Slashdot Mirror
On The Dune Miniseries
the_tsi writes: "Looks like Dune was pretty succesful last night. The SciFi Channel has already announced that Dune Messiah and Children of Dune will be produced. The sequels will be also written/directed by John Harrison." As well, what did everyone think of last night? I was impressed -- compared to the movie, quite a step in the right direction -- although the part with Paul acting more like a Young Luke Skywalker was irritating.
Yes, MacLachlan was the first to play Paul. But if that's the argument, why watch any other Hamlet than Olivier ???
That is NOT what the navigators look like!
Some quick info on me:
n e/ index.html), you hear over and over how true they are trying to be to the books. I challenge that statement. In screenplay, some changes will need to be made to keep the viewer "in the loop", but in 6 hours far less adaptation should be needed than Lynch required.
::SIGH::
I have the six *real* Dune books in first edition hardcover, soft cover, Spanish, and French. I have read them each book no less than 6 times. I own and have read the Dune Encyclopedia a couple times (though don't consider it Cannon). I own the two prequels. I've read HA twice and HH once. While they were...interesting to read, they had their problems, and I don't consider them Cannon either, I feel Kevin Anderson's stink negates Brian Herbert's birthright. I consider myself a fan of the Dune universe, but I am far from an expert.
I have been excited about the Miniseries for months. While I have seen the Lynch movie a dozen or so times, I despise it. There are some that praise it, some that take it for what it is, and some that even think it was true to the book. I think that it is none of the above. My friends have been asking me for weeks what I'm going to do if it rains at the end of the Sci Fi Miniseries.
(I don't think that the people at Sci Fi want to find that out).
If you read the CNN article
(http://www.cnn.com/2000/CAREER/trends/11/30/du
The look of the series is interesting, but I have some problems with it. As I make statements here, please feel free to correct me if I make a mistake (Except spelling: give me a break I'm at work and pissed off as I write this). The Atreides uniforms are supposed to be black with red hawk crests on them. Herbert describes these over and over again. Why are they a sort of khaki? You could claim, like the US Military, there is more than one uniform, but wouldn't Paul be wearing the "dress" Atreides uniform when he went to meet Moiham? That doesn't look black folks.
And as some have posted, Alec Newman is a brat. I know he knew nothing of Dune before filming, but how could John Harrison have missed this? Paul was a boy trying to find himself, not a spoiled rich brat trying to get his way. The scene in the
beginning, with Newman in his room in the palace was a nice look. Very Renaissance, with rose petals in the finger bowls.
On to the meeting with Moiham. WTF was that? Every time Herbert writes about the BG they walk into a room in their long, flowing, BLACK abba robes. If Harrison wanted to whore them up with those big hats, more power to him, but the robes are supposed to be black. There was nothing I liked about this Moiham, which will work well at the end when I hate her so much I want her dead.
The Gom Jabbar scene was fine, except if I didn't know better I'd think that those were fish tanks and not the oceans of Caladan on the wall. One thing I'll give Lynch, he beat the water thing into us.
So we take a trip to Kaitain, where we meet Shaddam and Irulan. I would like to point out there are now two movie adaptations of Dune, and I don't like either Shaddam in the least. Could someone please read the book and capture this
character? Talk about missing the mark. Meanwhile, Irulan is doing Ballet or Prana-Bindu or something, but this scene doesn't do much for me.
And the blasted Harkonnens. This is a Baron Harkonnen I could get to love. He's fat, bipolar, scheming, and a raving homosexual. Perfect. Feyd and Rabban are also pretty well captured. This Feyd is much more believable than Sting was in
the part. The look of Geidi-Prime is magnificent...better than Lynch's. Piter though, all wrong. The Lynch movie had Piter down to a T, but this Piter sucks, and then he's dead. A shame.
The Guild Highliner - beautiful. Much better than Lynch's. CGI really does it for me here. Thufir scolds snotty Alec to not endanger the Atreides shipping privileges. The Navigator though, I'm not sure about yet. There has to be a happy medium
between an Orange Vagina and a Monarch Butterfly. Herbert describes them as being once human, with flippers where limbs once were, and this one has wings. As for the act of folding space, same scene, 16 years and more money later. Again, the
CGI did it for me here.
