Subject: Review: Frank Herbert's Dune (2000)

From: Jeremiah Kipp <[email-masked]>
Date: 16 Mar 2001 18:32:19 GMT

FRANK HERBERT'S DUNE (2000)
                         A film review by Jeremiah Kipp
                         Copyright 2001 filmcritic.com
                                filmcritic.com

It seems that David Lynch's adaptation of Frank Herbert's epic science
fiction novel Dune (1984) wasn't enough to convince people that this
classic works far better on the page.  At least that box office fiasco
packs in some interesting Lynchian perversions.  Besides, how can you go
wrong with a cast that includes Patrick Stewart, Max von Sydow, and
Alicia Witt as a bald, pint-sized, knife-wielding child?  Let me tell
you something, buddy -- you can't top that!  Maybe it ain't Herbert's
vision of Dune, but it's fun at parties.

So someone in the Sci-Fi Channel marketing department thought that
they'd be able to create the definitive version of the novel, making
much ballyhoo over it in the press.  "This is the way Frank Herbert
intended it!"  Yes, yes, I'm sure he was precisely thinking of static,
made-for-television sets lifted from Star Trek: The Next Generation,
bathed in nauseating greens, oranges, and fire engine reds.

Instead of Lynchian puppets and latex gore, we're treated to phony
bluescreens, computer generated B-movie effects, and a series of
unrealistic matte paintings (at least, they looked like matte paintings
-- the press kit says they filmed in Prague and Tunisia!)  And what's up
with those gauche costumes, a cross between Japanese kimonos and Ronald
McDonald.  Something is clearly wrong here.

An attempt to summarize Herbert's richly layered plot would prove
confounding, what with his fastidious attention to detail.  We'll stick
with the Cliff's Notes version: Spice is the key to time travel, so
ruthless barons and emperors across the galaxy negotiate to get their
greedy stinking hands on as much of it as possible.  He who controls the
spice controls the universe.

With his eye on the prize, stalwart Duke Leto Atreities (William Hurt,
given top billing but whacked pretty quick) picks up stakes from his
homeland and moves to the desert planet known as Dune.  Comfortably
settled into his new digs, he proceeds to mine for the spice and teach
his brash young son Paul (Alec Newman) about the birds and the bees. 
Bizarre omens forebode that Duke Leto will be slain, and that young Paul
will be groomed as the prophesied Messiah to lead the Fremen (rogue
desert warriors) to salvation and freedom?

Slobbering Baron Vladimir Harkonnen (Ian McNeice), sleek Emperor Shaddam
IV (Giancarlo Giannini, Hannibal) and other diabolical forces work
intricate plots against the good guys.  A traitor, an assassination
attempt, and an ambush all figure into play before Paul and his pouting
cosmopolitan mother (Saskia Reeves) are cast out into the wild.  Will
Paul be groomed by the Fremen tribes to fight in a ritualized kung-fu
fight with Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen (Matt Keeslar, The Last Days of
Disco)?  He damned well better, lads, because this is a six-hour epic!

All of the shoddy production elements would be forgiven if there was a
halfway decent cast holding this house of cards together.  Hurt wanders
through early scenes mumbling his lines, coasting on what I hope was a
fat paycheck.  He at least exudes regal presence, whereas Newman's Paul
Atreities (played with authority by Kyle MacLachlan in Lynch's version)
is less a boy prince than a refugee from a boy band.

The women are a gaggle of weak-willed geese, with Julie Cox especially
bratty as the emperor's daughter.  Her "flirting" scenes with Paul will
not only disgust fans of Herbert's book (for which their relationship is
purely a matter of social convenience and political tact), but will also
turn off anyone who happened to be taking this malarkey seriously.  When
did the sci-fi space opera turn into Teen Beat?

I hate to keep returning to the Lynch version, but it was really so much
better.  Even if you didn't catch all the new language or rituals
originated by Frank Herbert (for he is the Kwizatz Haderach!), you
accepted it as dream logic.  Better to be entertained and confused than
casually dismissive, which is as much as this new Dune deserves.

RATING:  *

|------------------------------|
 \ ***** Perfection             \
  \ **** Good, memorable film    \
   \ *** Average, hits and misses \
    \ ** Sub-par on many levels    \
     \ * Unquestionably awful       \
      |------------------------------|

MPAA Rating: NR

Director: John Harrison
Producer: David R. Kappes
Writer: John Harrison
Starring: William Hurt, Alec Newman, Saskia Reeves, P.H. Moriarty, Ian
McNeice, Matt Kesslar, Giancarlo Giannini, Julie Cox

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