Just thinking about continuing my assessment of Denis Villeneuve’s bloated bomb makes me reach for the gin. You’ll recall I decided to address whether ponderous camerawork, massive explosions and a behemoth score can actually substitute for a script, dramatic tension, excitement, inspiration, and/or (god help us) acting.
Courage!
Rarely has so much money been thrown at such an empty concept for remaking an earlier semi-bomb. At least the original 1984 Dune had a certified genius—David Lynch—sinking the ship.
Uniforms like these aluminum foil origami jumpsuits, [see above shot of special-needs actor Josh Brolin posing next to self-important actor Oscar Isaac] made me nostalgic for the spectacle of Kyle MacLachlan fighting uber-hunk Sting in the original cinematic Dune.
But onward! Visuals: Shall we begin by asking how many Architectural Digest decorators it took to polish the concrete fortress walls of the House of Atreides? Tunnels of grey, leading to rooms of grey, occasionally occupied by individuals in grey. I’ve seen bus station waiting rooms with more style than the royal chambers of our central figures. The camera obsesses over the acreage of grey that forms the central heart of this lumbering film.
Maybe the interiors were designed by fashion people, you know, Prada, or Chanel, or Alexander McQueen so that when the female actors glide from one grey hall to another, we could admire the way their diaphanous robes billow in the wind machine airflow. Yes. That must have been the thinking behind the cavernous, dark interiors. Catwalks of the future. [Note the post-Taliban exoskeletons in which our principals are dressed for desert life.]
And how about the decision to have big guy Jason Momoa, playing the wiley Duncan Idaho, do his acting entirely with his eyebrows! Ugh.
How about long, self-indulgent camera shots? The Valium-scented overhead shots, the countless drone shots, the shots designed to substitute for the missing: A) script, B) insight, C), narrative arc, or D) dramatic tension. No worries. Just keep the camera rolling, tack on an extra half hour, and gamble that the Cannes crowd will eat it up.
Another secret of Villeneuve’s concept: no editing. Just take after take after take. Again for reasons noted above: keep viewers off-balance so they won’t notice the vacuity of the cinematic text.
And throw in many explosions. Explosions requiring loud booms. Here the visual barrage meets the sonic barrage.
Score: And that brings me to the once-notable Hans Zimmer, composer for Gladiator, The Lion King, Inception, and a few others. In this film, Zimmer’s mega-decible score does most of the heavy lifting, drama-wise. During the final, interminable, 45 minutes of Dune (the one with teen throb Timothee Chalamet ((don’t get me started on the pretentious spelling of his name!))), Zimmer’s score IS the film. This device of making the sound do the work is cheap and obvious. Villeneuve ran out of ideas very early on, even though Frank Herbert (the book’s author) provided plenty of them. So he just cranked up Zimmer’s score, threw in explosions and Bob’s your uncle.
Loud. Very loud. And when the film still fails to revive movie-goers who have by now fallen into comas unalleviated by either popcorn or diet Cokes, Zimmer & company simply make everything louder.
And slow. Slow sand. Slow explosions. Slow loud music.
Let’s review: Dune is a book of eco prophecy, laced with compelling mythology, labyrinthean power conflicts, inventive sorcery and mysticism set in the heart of a desert scented by spice. And not just any spice. Spice that allows the consumer to intuit thoughts, feelings, and events both intimate and far into the future. At the center of this story is a young man who, thanks to his mother’s power and clairvoyance has been bred to exist in many temporal states at once. Yes my friends, long before Keanu Reeves, Paul Atriedes was The One. And no my friends, Timothée (pretentious spelling) Chalamet, is NOT The One.
Spend a more pleasant two and a half hours filling out tax forms, or calling AT&T Customer Service and waiting on hold to a continuous loop of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons.
Caveat Emptor! and if there is a god, Villeneuve will find himself without the funding to continue his cruel dismantling of Dune.