So we're on Caladan. I have to say, I love the look Harrison has come up with for the palace that was once Count Fenrig's. The fountain for guests to wash their hands, the grandiose appearance, I really liked the look and feel of it. Can we discuss the garden for a minute? Jessica is supposed to discover the garden, and the message from the Lady Fenrig, another BG. Don't let the garden just be there, and don't bring it up without the message. Do it right or don't do it. Also, I will give Harrison credit for making Arakkis feel livable in the cities, something Lynch failed at. People live here, work here, trade here, and Harrison got that.
So who was the wench in Paul's room when the Hunter Seeker attacked? Hi - not true to the book. Even Lynch got that right. And I can't make up my mind if I like this Stilgar. Correct me if I'm wrong, but when Stilgar spits in the book, didn't Duncan explain the custom, not Paul (like in the Lynch movie)? Why is the brat talking? SHUT UP! You know, Paul bothers me because I hate Kyle MacLachlan, so Alec has an advantage. The part is all wrong, but it's obvious that Alec is a good actor.
On to the infamous banquet. Again, Harrison has the look, and all is going well until Irulan walks in. (SO MAD RIGHT NOW...) Why is Irulan here? I challenge this miniseries to make a bigger mistake than this (oh, and not getting the character of Paul right). Paul and her don't meet before he takes her as his war bride at the end of Dune. They have nothing in common, and she ends up plotting his death in Messiah, which Harrison is already working on a screenplay for. Someone may have actually found a way to create a pithy ending without rain. I like the conversation with Gurney and Paul, makes the characters a little more real. And then the house guards get is a pissing contest with the Sauddakar before leaving. Dumb. Boo, hiss.
Now, Yuegh is a minor character, so Lynch made an effort to make him noticed, what with him being Judas and all. Funny thing, as many times as I've read and watched Dune, and I knew what was going on, I was like "Where's Yuegh" because I didn't know who was playing him. I think we saw him once for two seconds in the holo lesson. He needed a little more air time...something. The Sauddakar don't look like Chlorine breathing trash bags (yeah!!!) but the fight was missing something.
Oh well, I guess it was ok.
And Duncan didn't die in the Palace. THANK YOU! They got the sequence of events right. I hope they obligated this guy to play Duncan in all 6 miniseries =)
So, at the end of 2 hours, I guess I can give this a C+. It's a good try, and they're trying to stay true to Herbert, but where they took artistic license they messed up big. I'm trying to keep an open mind. We'll see how the rest goes.
"All I ever wanted was to see Larry Wall give Bill Gates a Perl necklace."
http://www.eisenschmidt.org/jweisen
two things really, really bothered me about this movie. Now, I have read the book a good few times. (I am only 16, but i have read it almost annually since I first read it when i was 10-- and could not understand all of it)
Maybe I did not get the book, but it seems to me that everyone in this whole movie was mis cased.
Paul: Spoiled? No. He was just a kid who did not yet understand "it" all, but was no halfwit. This Paul had some shining moments. The only time he really seemed in character was when the worm ate the miner and he was looking in awe. Other than that, nothing.
Jessica: IMO, she was the worst cast. No power whatsoever. She is like the dumb concubine who doesn't know anything when in fact she knew more than anyone. I think part of this was that she never talked (like in the book) to the truthsayer in any intellible manor.
Leto: Actually, I thought he had the most good moments. True he had a lot of bad times ("He almost killed my son!"). But then again, he had some times when he was a true leader. Unfortunatly he was very much like a half-wit himself. In the book, he has charisma, in this series... little, if any.
Yueh: Am I the only one who saw this guy as asian? Oh yeah, and what does "the tooth" mean to the non book reader? Nothing. No explaination. Not to mention that there was never the scene where Paul and him bond on their way to Dune. There wasn't even the scene where Paul got the orange bible!
Duncan: At least they got one person who looked like a true warrior. Everyone is chubby old men in this series! He really didn't play the part either, no real deepness in him.
