By CYNTHIA BIDDLECOMB
Los Alamos
“Dune: Part 2”—which opened Friday—is a film that deserves the Big Screen, a satisfying, Action/Sci-fi movie, based on the epic 1965 novel “Dune” by Frank Herbert (and its five sequels). Fans of the Dune books, and those who enjoyed the 2021 film “Dune”, will not easily be disappointed. For adults and teens alike, it’s worth sitting through 2 hours 46 minutes.
Watching Dune 2, one can guess it will be nominated for several Oscars. Dune Part 1, in fact, won Oscars in 2022 for Best Sound, Visual Effects, Production Design, Original Score, Cinematography, and Film Editing, and was also nominated for Best Picture, Adapted Screenplay, Costume Design, and Hair and Make-up. Part 2 excels in these same categories.
Returning as headliners in Part 2 are Timothée Chalamet as Paul Atreides, Rebecca Ferguson as his mother Jessica, and, half-way through, Josh Brolin as Gurney Halleck, Paul’s former mentor. At the end of part one, Paul found himself among the furtive Fremen people of the planet Arrakis. In part two, of the Fremen he had just met, Chani, played by Zendaya, becomes Paul’s love interest, and Stilgar, played by Javier Bardem, leads their inventive, guerilla-style militia.
The Fremen’s home, Arrakis, is a desert planet with very little water but rich in a mineral they call “spice”, which is coveted throughout the interplanetary Empire. Spice, as we learned in part one, is essential to interstellar travel, and it is known to promote youthful vitality, a longer life, and for the rare few, spiritual visions. Massive worms travel under the sand, protecting Arrakis spice; indeed the Fremen know how to call upon the monstrous worms for help and travel.
Arrakis spice mining operations are run from another planet by the empire. Fremen continually destroy the mining equipment and the empire’s Harkonnen miners. Paul and his mother quickly learn Fremen culture. They help to oppose the outsiders’ spice extraction. As he helps train Paul, the ever-optimistic Stilgar begins to see him as the promised messianic figure who will free their people. Jessica soon joins in religious rituals and becomes the Fremens’ Reverend Mother.
On the empire side, Christopher Walken returns as the Emperor, Stellan Skarsgård as Baron Harkonnen, Dave Bautista as Harkonnen Beast Rabban, and Charlotte Rampling as their Reverend Mother Mohian. New to the story are the Baron’s sociopathic nephew, na-Baron Feyd-Rautha (Austin Butler), and the emperor’s daughter Princess Irulan (Florence Pugh).
Dune: Part 2 is a star-studded film with a cast of hundreds of extras, multiplied by CGI in some scenes to represent hundreds of thousands. It’s a cinematic wonder with exteriors filmed in the deserts of the United Arab Emirates, Jordan and Namibia. And the musical score, again by Hans Zimmer, is triumphant. Might there be funding for Dune: Part 3? Time will tell.
The MPAA has rated Dune: Part 2 “PG-13 for sequences of strong violence, some suggestive material and brief strong language.” In this reviewer’s opinion, knife combat and exploding mining equipment, both prominent in the film, are not gory and are expertly choreographed.
