Back in March and April 2020, I'd awaken in the morning and just lie there, considering the way the COVID-19 pandemic was impacting everything in the world. Being who I am, I also considered whether or not movie theaters would ever reopen and if they did, would there be wonderful films still playing in those cinematic cathedrals? Was everything just going to get sent to the Netflix algorithm black hole? Would filmmakers have any more inclinations to make big grand swings in the realm of filmmaking? Such queries left me overwhelmed under the covers in those unpredictable months. Cut to 2024 and I got to watch Dune: Part Two on a massive IMAX screen. While certainly nowhere near the best new release movie I've seen since the pandemic shut down theaters (that honor goes to Drive My Car), Dune: Part Two is one of the most reassuring post-March 2020 theatrical titles I've witnessed on the big screen.
Visual imaginations that can only be properly rendered on a gigantic silver screen are not dead. Fresh unforgettable images and performances that belong to a new generation are being realized. The cinematic cycle is continuing on, thank goodness. Even as someone who had gripes with the original Dune movie, writer/director Denis Villeneuve has done applaud-worthy work on Dune: Part Two. With this follow-up, he's crafted an immersive blockbuster that would register as something special even if it didn't feel extra reassuring after movie theaters nearly vanished forever.
Dune: Part Two already gets a leg up on its predecessor by kicking off its runtime with immediately compelling material. The original Dune could get bogged down in too much set-up and exposition, whereas Dune: Chapter Two kicks things off with a tense sequence depicting Paul Atreides (Timothee Chalamet), Chani (Zendaya), Lady Jessica (Rebecca Ferguson), and other Fremen fighters trying to evade newly-arriving Harkonnen soldiers. The scope of Dune: Part Two as an overall movie is massive, but here in this opening sequence, Villeneuve ingratiates audiences back into the desert world of Arakis with a compelling claustrophobic suspense sequence. Our heroes are pinned down in the desert, desperate to evade being noticed by their enemies. They're not looking to destroy a planet at this moment, they just want to survive to see another day. Cinematographer Greig Fraser and editor Joe Walker opt to capture their plight in a restrained number of frames, which really lets the tension bubble and boil.
After this gangbuster opening, Dune: Part Two gets underway with a plot concerning Paul grappling with the widespread perception among many of the native Fremen people that he could be the prophesized Chosen One figure known as Lisan al-Gaib. His grappling with the idea of embracing this mythic status in Fremen society comes as several different parties begin to descend on Arakis to exploit it for their own means. The devious Baron Harkonnen (Stellan Skarsgard) sends his nephew Feyd-Rautha (Austin Butler) to Arakis to wipe out any possible rebellion on the planet while Emperor Shaddam IV (Christopher Walken) is keeping a close eye on this planet and its developments. Paul now has so many eyes on him. Under all that pressure, he could become a hero for the ages...or possibly something much more human...
We get a lot of big-budget movies these days thanks to studios shifting their focus almost exclusively towards tentpoles and streamers spending every penny they have to make "real" movies. Unfortuantely, this has just resulted in a glut of costly movies like The Gray Man or Argylle that leave you wondering where all the cash went. These films aim for overwhelming ecapism, but merely just remind viewers of cheap filmmaking. Denis Villeneuve and company, by contrast, have crafted with Dune: Part Two something that earns its grand scope. It harkens back to mid-20th century epics or Lord of the Rings with its transportive qualities rather than The Tomorrow War or any other modern-day tentpole schlock.
The realms on-screen are translated from Frank Herbert's text with such lived-in detail and, best of all, a welcome sense of showmanship. Villeneuve loves darker realism in his works, but he's also happy to indulge in the most preposterous elements of the Dune universe and especially the most outlandish visual possibilities of this domain. The evil Harkonnen planet alone is a wondrous sight, a gloriously monochromatic realm that asks "what if Fritz Lang had made Star Wars?" Grand touches in this space like fireworks that just shoot off what look like dark ink blots into the sky are such terrific stylized flourishes. You won't see those kinds of images in just any film and they speak to the culture of death and misery these beings have immersed themselves in.
Dune: Part Two's maximalist sensibilities extend to deeply committed performances by an outstandingly stacked ensemble cast (Javier Bardem and his comic hops are the MVP of the entire film) as well as Hans Zimmer's incredibly pronounced score. I just wanted Zimmer's orchestral compositions to wash over me, they're so entertainingly brash and brimming with personality. There's so much passion emanating off these tracks. Combining them with the striking images on-screen makes Dune: Chapter Two a welcome example of blockbuster cinema that tantilizes the eyes as well as the ears. It also makes a great case for more modern blockbuster scores that aren't afraid to take risks and make themselves noticed. No more of those Lorne Balfe or Benjamin Wallfisch scores that just fade into the backgrounds of the movies they inhabit! More scores infused with Zimmer's Dune: Part Two gusto!
Even with all these positive attributes, there are nitpicks and qualms I have with Dune: Part Two in some respects, including some aspects of its racial politics and certain supporting characters that could've used an extra scene or two to get further fleshed out. But, as director Joel Schumacher once said, "no one pays to see under the top," and Dune: Part Two certainly is a reminder of that. This feature delivers where it coutns in conjuring up all the wondrous oversized imagery and breathtaking scope you could want from this kind of movie. I once feared movies like this would never get made or released again theatrically in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Boy was I glad I was wrong.
No comments:
Post a Comment