Movie review: ᑐᑌᑎᑕ
2021-Nov-10, Wednesday 08:41![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)


A couple weeks ago I got a Facebook invite from
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To start with the heavy stuff, when we left
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I loved the set design. Everything was enormous, as befits an interstellar feudal aristocracy with the wealth of multiple worlds to draw on. The palace at Arrakeen was a gigantic brutalist pile, with huge mostly-empty rooms to essentially create an artificial cave and keep things cool. I found this article about the set design, about the medieval castle look of Caladan and the bunkers of Arrakis. It was not lost on me that on Caladan it was literally always either cloudy or raining, and the symbolism of the giant starship rising out of the ocean while Paul watched was also very evident.
The ornithopters were beautiful--buzzing dragonflies over the desert sands. Especially when they'd pull in their wings for a dive. And the sandworms! Mostly hidden except for that one scene that was already used in promotional photos, just an ominous depression in the sand getting nearer and nearer.
I was a bit less happy about the characters and the biggest disappointment was Jessica. It was very notable to me that in a movie where most people don't show a lot of happiness or sadness, Jessica cries frequently, and it especially stands out because even though Paul's duel against Jamis happens during the run-time, the funeral where Paul cries does not. Everyone else is kind of determined or satisfied or mysterious and so on, which does match the tone of the book (though I don't think Paul was quite whiney enough), but Jessica does not. And it stands out more because she's the only female character with significant screen time other than Liet-Kynes (who is a woman in this version). The best character was definitely Duncan Idaho--Jason Momoa kind of plays the same character in every movie but it turns out that character is actually Duncan Idaho so he finally found his niche. I've seen multiple people say that for non-book-readers, he singlehandedly redeemed a character named "Duncan Idaho," which is important because Duncan Idaho is the real main character of the Dune novels.

Unlike the 1984 Dune, ᑐᑌᑎᑕ doesn't have a lot of exposition other than Paul watching a couple holovids about Arrakis at the very beginning. As a book enjoyer I was easily able to follow the plot, but I was a bit worried about
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The best part of the soundtrack is House MacTreides. Fight me.
I'm very excited for ᑐᑌᑎᑕ II, especially if I can see it on the big screen. Watching the family atomics breach the shield wall and the Fremen riding in on a sandworm army, or the confrontation with Shaddam IV...it'll be amazing. It'll be a visual and aural spectacle, regardless of what else it is.
I definitely recommend ᑐᑌᑎᑕ, especially for book-enjoyers, but
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