Mentat: This is the absolute worse. The Mentat can take on ANYONE. At least he is supposed to. Not this actor. This Mentat couldn't fight a pig. He wasn't even wise.
I am not even going to get into the non atredies cast. harkonnen was the worst cast, Liet was probably the best, and the emporer (and his palace!) and his daughter were horrible. (Especially his daughter... she wasn't even supposed to be there!!!)
The other big problem was the cutting of the scenes. The book was amazing. It was amazing for a reason. Stick to the book! Nothing at all before they left, nothing on the trip to Dune, nothing about the Bene Gesseriet, nothing about the Mentat. Nothing about the Old Duke's death. Nothing. Why wasn't there any background?
On Dune, there was no girl trying to get Paul to sleep with her (at the party). No poison seekers. No explaination of the terrain. (Why they were in that city and why worms could not go there)
Even now, after 2 hours of this, it seems that there was much less dialogue, and very little content. The duke just died and I still don't konw why. (If i had not read the book.)
Don't get me wrong, there were some good parts, but I have got to say, I would like slashdot to get the screenwrite and director for one of those question sessions. In that way maybe he can make another movie or miniseries instead of those other shows that were announced. Get this one right so I will have something to show MY kids in fifteen years.
What comes first, finding a teacher or becoming a student?
I seemed to me that Duncan died as Paul and Jessica took off from the Fremen camp. They flew off and Duncan was there looking like a rabbit in the headlights as a missle flew right up his tailpipe, BOOM! Ya got Duncan Idaho mashed potatoes. It went by pretty quickly though, easy to miss
rev
Did they have to cut every single scene that did any sort of character development to little pieces? I got so annoyed after that farce of a dinner party I turned it off. Princess Irulan? What the hell!?! I actually started to like the movie after sitting through an hour and a half of that crap. And the Gurney/Paul fight scene. Could that have been butchered any more then it was.
The writers probably sat down and said, "Hmmmm, too much character developement happens hear, as well as some really good dialog. Let's cut it down to 10 secs of crap, so we can have Paul call House Harkonnen pigs later on."
Losers!
kashani
- Why is the ninja... so deadly?
Agreed, though, how many times are we going to see a harvester? I, however, had envisioned "blue-on-blue" spice eyes as simply being the both normal whites (sclera) and iris of the eyes as blue. Not glow-in-the-dark-blacklight-psychedelic-poster type blue. {shrug} maybe that just didn't translate to the small screen very well.
Right : on SKY digital we have the SCIFI channel, is it the same as the one in the States? If so, does anyone know if this miniseries is coming onto SKY? thanks wa
Okl I remember now...
;) )
However, I seem to remember the Atreidies having a mentat around? (other than the one in training that is
I thought that he was a mentat before becoming a Ghola and was trained as a Zensunni by the Bene Tleilax.
Who was the Atreides Mentat then?
-Steve
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
It seemed that way to me too,
that the actors were more stage than screen.
But in a way, I think this is appropriate.
This is, after all, and _adaptation_ of the book,
they had to make choices.
David Lynch's adaptation focused more on
the internal thoughts of the character,
and the mystical ascpects of the story. Hence one frequent
complaint about the movie, that the voice overs
were in the way ( I don't agree, I think they
were perfect).
This one, though, seems more like a stage play,
filmed for TV. As I though, and as many
others have commented, it was very
Shakespearian (sp?) in it's nature:
The asides, such as the Baron's after Hewey's death.
For a stage play, then, they need stage actors.
In a way, it explains the absense of the voice-overs, for they aren't appropriate to the
medium of a play. Asides, and longer
monologue conversations are.
Hence, new dialgoue was created,
to supplant the lost internal thoughts.
As a movie, I'm not sure if I liked this one.
It seems dry, distant, removed from the action.
Very little of the mysticism of the book and Lynch's version comes through. The scene with
the gom-jabbar was especially flat.
On the other hand, I find that if I actually
try to think of this as a play,
and not as a simply movie, many of the
choices make sense.
