| David Lynch's Dune: What Went Right?
By Robert Peterson
posted: 11:52 am ET
05 December 2000
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Was David Lynch's freaky,
bizarre and nearly incomprehensible 1984 film Dune really all that
bad?
Sure, it was a disaster at
the box office. And many Dune faithful have dismissed
the film as an embarrassment, as a bloated and overly abstract piece
of dreck that bears little or no relation to Herbert's novel.
But let's look at what is
so freakin' good about this film. Let's try to figure out why it's still
a late-night favorite, why geeks quote it all the time -- and why, incidentally,
Frank Herbert himself liked it so much.
The future on other planets
All but the film's biggest
detractors concede that production designer Anthony Masters (2001)
and costume designer Bob Ringwood (Batman, Excalibur, A.I.) fully
realized a world alien enough to be 8,000 years in the future and familiar
enough to be 8,000 years in our future -- a world that has advanced
to an astonishing level of technology without computers.
And they did it with a minimum
of description from the book. Herbert's world is rich and detailed, yes,
but he devotes his attention to personalities, politics and ecology, not
actual appearances.
The novel indicates that
Castle Caladan is a "pile of stone" -- no more, no less -- and that the
Atreides wear a red hawk emblem on the chest of their black uniforms. It's
not much to work with, but Lynch's designers took the hawk and decided
to put everyone in black and beige military uniforms, complete with epaulets
and ribbons.
Since Paul wears full regalia
even when he's relaxing, this attention to uniform clothing sets a tone
of pomp and 19th-Century romantic opera -- and, tellingly, the military,
quasi-feudal military outfits worn by Third World dictators. Ringwood and
Masters hit us with imagery that recalls tinplated strongmen and banana
republics -- just like Herbert's multipolar world, where great houses feud
over territory and natural resources.
Lynch and his designers also
took care to let the natural resources of the main planets influence the
artistic evolution of clothing, sets and props, especially on Caladan and
Giedi Prime.
According to the director,
they thought of Caladan as the "wood" planet and Giedi Prime as the "oil"
planet. This puts the Atreides in a natural, warm environment and the Harkonnens
in a nasty, smelly one. We relax as we follow Paul through the vaulted
hallways of intricately carved wood, and gag as we watch the Harkonnens
eat bugs while they bask in dank glowglobe light surrounded by snot-green
walls, the stench of burning oil no doubt choking the air. The contrast
naturally tilts our sympathy toward the Atreides.
Forgotten technologies
But the designers' greatest
triumph came in realizing the future of the Butlerian Jyhad, where computers
-- and all machines that "imitate a human mind" -- have been banned.
What a civilization that
has interstellar travel and high-speed communication, but no computers,
look like?
Masters gave Lynch's film
a look somewhere between Star Trek and 1890s London. The glowglobes
float and hum through the air, adorned with wrought-iron wings. The "fighter"
training module (mostly lifted from the second book, Dune Messiah
) whips, slashes and shoots like a HAL 9000-powered death machine, but
steady-state components make it resemble a quaint brass-plated Rube Goldberg
you might find in H.G. Well's study.
The Spacing Guild most effectively
shows this deft oxymoron, mixing equal parts Blade Runner, Star
Trek's Borg and The Great Train Robbery.
The Guild navigator travels
-- or lives in -- a black wrought-iron holding tank that we might mistake
for an old-fashioned train car, an ironic bit of reverse engineering for
these new-era transportation monopolists. Despite its presumably advanced
functionality, the tank seeps oil on the marble floors, forcing an underling
to sweep up behind with a broom.
Another underling speaks
into a classic wire microphone that looks like something William Jennings
Bryan might have used, but it's hooked into a contraption sophisticated
enough to translate the Rosetta Stone into Klingon.
The cast
In case you're still reading
to find out why Herbert liked Lynch's film so much, ask yourself: can you
blame him for being somewhat flattered by the marquee names involved?
Finally, someone was spending
the mind-blowing bucks to realize his vision, complete with a slew of prodigal
designers, a hotshot young director fresh off an Academy Award nomination
and a distinguished cast.
And what a cast. Some of
the choices didn't work, but not even Sting could mess up a line as delicious
as "Will your woman deserve my special attentions?"
OK, let's start with the
lead: Paul. The biggest strike against Kyle MacLachlan was his age
(too old), but to really do Dune right you'd need to cast two people
as Paul, one about 15, the other 25.
