Paramount buries Dune remake

hmm

I'd quite like to see an adaptation that wasn't as awful as the first film, but I think it's unlikely.

"cut the mammoth subject matter down to a compelling story that could be told at feature length".

...in other words - boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl back, and in between all that some people get shot. A beginning, a muddle and an end, like every feckin film that's come out of the USA in decades.

So many good SF books

So few people in Hollywood who can read....

'Episodes' should be required viewing for all producers.

Confused

I though Hollywood's business model was to do pop-star studded glitzy remakes of old movies that in their day made lots of money in spite of poor visuals

So their plan is to do a crap remake of a glitzy movie that made no money despite having glitzy production , lots of good actors and the pop star of the day

ps. I hear Peter Jackson is doing a remake of the 2005 King Kong, the new one is going to be in black and white and will use advanced CGI to make it look like it was shot on grainy 16mm film

Alejandro Jodorowsky is probably free

Shame Dali can't make it.

Greatest film never made, that. Lynch's effort - especially the 3-hour-long fanedit based on the original shooting script - was pretty good, but Dali, Jodorowsky, Gieger and Mobius all working on the same film, with a story by Frank Herbert?

Can't see the accountants in charge of modern movies going for it though. Sad face.

Great Novel

The parallels between oil and the Arabs is spooky.

I loved Dune (the book)

But I also thought it could have been edited better. I thought a few scenes towards the end were a bit rushed. However, it's real strength was not just the mostly great writing and the engaging universe that was created, but it was also an unsettling look into the exercise of power and influence. Paul Muad'dib, House Atreides and the Fremen were in no way whiter than white: they just weren't as evil as the Harkonnens.

Anyway, I think it's for the best that the film is being shelved for a while. The mini-series wasn't that long ago and if the memory of Lynch's awfulness can fade a bit, that's all the better. I also wouldn't mind a Fellowship of the Ring/Jurassic Park-style adaptation where some scenes and characters can be cut or consolidated to fit into a 2-hour film. Or I think it could be made into a double-feature. Part 1 ending with Harkonnens taking back Arrakis and Part 2 covering the rest. Arguably the book should have had that structure, too.

Finally, I don't care about Sting, but Patrick Stewart would have to be in any remake.

Dune

>The planned Paramount Pictures movie adaptation of Frank Herbert's Dune has been cancelled.

Thank christ for that. They bolloxed it up badly enough the first time. It's a massive, intricate, saga that you don't come to understand until quite a long way in. It's a book, not a film, leave it alone!

@Oliver7

I saw it for the first time a few months back. Until Paul Atreides gets to the Fremen, it is *perfect*. Thereafter everything goes to hell in a handcart in pretty short order, as vast swathes of plot and character are cut to fit far too little screen time. Also wish they'd left out the "weirding module" guns, which were completely unnecessary.

An amazing thing is that most of the special effects still work. The only way you'd tell this wasn't filmed in the last couple of years was the back-projection scenes on the worms. The shield effect in particular was an incredibly original image for me in 2010 - in 1984 it must have been "WOAH!! WTF did we just see?!?!"

Well I liked it

Apart from the trauma of Sting in purple posing pouch I thought it did a good job.

The visuals were stunning, the performances mostly very good and it did an impressive job of keeping to a fairly complex story. It's been a while since I last read it but I think he film was a lot closer to the book than PJ's LotR for example.

Cut-down...

"cut the mammoth subject matter down to a compelling story that could be told at feature length".

Pocahontis, in a desert, then.

To be fair, as much as I loved the book, it is a bit bloody long.

Lynch's effort had its moments

Though it was far too positive and cuddly in its outlook, lacking the grim foreboding. I'll also agree that the Wyrding modules made sense at the time since it would have been difficult to represent the ultra-precise fighting style, the only way to do it with modern technology would be having everyone not using it in slow motion or having the users in fast forward in my opinion. The narrated epilogue was also quite nauseating. Paul spreading love? Oh puhlease.

Sting made a decent Fade, being plenty vicious enough. Unfortunately the Baron lacked the low cunning of the books, coming across as an idiot unlikely to be much of a threat to any real power unless they were required by Imperial edict to clean his drains or something. He was a completely farcical character. Even Duke Leto's ambition was poorly reflected, him being too family oriented.

That said the still suits were very sexy, and there was always something unbelievably hot about the Fremen women. Thank goodness Westwood used Lynch's model for their Fremen in their Dune games. As a teenager in the 90's those Fremen women had a huge impact on me with their black hair and piercing blue eyes.

Bah!

Lynch should be lauded for Dune, mostly, but then shot twice. Once for the stupid replacement of Alia's voice with an obvious adult woman's and again for the rain at the end.

Then the body should be chopped up and the bits jumped on for THOSE F*CKING EYEBROWS!

Robin hood in the desert

The book is great, but why bother even trying to film it? A simplified plot would leave out all the "perils of being a messiah" stuff and the hydrolic despotism etc and just focus on the betrayal by the emperor and harkonen and Paul the leading of a bunch of "outlaws" to revenge. Its an old formula, more suited to a single film than the complexities of the novel. Still leaves lots of room for special effects and fight scenes.

Or just make an all NEW SciFi film out of a decent book.

Ok, we got a reasonable film of Dune already. It's about time we had some all time classics dramatised. How about Ringworld (Larry Niven, 1970, up yours Halo), The Mote In God's Eye, Consider Phlebas, Use of Weapons, Ender's Game etc etc. All better than Dune IMO (Don't downvote me! It's all subjective right?). Personally I loved David Lynch when he was making his own stuff, but that's just my own opinion. Ringworld is as rip-snorting and out there as Star Wars, would make an incredible movie. Nice they thought of the intelligent Sci-fi reader with Dune though, they normally just pander to kids with console spinoffs.......

Not sure how a hardcore Herbert fan would feel about Lynch's original movie though, I'm still smarting about the abysmal Judge Dredd f*ckup, I would not mind seeing that put right with a decent film, soooo........