If you were watching this in a theatre,
that scene would have played out wonderfully.
All in all, I think this was a descision that
they made by choice: look at the couplets
at the end of each scene, the asides,
the monologues, and the "Dune" image appearing
at the beginning... the style that was done in
reminded me in a way of the curtain
coming back up for the next act.
It is my hope that it will pick up,
now that they are done with the major
exposition part.
Did I have a point?
Nah.
-Slackergod,
failing to worship even myself since 1980.
While I am not an expert on Dune by any means, I enjoyed the movie. Though I do agree with some things you are saying. But I think the movie was done quite well for the following reason, my girlfriend loved it. I forced her (she has never read the books) to watch the Lynch movie and she hated it, she had to ask me what was happening every 5 seconds, thought the voiceovers were completely lame, and found the whole movie not very entertaining.
After watching the first installment of the miniseries she was thrilled, she can't wait to see the next two parts.
Maybe it doesn't do the book justice, but what can you expect? Dune doesn't translate into a screenplay easily. I enjoyed both the orginal Lynch movie and this mini-series as someone's attempt to show something the is easier left to the imagination and I don't think most people could have done much better.
---
Remove the -x- from my email address to send.
I really liked the first installment and thing so far they have been very true to the story (and even to David Lynch's movie which I love) But I'm a little disappointed by some of the character representations. I have no complaints with any of the actors (I prefer Jürgen Prochnow as Leto but William Hurt is doing a very fine job), but my big complaint is with the Baron. Baron Harkonnen Vladimir is supposed to be a grossly fat and disusting man. "... grossly and immensely fat. And with subtle bulges beneath folds of his dark robes to reveal that all this fat was sustained partly by portable suspensors harnessed to his flesh. ... but his feet would carry no more than fify of them [standard kilos]." I thought David Lynch did an awesome job with the Baron in the 1984 film version of dune. He was discusting and coupled with his character a great villian. I thought the scfi version was watered down and not an adequate representation. This Baron doesn't seem as evil and cunning as the book or the other film.
I was also a little disappointed that they cut the scene out where Jessica and Paul have been captured and are being carried to the desert and Paul uses the weirding way to free him and Jessica.
So far though I've been very impressed. They are doing a wonderful job with the story and most of the visuals are awesome. The sand worm was extremely impressive, I can't wait for the final battle when they ride the big ones in. But some of the desert scenes have had a real bad look to them. There was one scene that looked like Paul and Jessica were inside a building when they were in the desert.
But I'll keep watching and probably get it on DVD when/if it comes out.
Stick
What do you despise? By this are you truly known.
Actually, it is Harkahnnen. There is an audio recording of Frank Herbert reading from the books. You can inform your roommate that he is a git.
> Duncan got hit by a rocket. He's dead. You're thinking of Gurnie Halleck (Jon Leuc in the first movie heh), and he does live. In the book Duncan goes down underground with sword in-hand.. much cooler, but still.. fun to see the look on his face. As for the Suk school, you're right.. it's sposed to be nearly impossible and a huge thing.. if only they bothered to narate to the audience what the hell the suk school was! -GiH
If you are kidding, you are a bastard.
If you are serious, I cannot wait.
What the hell? They just might nail it.
~~ What's stopping you?
Dune is "too complicated" for commerical television, but you want to bring it into the far more abstract medium of anime?!?
Television is the only medium that is dynamic enough, persistent enough and intimate enough to even take a shot at Dune. You're right about a miniseries not being adequate though: It needs to be done Straczynski style, with each book becoming a season. Only the calculus of one episode pounding into you after another can capture the sheer power of the original Herbert storyline.
Ellen
mods metamodded as "Unfair"
I was very put off by the early introduction of Irulan at first, but the longer I thought about it, the more it made sense. After all, in the book, we're introduced to Irulan very early, as sort of a semi-narrator. Irulan is established as a major character, despite the fact that she doesn't really appear in the narrative until near the end. Even though Irulan's scene last night took liberties with the book, I thought that it was an effective way to convey her importance. (Or at least, I don't know of a better way to do it. I'd hate to have her introduce each scene with some kind of monologue.)
