the Emperor, then heading into space to take the war to his enemies. I got a bit confused because just when it looks like we're finally some full-on action, the movie just ends. I do remember some good battle scenes with Paul and the Fremen taking out the Harkonnens on Arrakis, so ultimately that was a good start, but we just may never see the end of that war on film.
So if you've already read the book, or seen the earlier movie, you know what happens here. I can't really tell what's a spoiler and what isn't, because none of the "reveals" were all that revealing to me. But Paul trains with the Fremen, who are the native Arraki people who can ride those giant sand-worms and control them, to some degree. The sand-worm are crucial to the production of spice, which is what enables inter-stellar transport, and also can be used to make a great cinnamon roll, I think. (I think the spice is worm poop, but what do I know? They never exactly SAY that...). Here we also learn that the Water of Life, which is poisonous to most people but gives powers to the Fremen Reverend Mothers - Paul's mother, as a member of the Bene Gesserit (the mysterious women who can see the future and control everything) joins their ranks by drinking the Water of Life, but it nearly kills her at first. Upside, she also gains the power to speak telepathically with her unborn daughter, who's just a fetus but still has some strong opinions.
Paul falls in love with a local girl, Chani, while he learns the Fremen's language and their ways, and the Fremen debate whether he will turn out to be the savior from Off-World prophesized to lead their people to prosperity. Paul doesn't want to be that savior their Mahdi, but that's exactly what their savior would say, he would be humble and learn from them until it was time to strike down their enemies. (Oh, it's comin', though...). Paul had been raised by his mother as a possible Kwisatz Haderach, which is another type of prophesized savior, only one foretold by those Bene Gesserits. This kid was raised to be one society's religious savior, but then before he can take that job, he ends up on the desert planet where he becomes this second society's potential savior. You ever get the feeling this guy might actually amount to something, if he could just stop chasing the local girl?
Not so fast, those Bene Gesserits are on a lot of different worlds, they decide that since Paul's no longer around, they need a new candidate for the Kwisatz Hederach, so they find one in the House of Harkonnen, Feyd-Rautha who is a famous gladiator and psychopath on his homeworld, which for some reason is filmed all in black and white - or maybe it just IS that way, their culture hasn't invented color just yet. Anyway, Feyd-Rautha is like the Paul Atreides of that world, he applies for the position and also, his uncle, Baron Vladimir also makes him the official ruler of Arrakis, because his big brother Rabban wasn't getting the job done. The Harkonnens want the spice and no trouble from the locals, and they're losing on both fronts.
The Harkonnens attack the planet, big-time, and Paul is forced to travel to the south part of the planet (really, it's all one big sandbox, how do you even tell the north part from the south part?) and there he also drinks the Water of Life, even though it's poisonous to men. Sure enough, he falls into a coma and only his girlfriend's tears can bring him out of it. (Sappy, sure, but probably there's some chemical reason for this...). As a bonus for surviving, he also gains clairvoyant partners, and he can see the path to victory for the Fremen, and also a vision of the planet being green again, and not just a giant planet-sized desert. This leads the Fremen to call him by yet another term, the Lisan al Gaib, yep, so that's THREE prophet or Messiah jobs this kid is qualified for - he's hogging all the jobs, there must be a bunch of unemployed messiahs out there somewhere in the universe...
More Harkonnen troops show up, and then the Emperor shows up with HIS troops, but they're no match for atom bombs and giant sandworms, I guess. Having used his new mental powers to figure out his mother's secret, and thus learning he's also descended from the Harkonnens himself, Paul kills the Baron and blackmails the Emperor, who was the one who decided that Paul's father should be killed. It's a stand-off, because Paul's threatening to destroy the spice fields with his nuclear weapons - the only way to settle this is a duel between Paul and his counterpart, Feyd-Rautha. No spoilers, but come on, you can figure out who's going to come out on top here. (Will it be the white guy or the REALLY white guy?)
Also starring Timothée Chalamet (last seen in "Wonka"), Zendaya (last heard in "Space Jam: A New Legacy"), Rebecca Ferguson (last seen in "Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One"), Javier Bardem (last seen in "The Little Mermaid" (2023)), Josh Brolin (last seen in "Brothers"), Austin Butler (last seen in "The Bikeriders"), Florence Pugh (last seen in "Oppenheimer"), Dave Bautista (last seen in "Army of Thieves"), Christopher Walken (last seen in "Marvin Hamlisch: What He Did for Love"), Lea Seydoux (last seen in "No Time to Die"), Stellan Skarsgard (last seen in "Frankie & Alice"), Charlotte Rampling (last seen in "Never Let Me Go"), Souheila Yacoub, Roger Yuan (last seen in "Bulletproof Monk"), Babs Olusanmokun (last seen in "Dune: Part One"), Alison Halstead, Giusi Merli (last seen in "Love Wedding Repeat"), Kait Tenison (last seen in "Annette"), Tara Breathnach (last seen in "The Professor and the Madman"), Akiko Hitomi, Imola Gaspar, Joseph Beddelem (last seen in "Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time"), Leon Herbert (last seen in "Alien 3"), Sima Rostami, Dylan Baldwin, Jordan Long (last seen in "The Gentlemen"), Billy Clements (last seen in "Meg 2: The Trench"), Steve Wall.
RATING: 7 out of 10 ornithopters
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