However, MacLachlan keeps
his voice high in the opening sequence and progressively lowers it over
the course of the story to reflect his accelerated aging, and his classical
training -- he was acting in the Oregon Shakespeare Festival before Lynch
found him -- helped him fill Paul's enormity. It can't be easy to play
a character who's a cross between Jesus and Mohammed (to the Fremen) and
Machiavelli (to everyone else).
Grossness aside, Kenneth
MacMillan barks and shouts his way through a decadent performance as the
Baron. It's over the top, sure, but who wants an understated Harkonnen?
The same person who wants an understated Khan in Star Trek II?
Probably his best moment
comes when he ogles a sweat-slick Feyd-Rautha and whispers, "Lovely Feyd,"
then bellows, "Where's my doctor?!" The Harkonnen
obsession with exotic sexuality -- incest and probably pedophilia,
considering how "young" the slave boys (and Feyd) are described -- is straight
out of Herbert's book.
Although Sting's advanced
age pushes their sexuality away from pedophilia, MacMillan makes a strong
choice to be true to the Baron's demented lust for his nephew.
The list of strong casting
choices goes on. Despite a language barrier, Jurgen Prochnow, the Gibraltar-solid
U-boat captain from Das Boot, makes a fine Leto. Linda Hunt
is a no-brainer for the Shadout Mapes. Lynch stalwart Dean Stockwell
finds the tragedy in Dr. Yueh. Old pro Jose Ferrer blusters and
cowers just like Shaddam IV should, and the icy Sian Phillips is
a razor-edged knockout as Reverend Mother Mohiam. Even though Shakespeare
veteran Patrick Stewart hadn't yet figured out that boom mikes can pick
up sound from far away, he's still crysknife-tough as Gurney Halleck.
Less successful are Francesca
Annis, who delivers most of Jessica's lines with breathy over-significance,
and Sean Young, a perennial candidate for world's most boring actor, as
Chani.
The kingdom of God seen
from within
More than anything else (and
perhaps most controversial to fans), Lynch nailed the spirit of Dune
-- from the Fremen perspective. Certainly, Herbert wrote about political
wrangling, feudalism, ecology and economics, but he also wrote about the
actual coming of a messiah.
When the Fremen meet Paul
and Jessica and realize that this ancient prophesy is actually coming true,
the audience needs to imagine how impossibly mind-blowing that must be
for the people involved. That's what Lynch is very good at: turning
the world upside-down, blowing minds.
This film is similar in tone
to many of his other dreamy, puzzling, and abstract projects. Watch Eraserhead
and you'll see a creature who could navigate a Guild heighliner, not to
mention the origins of Paul's infamous "Arrakis --Dune -- desert planet"
voiceover dream sequences. Watch Blue Velvet and you'll see a villain
just like the Baron, drowning in addiction and twisted sexuality.
Most importantly, though,
when you watch Blue Velvet (or its TV cousin, Twin Peaks),
you'll see a story that descends into dementia, but eventually embraces
good over evil in a wholly un-ironic way.
This "heart-on-the-sleeve"
attitude toward goodness translates well to the Fremen's black-and-white
world. They're tough, but they serve God.
"God created Arrakis to train
the faithful," the Fremen say, and they believe in the prophesy of Muad-Dib
with utter, innocent conviction. Lynch's dreamy tone reflects that innocence.
It puts us in the Fremen's minds -- how they must have felt like they were
living a dream as they watched Muad'Dib lead them to power.
Slimy, yet politically
unsophisticated
But Lynch misses the irony
for the innocence, and it's the historical ironies that make Dune
a classic.
After all, the Bene Gesserit
manufactured the Muad'Dib prophecy to protect their sisterhood should they
be captured by Fremen, as Jessica is. The Fremen "legend" isn't an organic
result of centuries of myth creation -- much less direct divine inspiration
-- but someone in Bene Gesserit Research and Development probably typed
it up off the top of their head.
Lynch isn't interested in
this rather important historic wrinkle. In his movie, we only see a legend
come true, and that's where he fails to adapt the deepest complexity of
the original novel.
We should see a legend that
comes true in spite of everything the legend's creators do to prevent it
-- the monster the Bene Gesserit created came to get them. By missing this,
Lynch and his designers missed the underlying irony that makes Dune
so brilliant, even if they fully realized the look and feel of Herbert's
world and captured at least half of the book's tone and spirit.
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