That said, I still thought last night's adaptation was fairly weak. (I also caught myself referring to Gurney as "Picard" several times, but that's an unrelated problem.)
I have to agree with the Luke Skywalker thing though, favorite quote "We wont last more then a few hours out here in the open.." .. reminded me of Luke on Hoth.
Dacels Jewelers can't be trusted.
Mod this down, please so no other poor souls have to see that.
Dacels Jewelers can't be trusted.
> And WTF was up with the Princess visit? Did one
> of the producers want his daughter to have a
> bigger role? In the book, it never happened.
Not only did it never happen, but they've almost completely re-written Irulan. In the book, she has about two actual spoken lines, and a few of the chapter intros. In the mini-series, she's a major supporting character. And according to the previews, it looks like she's banging Feyd. Um...what?
IMHO, there is a limit on the kinds of stuff which kids should watch. Ultraviolent TV shows are fine... The more splattering blood and absurd special effects the better.
When little Billy hits his friend in the schoolyard, and all that happens is his friend gets angry, starts crying or he just gets in trouble... they're likely to be reminded the difference between television and reality.
Wrestling, poor sportsmanship and idolizing criminial behavior (a very small minority of hardcore music) strike me as far more dangerous. Inflicting pain, poor anger management, intimidation and getting in trouble are all strongly encouraged... often being the sole focus of the entertainment.
The former Power-rangers, WWF, WCW and other stuff are all examples of this stuff. Power Rangers? yes, have you seen how they treat that fat kid and that weird skinny guy? All the while using martial arts to solve their problems..
Well, I'd have to say the Princess Irulan from the mini-series doesn't even compare with the cute blonde chick from the movie. And that butterfly dress she was wearing ... blehh.
That's horrible, with digital telivision this is supposedly going to get worse... God hates the MPAA... so do i for that matter...
I am a big fan of Herbert, having read the entire Dune Chronicles several times, as well as White Plague. I haven't read the new stuff by his son about the great houses.
Overall, I think the series is worth watching, but I have some reservations and wish it could have been a little better. I am well aware that the producers didn't want to rip off the Lynch film. I understand that, and frankly are okay that they tried to be a little more understated. The motion picture was very grand, but I am left underwhelmed by the TV series.
They took a great deal of liberty with the storyline and dialogue.
First and foremost, in the TV show Princess Irulan made a visit to the first state dinner held by the Atriedes on Arrakis. There was a cute scene with the two of them bantering, and then her Imperial bodyguards get into a staring contests with Gurney's troops. I have no idea why they would even put that into the story, except to make some kind of tension from a love triangle between Paul, Chani, and the Princess. In the book, the first time Paul met the Princess was *after* he had become the superbeing, at which time he entered a marriage of convenience to secure the Imperial throne for his children. If I recall, about the most important thing Irulan did in the entire series was to slip sterility drugs to Chani. She wasn't that much of a major character in the books, so the only reason they gave her more importance was to have a device for giving more insight to the Corrino family.
I rather liked the gothic style of the film, but wasn't disappointed that the TV show was less dreary. Overall, for the TV show to do its own thing is good, but the show did go over the top in some other points, and I think the wrong ones. Since it wasn't as striking, the TV show had some problems defining characters. I had trouble distinguishing between some of the supporting characters, such as Duncan, Gurney, Thufir, and Wellington. Another gripe I had was the way the TV show hinted that Gurney was the traitor. The TV show rather blantantly hinted that it might be Gurney several times, which I thought was over done.
Another thing that was overdone, was the Fremen natives chanting Muah'dib while he was riding by. While some of the Fremen were aware of the prophesy and that Jessica and Paul might fulfill it, there was no need to belabor the point.
Another 'over the topism' was when the Harkonen fighters chased Paul and Jessica's orinithopter through the canyons. This was the Death Star trench scene, and it didn't really happen that way in the book.
