Dune -Part Two becomes the very thing it sets to critique

Photo: Collected

To many, Denis Villeneuve's latest directorial venture is a triumph for the sci-fi genre and cinema itself. And it is certainly not difficult to understand why the movie, which has already raked in $178.5 million - nearly half of what the first film made - is getting love from critics and fans alike.

Dune's visuals are unmatched. In a world where almost all big blockbusters feel like soulless VFX showcases, its gorgeous visuals have such a tactile feel that one can certainly be forgiven for worrying about the sand getting everywhere. 

The film also boasts a stellar cast. Thanos, the new Furiosa, Poe Dameron, and Elvis in the same movie, and none of them are the primary protagonist or antagonist; wow! 

It tells a story of epic proportions spanning galaxies featuring space witches, human computers, magic drugs and giant worms. What more can one ask for?

If 'Barbenheimer' was a shot in the arm for the industry ravaged by Covid-19, 'Dune: Part Two' is the movie that ensures the WGA ( 2023 Writers Guild of America) and SAG-AFTRA (The Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists) strikes don't stifle that momentum. 

To many, this is Hollywood's big triumphant return to form and, potentially, a saviour of the art form itself.

Dune arrives at a moment when filmgoers' hostility toward the deluge of soulless IP (Intellectual Property) adaptations micromanaged by moustache-twirling studio execs is at an all-time high. 

So, no wonder that 'Dune', the creative vision of a modern-day auteur who is yet to make a bad film, certainly feels like a breath of fresh desert air.

Wait a minute! you say; desert air is not that fresh. Well spotted dear reader, it is not. 'Dune' is not the Messiah we movie lovers want it to be. 

Despite looking like a flawless win at first glance, just like the dunes it borrows its name from, there is more lurking below the film's glistening surface. 

Rambling from a dissenter of dune

I am a big fan of Villeneuve and enjoyed the first film despite its flaws. So, I went into the theatre expecting to love the movie. Yet, I left slightly bored, moderately disappointed, and feeling rather hollow. 

The first thing that felt off to me was the soundtrack, which was at the same time doing too much and too little. Some might praise the ominous score for perfectly representing a world that is being primed for war but I think the one-note score works to the detriment of the film. 

The music composed by the great Hans Zimmer feels rather forgettable in big moments as it kind of melts into the background and seems like it is trying really hard to hype up moments that should be quiet and delicate. 

Speaking of quiet, 'Dune: Part Two' feels like it desperately wants to be epic all the time. It takes away from the quiet moments and leaves the characters feeling not very fleshed out and their relationships very superficial. This is not helped by the fact that whenever the dialogue deviates from the source material, it is rather corny and trite. 

A great adaptation usually fills the gaps in its source material and elevates it. Meanwhile, 'Dune: Part Two' makes some befalling creative decisions, leaving out important story beats and trying to half-heartedly put new ones in place while leaving in arguably the weakest part of the original book, its climax. 

The result is a 2-hour-46-minute-long movie, which feels too long at times and very rushed by the end. 

In the movie, the adult version of Paul's sister Alia Atreides is played by Anna Taylor Joy, who appears briefly in a very short scene that can only be described as an MCU style cameo designed to hype up the next movie. The very thing we are tired of, remember? 

The movie refuses to make the time jump necessary to make Paul's journey, from a total outsider who was told he would never be a Fremen to their supreme leader, convincing. 

According to the movie, less than nine months have passed since its beginning and its climax while in the book, the same events take place over a period of more than four years.

Adopting a book known for its rather rushed climax, the movie somehow succeeds in making it feel even more rushed, mainly due to the rapid and offscreen nature of the final battle. 

Paul's casual waltzing into the emperor's ship seems too easy. In a better movie, it would be a trap. However, Paul makes light work of the all-powerful Emperor and tyrant Baron; it was rather anticlimactic.

A failed critique of colonialism

I find it rather odd that a movie, supposedly critiquing colonialism and about the destruction of a heavily MENA-coded (Middle Eastern/North African) community over a highly prized natural resource, has nobody from that community anywhere in the main cast. Nor do they have a writer

from that community on their creative team.

In the movie, the Fremen witness their sanctuaries being raided and their children killed by a colonising power seeking to claim their land and resources. They wear headscarves and niqab lookalikes, long-flowing abaya-esque clothes, speaking Arabic. 

They pray in sun-drenched sands and wait for a saviour named Mahadi to deliver them unto paradise.

Does it ring a bell? Is there a real-world community like that who have faced the continuous bombing of their places of prayer and had their families wiped out like they never existed?

Does the movie have anything to say about these people and their very real plights? 

Nope. In fact, 'Dune: Part Two' goes out of its way to remove many of the Islamic influences from Herbert's original text. For example, Paul's war was not referred to as a "jihad" (understandably so), and the Arabic words used by the Fremen were replaced with a new fictional language. 

The cultural specificity that could have made the Fremen society more compelling has been largely removed from the film.

The story fails to truly grasp Islamic faith and culture, using them as mere set dressing and an excuse to dress up without seeking to comprehend their significance. Exoticising the customs of others and turning them into costumes is, in fact, a form of cultural colonialism.

What I found to be the biggest issue with the movie is the fact that Villeneuve doubles down on the appropriation and orientalism present in the books. That is why 'Dune' is not a successful critique of colonialism. 

Just as Paul and his mother embed themselves with the Fremen to their advantage, the movie co-opts the culture it has no interest in properly representing to make a quick buck, making it guilty of being the very thing it claims to condemn.