A Sequel with the Bene Gesserit Power of Voice
DIRECTED BY DENIS VILLENEUVE/2024
To paraphrase a warrior’s adage, never bring a knife to an atomic bomb fight. Yet by the end of Denis Villeneuve’s bombastic second half of his epic adaptation of Frank Herbert’s seminal science fiction classic, Dune, that’s exactly what two of the film’s central characters are doing.
If anyone came to the giant-sandworm- infested desert planet of Arrakis for the waters, they were very misinformed. Once upon a time, though, the arid place was awash in seawater and crashing waves. But not anymore. Now it’s just sand. Two hours and forty-six solid minutes of sand, sand, sand. Sand and conflict. Because as we know from Villeneuve’s prerequisite Part One, there’s Spice in them thar dunes…. and he who controls Spice, controls the universe.
As Timothée Chalamet’s exiled thin white Duke, Paul Atreides, seems to grow increasingly sold on the messianic hype being leveled upon him by Stilgar (Javier Bardem) and various other members of his devout Fremen tribe, it’s difficult to know who to root for. It is not, however, difficult to know who to root against.
The film’s out-and-out villains are entirely hissable and unmistakable as such. Among the returning bad guys are Stellan Skarsgård as Baron Vladimir Harkonnen and Dave Bautista as the Baron’s nephew and military leader Glossu Rabban Harkonnen. New are Austin Butler as the Baron’s freakishly hairless and pale other nephew, the psychotic killer Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen, as well as Christopher Walken as the Padishah Emperor of the Known Universe himself Shaddam IV, and Florence Pugh as Princess Irulan, the Emperor’s daughter. Already, this is a cast of cosmic power that will not be denied.
Dune: Part Two both stands and falls as a full-on massive follow-up to Villeneuve’s 2021 Part One, itself gloriously and unapologetically in synch with the weighty tone of Frank Herbert’s seminal novel. One’s comprehension of what the heck is what in the plot depends, on every level, on the viewer’s investment in the material.
When Part One opened, I wrote that “The through-lines of space travel, central sand planets, rebellions, evil empires, political allegory, and even Chosen Ones are all indeed present, though it altogether lacks any aspect of character magnetism or dash. It’s hard to become invested in the plight of young royal subject Paul Atreides (Chalamet) and his loving mother, Lady Jessica (Rebecca Ferguson of Mission: Impossible fame) when they are kept at such arm’s length and decked out in Teflon”.
Compared to the remoteness that I felt that was baked into the wildly ambitious first film, I’d say that Part Two, by comparison, does better. There’s an effective uneasiness in watching both Paul and Lady Jessica slowly slip away into differing cultic behaviors. In other words, they’re still decked out in Teflon and with black nose hoses to boot, but the fact that we do feel something can only mean that Part One was more successful than previously assumed, and that Part Two has more to offer. Just what exactly is being offered remains a nearly impenetrable conundrum, but again, we’ve been led to expect exactly that. Factor in Zendaya’s fully emerged and terrifically prominent religious skeptic and love interest of Paul, and Part Two is that much greater.
Part Two begins several years later (tracking with the similar time jump in the novel), finding Paul entrenched with Bardem’s faction of Fremen as they struggle to survive the harsh planet and the ongoing Spice raids of greedy Baron Harkonnen. They fight back with coolly realized guerrilla tactics, very much evoking the Vietnam War era from which Dune found major popularity in the first place.
Everyone wants to ride a sandworm (according to Saturday Night Live, in more ways than one!), the gargantuan subterranean indiscriminate devourers of Arrakis, but only the chosen one is believed to possess that ability. When Paul inevitably manages to do so, the resulting action comes across as the most extreme sport for nerds ever conceived. More Fremen get the hang of it, making for some pretty wild action sequences, and kicking up more sand than the entire cast of Lawrence of Arabia when lunch is called.
Audience members who felt in any way positive about 2021’s Dune: Part One should make a point of catching Dune: Part Two theatrically. Not just theatrically, but in the darkest, loudest auditorium available. Only then will one experience the full-on mutually assured Spice of life on Arrakis.