When Dr. Keynes inspected Paul stillsuit, and commented that he had it hooked up correctly, Pauls reply was typical of what I thought was wrong with the TV show. In the book, Paul replied "It seemed the proper way," while in the TV show Paul's reply was "It looked like the right way to do it." While I don't have a problem with writers taking liberty with the dialogue, I think this typifies the weakness in some of the scenes. I think the show would have had better impact if much of the dialogue had bee preserved. That part was watered down at a time when going over the top would have made for a good plot point.
Another over-the-top opportunity lost, was that the scene was cut where Paul and Jessica were discovered in the desert by the Fremen. That was an opportunity for the Fremen to comment on the prophecy, as well as for Paul to show is combat prowess.
I liked the way the Harkonnens were portrayed. It was one of the things that added positively to the feel of the TV show. In the movie the Baron was well acted, but it showed him as so gross it almost undermined his evilness.
Oh well, enough rambling. Farewell, slashdotters.
Actually, they were navigators. He looks at them at one point, after one of them drops the contact lens from his eye, and says something to the lines of "You're navigators, both of you, aren't you?" to which they agree.
Uh... when was the last time you looked at your own user number?
Well, in SFC's defence, Herbert didn't elaborate much on the Suk School and their conditioning either, just that it was unbreakable (and even that point he of course contradicted -- apparently "unbreakable conditioning" means "He won't do it unless it's really, really important to him")
This next song is very sad. Please clap along. -- Robin Zander
Why bring Chani into the plot as a servent (or I at least think that is Chani, if not, who is she and why bother)?
I hope that wasn't Chani - she definitely shouldn't be working as a servant in the palace. The servant, whoever she was, did serve a purpose in the scene with the hunter-seeker - since they were avoiding the use of voice-overs, the only way to let the audience know about the hunter-seeker was to have Paul explain it to another character.
Naked.
spoilers (like anyone hasn't read it)
I really liked the overall feel. It seemed sort of theatrical to me, probably a consequence of low budget, but in any case, it makes you concentrate on the dialog rather than the effects. Same thing with the actors. Not necessarily the best for those characters, but it doesn't matter. It's about the story.
Regarding the lack of explaination for the background mythology, I'm guessing this is a conscious choice. Voice overs would be saying too much. I don't want to watch a film of someone reading Dune. I want to see a movie. The only options are to cut a lot of stuff, or to just leave it there but not bother to explain it. Since it will be clear later on, and also because most viewers know what's going on, this is the better choice.
One bit I'm not sure of is Irulan. Reading the first few books, I thought of her as pretty much a nobody. Like, she's just "the emperor's daughter", and doesn't have any personality herself. The character presented here, though, is someone who you really like. She's well suited to Paul, so I don't think the "I love Chani, you're just political" thing is going to work as well.
I totally agree with the changes to the dialog. The only line I was sure wasn't in the book was refering to the council of the great houses, which is called the Landsrat or something in the book. Especially now that I think of it again, would "you'd be singing soprano" make sense outside of our culture? Do the Artreides divide singers into the same groups? Is the association of castration and high voices universal? ( castration would not actually cause ones voice to change )
Overall, Dune has a really good adventure story in it, along with a bunch of neat technology and mythology. The technology can't really be explained on film. You can do scenes like Paul pushing a knife through the shield, but the technology wouldn't be very visible in general. You'd see bombs coming in slow, but you wouldn't know why ( no one would use fast bombs, because they'd bounce off the shields ). Same thing with a lot of mythology. It's complicated, and it doesn't film well. I'm guessing explaining Kwisatch Haderach would have taken at least a few minutes, and I'm not sure if it would have advanced the story any. Probably it will be explained before Paul drinks the water of life.
I completely agree. I suspect that the screenwriter read the Cliff's Notes a few years back and filled in the (huge) gaps with random crap. It's been quite a while since I read the book, but as I recall the Sardaukar were supposed to be total bad-asses- the Emperor's elite shock troops. So who were those pot-bellied old men escorting Irulan around?
There were a couple of scenes in the book that I'd always wished had been included in the movie, namely the scene with Jessica in the arboreum discovering the message left for her in the plant leaves and Feyd's florentine-style fight against a slave wearing a half-shield. I'm guessing that the scene last night with Jessica in the garden and Feyd kicking that guy's butt with the big stick were supposed to be them, but it's hard to tell because there are almost no other similarities.
