Denis Villeneuve's Dune

In that scene, the reaction of that particular Fremen points to them thinking the guy *was* dead.

I'm not trying to come across as pedantic, but I should also note that the death stills in the books aren't field apparatus as depicted in the films. Fremen wrap the bodies to trap moisture and take them back to the sietches where special machinery is employed. It would be very unlikely for a living person to be accidentally distilled.

Edited by Fighteer on Mar 15th 2024 at 10:49:31 AM

That's how the miniseries portrayed it too. And it was definitely not an accident, with the unlucky asshole kicking and screaming as he's placed in the still.

Edited by M84 on Mar 15th 2024 at 10:51:55 PM

Considering what the Harkonnens did to the Fremen, I imagine it's a Pay Evil unto Evil thing.

Not once is 'jihad' said.

On one hand, I understand.

On the other hand, that final line loses some of its gravitas.

A thought that has just occurred to me:

Has anyone in the Dune universe ever tried to create a synthetic version of spice?

Yes, a group named Bene Tleilax managed to do it 1500 years after Leto II's death.

Edited by jawal on Mar 17th 2024 at 9:21:30 AM

with sandworms they stole from Dune

Now that I think of it… shouldn’t Paul’s second son be named Leto III? >.>

Why? Paul's father doesn't count here; the number 2 is in order for people to specify which one of Paul's children named Leto. They are talking about.

The late Duke won't get confused with Paul's children.

Edited by jawal on Mar 17th 2024 at 10:14:13 AM

According to the wiki they are referred to as Leto II the elder and Leto II, or sometimes Leto II and Leto III implying it is the distinguish them from the Duke.

I just saw a clip of Rebecca Ferguson talking about the process of Dune 2 and how she wasn't in love with being pregnant, heavily tattooed, swaddled in heavy cloth, and with a veil over face. She eventually pushed back against Villeneuve a bit to have her face less covered by a veil, saying "it could be anyone under here."

Which i found funny because a lot of the time when such things are brought up its the studio/execs want actor's faces to be shown, but honestly if I was a movie star, I'd probably want my face on camera too.

Edited by ArthurEld on Mar 18th 2024 at 7:01:12 AM

Ben Affleck said the same thing about being Batman, Bruce Wayne he had some input over but Batman is all about the costume, stunts, car, gadgets and sound design that's out of his control.

Truth is studios love having the actors face on display but push back against actual acting, they want a basic Shot/Reverse Shot because it's cheaper to film. If they can get away with a stand-in with their face covered done as a pickup they will.

Oh yeah, I saw that clip too, I think. She brought it up as an ego thing, but yeah, her pushing back makes sense.

It's a whole thing that most lead actors get a "you need to show my face most of the time" contract and people like Karl Urban in Dredd and Pedro Pascal in the Mandalorian are exceptions who have to specifically agree to it. And Pedro Pascal still gets at least one scene a season with his face.

I'm trying to remember if the book makes any sort of big deal about Jessica's outfits — I genuinely don't recall any description of her wearing a veil, but I could be wrong. I'm not sure why the costume designers for the film would insist on it, nor the tattoos.

Off the top of my head, I don't recall anything about that, either. As for the tattoos, I feel like that was leaning into the "people with power stand out from the normies" visual trope and having the Fremen Reverend Mothers be tattooed with their language is a very effective way to both get that across and make them visually distinct from the normal Reverend Mothers.

Edited by Willbyr on Mar 19th 2024 at 8:20:45 AM

IMO, the books weren't super concerned about what people were wearing in general. It's part of the reason all three versions have pretty radically different looks. The stillsuits get a lot of description, but the Fremen robes are left kinda vague and the only other clear description is the Emperor wearing the Sarudakar uniform.

Which is why we have the body horror version, the silly hat version and the grand operatic version. None of these really contradict the book that clearly, beyond the Lynch version dropping the Fremen robes.

I started rewatching the miniseries actually and, I have to be honest, as ridiculous as the hats can be, they're surprisingly effective. Once you pick up on the pattern, there's a bunch of group shots where it's like "okay, that lady has fins on her hat, she's Bene Gesserit, that guy has a cone in his hat, he's part of the Spacing Guild". The biggest dud is Irulan's outfit when she first arrives on Arrakis (in the Miniseries, it's before even the coup) and it's just got a lot of butterflies pinned randomly all over it. The idea works, but the execution falls flat.

Edited by Zendervai on Mar 19th 2024 at 9:57:19 AM

I personally think that the Villeneuve version helped to drive in the more "futuristic" aspects with the Harkonnen, Atreides, and Sardaukar uniforms, even though the Sardaukar had an actual uniform that was described in the book.

I definitely saw a distinctive approach to The Aesthetics of Technology. Atreides and Harkonnen technology is ultra slick to the point it belies how advanced it is, the personal shields are powered by what looks like jewelry. Fremen tech is much more Used Future in comparison, but the stilsuits and other water conservation tech is also deceptively advanced. Probably the most "functional" looking devices are the specific laser guns.

I would figure that after Dune Messiah they'd look at what else they could adapt specifically from what Frank Herbert wrote and see what else they could do. They'd probably be careful not to try adapting anything too weird that he wrote. That would be what I suspect would be their choice of navigating the rest of his works.

We already know that an adaptation of Children of Dune can be done at least.

There's also the weird triangle thing◊ that Feyd wears in most of his scenes.

For me the bigger disappointment was Leto II's sandtrout skin. It only really covers his arm, though by the end it does cover more of his body. In the book it already covers his whole body except for his face, not unlike a Fremen stillsuit.

I think they really wanted as much shirtless McAvoy as they could manage.

Edited by GrandmasterKiramidHead on Mar 19th 2024 at 12:14:07 PM

That and it saves money on the costume and makeup budget. And a full body costume would have caused physical hardship for the actor too.