“Dune”, blockbuster saved by its (relative) modesty | Slate.fr – Slate.fr

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We could put it this way: there was no reason why Hollywood could not take hold of the sci-fi universe created by the writer. Frank Herbert. And in this case, Denis Villeneuve’s film is arguably the best that can be expected.

Written in the mid-1960s, Dune is a magnificent novel, a visionary epic which, by recycling figures for the most part borrowed from the tales of chivalry, anticipated many of the great challenges of times to come – as before it Isaac asimov, at the same time as him Ursula le guin and right after him John Brunner.

That is to say, authors who have thought, in the form of stories moved in time and possibly space, of the organizations of complex societies, making it possible to highlight the social mechanisms at work and possible developments, with all the license of a great romantic imagination. Or another approach than these other great figures of science fiction that were Ray bradbury, Arthur C. Clark Where Philip K. Dick, much more concerned with psychology, even metaphysics.

A poster project for the adaptation dreamed by Alejandro Jodorowsky, and which never saw the light of day.

Carry Dune on the big screen is such an ambitious project that it has discouraged multiple attempts, and led to failure, in a different way, Jodorowsky’s ultra-ambitious enterprise, interrupted, and David Lynch’s disappointing attempt.

Overcome a fatal contradiction

These two precedents came up against the same contradiction, the gap between a very sophisticated narrative and visual inventiveness, and the presupposition of the only organizations capable of financing such a project, the big Hollywood studios, in favor of simplicity, of a readability and immediate appeal for a very large American and international audience.

Denis Villeneuve is the one who proved capable of solving this difficult equation, benefiting from a factor that already existed during previous attempts, but was far from being as significant as today, the possibility of declining in such a way. almost infinite, the “franchise” created by a first film if it obtains sufficient success.

Dune, which has meanwhile become the best-selling science fiction novel in the world, is indeed the first (and the best) volume in a “cycle” of six titles, which offers all the resources for sequels, prequels, spin-offs, serializations, and the whole lyre of marketing processes that have become the primary mode of operation of the industry.entertainment. Without forgetting the thirteen volumes devoted to“Universe of Dune” co-signed by the writer’s son, Brian Herbert, and Kevin Anderson.

Villeneuve still had to find the possibility of carrying out this first mission, which would then open the way to a proliferation of by-products of which nothing guarantees that he will carry them out. The answer lies in virtues rarely present in such environments, modesty and taste.

Or rather the beginning of the answer: it is not Dune which hits French theaters on September 15, but the first half – just as the book was at the time first published in two parts.

Against the supremacy of machines

Modesty? No misunderstanding: Dune is a massive big-show production full of insanely expensive special effects and wildly paying stars. If there is indeed modesty, it is within this apparatus.

Modesty consists, first of all, in getting in tune with the text, and never trying to “push the fire” to spectacular or sentimental elements. These exist, but will come in due time, and no more.

A fantastic far from overbidding and effects – Rebecca Ferguson as Dame Jessica, Paul’s mother. | Warner Bros.

This restraint concerns in particular the use of visual effects: the film obviously uses a large amount of digital special effects, but refrains from overloading the screen, confining them to the role of a tool, which moreover makes echo to one of the biases of the novel (an extraordinary bias for the time of its writing): the story takes place in an era where artificial intelligence has been banned.

This dimension of storytelling, which transfers or restores to humans powers that we also now delegate to machines, finds its visual translation in the relative sobriety of representations, sobriety in phase as well with the atmosphere of a story located on a planet. completely desert with one of its main themes, ecology.

Complex power relations

Judicious, this restraint on the visual level also makes it possible to respect one of the main characteristics of the novel, and one of the most fascinating, the complexity of the regimes of power, and the relations between these powers, which it stages.

With clarity but without simplicity, the film thus allows you to get to know the noble family of the Atreides, including the young Paul who will be the hero during a vast initiation story, the rival family of the Harkonnen, the Emperor who reigns by cunning and violence on the galaxy, the Fremen, natives of the planet Dune in struggle against the external powers which oppress them and exploit their much coveted raw material, the caste of powerful women Bene Gesserit to which Paul’s mother belongs, the Sardaukar legions, the Space Guild …

Liet Kynes (Sharon Duncan-Brewster), holder of considerable knowledge and powers linked to her ecological expertise. | Warner Bros.

Despite some improvements (Liet Kynes, an important secondary character, became a black woman) the film, like the book, does not escape the White Savior syndrome, this dramatic spring so widespread where a white character becomes indispensable to the liberation or to the improvement of the lot of non-whites – no salvation for the natives Fremen without the young Duke. The film does not escape, in its visual choices, a certain number of orientalist clichés.

There remains a narrative dynamic where the twists and turns succeed in fitting into a framework whose scale, largely left out of the picture without our presence being ignored, gives a singular force to the pursuits, fights and betrayals that constitute the obligatory passages of the action film that is also, but quite marginally, Dune.

Chani, played by the young actress and model Zendaya, in an essentially decorative job – at least in this first part. | Warner Bros.

If the casting is sometimes of a pretty which evokes a fashion show, in particular the alluring imagery reserved for the young actress Zendaya, more present in the trailer than in the film, there is in this one a treatment of the fantastic which reduces the spectacular effects of sleeve, in a completely welcome way.

Consistency and fluidity

We see monsters and other extravagant beings, starting with the giant worms that roam the planet and destroy everything in their path, but the most fantastic creatures or situations are filmed as ordinary, and help to give coherence to the place. together rather than trying to show off.

The fluidity of the story is also served by a large number of visual choices, which benefit from generally going unnoticed. Since take off from the Enterprise of Star Trek (almost contemporary with the writing of Dune) closely followed by the Discovery One of 2001 Space Odyssey and ten years later the vessels of Star wars, the fleet of sci-fi cinema aircraft is so populated with prototypes that a director now has a hard time bringing his own to life.

In this field as in that of vehicles, weapons, costumes and other futuristic equipment, the sober and graphically effective choices of Dune appear as happy responses, neither plagiarism nor flashy.

Duel in the shadows: Paul faces the ordeal imposed by Mother Superior Bene Gesserit (Charlotte Rampling). | Warner Bros.

We can salute the talent of those responsible for the sets, costumes and accessories, but it is the choice of the ensemble, its coherence and its discretion that testifies to an assertive taste, which is the responsibility of the director, and participates in the staging in the broadest sense.

But the choices also relate to the colors, willingly extinguished, and the lighting, most often dark, or uniform. This sense of measure, which saves in narrative intensity and finesse, already marked the achievement by Villeneuve of Following Blade runner.

Dame Jessica, Chani, Chef Fremen Stilgar (Javier Bardem) and Paul: Heroes in Gray on Beige Background / Warner Bros.

Above all, we find the spirit of what defined the best film to date by the Canadian filmmaker, First contact. It was there that he really began to demonstrate his ability to fit in with the demands of Hollywood heavy industry while bringing a personal touch to it.