The Fremen we've seen so far look positively soft (and in some cases even a bit overweight!).
The Guild steersman looked like a leftover special effect from Cocoon, and "nobody has ever seen one?" Please!
The arial dogfight was pretty, but unimpressive, and had absolutely no business being there in the first place. I'll bet that the sand plays havoc with those ornithopter fans!
It takes more than funky camera angles to make a villain. The Harkonnens were made out to be cartoon-like bad guys. I half expected to hear "my new death ray will destroy the Superfriends once and for all!" And what's up with the name pronunciations? Ugh.
During the first commercial break a friend of mine called me from out of state to say "do you believe how badly they're mangling this?" I told him that you couldn't condemn a 6-hour program based on the first 10 minutes.
Clearly I owe him an apology (Eric, if you're reading this, you're absolutely right).
One could go on and on, but I'll end here.
-Cybrex
Boundless Expansion, Self-Transformation, Dynamic Optimism, Intelligent Technology, Spontaneous Order- BEST DO IT SO!
Let me start by saying that I've probly read Dune about 100 times... it's among my favorite books ever (right next to Brief History of Time and Lord of the Rings).
To start, I think that the screenplay took a few too many liberties with the story in terms of chronology and outright modifying what happened in the book.
Second, I feel there was a lack of attention to detail and, in this case, that's almost criminal -- what makes Dune such a great book is, to a great extent, the richness of the language, the attention to detail and the vibrancy of the universe Herbert creates. I got pretty pissed when they were rolling thru the village and pointed out some Fremen and they weren't wearing stillsuits! Anyone's who's read the book and paid attention would know that you would never see a Fremen out of his stillsuit.
Also, I felt like they made some odd coices about what scenes were really important to spend time on while not including other scenes which I thought were more important. I won't include all the details, but there were a few times I noticed this.
This may seem like nitpicking by a huge dune nerd, and it is, but I think that to do Dune without really following the specifics is a bad move, and lessens the quality of the finished product...
That being said, it wasn't all bad -- the effects were pretty badass and I liked sets immensely. All in all I give it a 6 out of 10, 2 docked for playing with the storyline too much and 1 more each for not attending to detail and choosing unimportant scenes respectively.
If you disagree (or agree) with me, I'd be happy to discuss it with anyone. I love to talk about Dune. Email below...
-k
kerry@NOSPAM.w3m.com
Another thing that bothered me was that they changed Dr. Uweh's motivation from interestly tragic (avenging the death of his wife) to cliched and obvious (ransoming his wife).You can tell them apart by their hats, though. That's what they're there for.
Seriously though, was Dr. Uweh introduced at all before he poisoned the Duke? If so, he blended into the background so well that I missed it completely. (Despite the fact that they revealed his betrayal 45 minutes in advance.)This would probably be enough to ruin it for me even if the rest was perfect. Music is important. As a matter of fact, I think sound in general is what makes Lynch's Dune what it is; they could have left out the picture entirely, and it would still be an impressive movie.
MSK
How 'bout those oh so scary Sardaukar Terror Troop oufits with the floppy hats and koosh-balls on top? What ever happened to menacning black leather and body-armour?
Quotes from A Man for All Seasons
Actually, I believe that he was first given the name Usul, the bottom of a column, the support, which was his secret name and then he got to choose his public name -- Muad'dib, making his own dreams come true. Before he was given any name, though, he was called ... oh jeez ... the name for the male bene gesserit that could see the side the females couldn't see by the fremen in the villages.
i wasn't even aware of this until i saw a preview in the theater this past friday....does anyone know if they plan to show it again later this week or anytime soon?
...I know nothing, I am merely a messenger.
But the whole point of that marriage is that it's a political move on Paul's part to seal him to the emporer. There is no love there, the love is with Chani.
Stick
What do you despise? By this are you truly known.
Why didn't they start the thing at 8:00PM.
