Dune: Part Two (2024)

Director: Denis Villeneuve
Starring: Timothée Chalamet, Zendaya, Rebecca Ferguson

Synopsis:
As Paul assimilates into Fremen culture, he struggles with the prospect of leveraging the prophecies of the Lisan al-Ghaib to achieve his revenge against House Harkonnen and the Emperor.

Impressions:
The way they kept pushing the release date back, I was starting to wonder if I'd ever get to see this. After the first film, I was fairly optimistic with how this would turn out and my optimism was rewarded. The setup gets nicely paid off. I think they do a pretty good job of portraying Paul's struggles with his prescience, but I might have liked it if they pushed it a little harder. On a character level, the biggest surprise (and divergence from the book) is the portrayal of Chani. Here she is a rather outspoken skeptic in contrast with Stilgar's fanaticism and there's this wedge between her and Paul that somewhat undermines their romance. (And then there's the ending.) Book purists probably aren't going to be happy with this, but taking the films as their own thing, I can see the thematic value in how the character is used. Other significant changes include some time compression for the third act, so no Leto II Version 1.0 and no gom jabbar of the Atreides in case you were wondering. These aren't dealbreakers for me, but it should at least be fuel for debate.

We get some amazing sequences. Particular standouts include Paul's first worm ride, the Giedi Prime arena, and the Fremen council. I had my doubts about whether Timothée Chalamet could pull off Paul in the latter part of the story, but he did pretty well stepping up to the plate. Austin Butler left a strong impression as Feyd-Rautha, making the most of his somewhat limited screentime. Christopher Walken was certainly an interesting casting choice as Emperor Shaddam, delivering a mostly subdued performance with a few Walkenisms sprinkled in.

My praise of the special effects continue here. I particularly like the portrayal of lasguns. The look of Giedi Prime is very striking and the technique they used to film the exterior scenes is pretty neat. I was trying to pay closer attention to the music this time and if you've read my review of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, I was getting a similar feel here, subdued or even absent most of the time, only to swell in the big moments. There aren't particular tracks I would point to like I can with the '84 version, so make of that what you will.

All told, I was quite happy with how this turned out. I've heard there's already talk of a sequel and looking at the box office returns so far, that seems like a definite possibility. We'll see how it goes. In the meantime, I recommend this for your collection, right along with Part One.

Rating:
Own It