> I really liked it but fell asleep during one of the commercials!!!!
The costuming - well .. i just never pictured paul wearing a leather leaotard when he was walking around in the desert.
Hey, at least they have the head covering and mouthpiece...
Your Working Boy,
Those aren't silly hats. They are *black*berets* which are of course the mark of an elite fighting force. They're just silly black berets. The Sardaukar were on bodyguard detail; I hope they don't wear those on a combat mission.
the warmer the air, the more difficult it is for a mobile winged aircraft to remain aloft. the air is 'thinner' and has less 'mass' for the wings to push against.
i picture 'thopters as hybrid helos with a vertical wing. it would still need to find a way to fight counter-rotation.
overall, i would find such a vehicle wasteful energy-wise. that flight method requires a very lightweight airframe (birds have hollow bones).
Some of this may be a spoiler, watch out if you're seeing this story for the first time!!!
I have a lot of beef to pick with this movie. To summarize quickly though: it's pretentious and crap. It bothers me every time I hear "Frank Herbert's Dune" on their promos - this is no more his Dune than David Lynch's movie was his Dune. At least David Lynch's movie didn't feel like an afterschool special.
Let's start with the eyes. Their effect is good, though a little too overdone. That's a personal opinion. Where it is clearly wrong is in their choice of characters that get the blue-within-blue. Anyone addicted to the spice should have it. That means Baron Harkonnen (by Sci-Fi's rules), the Bene Gesserit witches (by Herbert's) and to a lesser extent, anyone that lived on Arakis.
Okay, how about language? The movie refuses to use terms that might "alienate" their audience. This is my explanation for their complete lack of important terminology. The spice is the spice Mélange. Dune is the planet Arakis. Paul may be the Kwisatz Haderach (no one mention's Feyd's connection...). Leto is the leader of the Landsraad. There are others. But even when SciFi uses the right terms they gloss over them quickly. The Gom Jabar is an important one that will be needed later... What's a Suk doctor? (For that matter, did anyone know who he was or have any reason to think him trustable before "The Treachery?") What's a mentat? What's the significance of Paul being both Bene Gesserit trained and mentat trained?
Next up - the Special Effects! They're terrible, but typical SciFi fodder. The graphics look like something I did on my PC at home. Okay, so they understand the concept of texture mapping. How about bump mapping? How about decent lighting models? How about dirt!! What's up with the ornithopters? They look like crap! The sets that are real look worse than Kirk's did back in the 60's. And those that are not look as bad as the first season of Bab 5 - which is good, but only if you compare it to something done in the 70's. What's with their moons? One of them is Luna (did you notice?), the other and the other planetary bodies in general should have been done with real software. The Wrath of Kahn planet generator would have been a much better pick and that was done in the early 80's!
The acting is horrible. I can't believe how badly they picked their characters. Luke was bad the first time, do we really need another one? I can't decide how much of it the writers unable to pull together a decent script (a lot) or the actors unable to deliver their lines (a lot). The whole scene where Irulan and Paul talk had emotional overtones that were never implied in the book. They're painting Paul like someone who wants to stick his dick in anything that moves - the chambermaid, Irulan, the girl of his dreams. He was only hot for Chani and possibly his mother (!) in the book. None of the characters are convincing.
That last paragraph was a bit muddled. In truth it should be broken into two problems. Terrible acting and plot inconsistencies. I had been hoping that this series would be faithful to the original (and if it's not, then why do they keep sticking Herbert's name on it?!). They bend the rules whenever their little scriptwriters want - often to get rid of voice overs (Kynes and Duncan helping Paul and Jessica), often to make it more "palatable" (Paul and his chambermaid chick, please don't tell me she's Chani) and partly for no discernable reason (What's Stilgar doing in the picture already?!). I get the impression that one person read the book, summarized it, then the script writers worked from that. It's obvious to me that none of the actors read the book - the temperament of the characters is bogus.
I have to say that this is par for the course for Sci-Fi channel. Throwing the black bars onto the screen is supposed to make this a "movie event of the decade." What a load of shit. I'm all for wider aspect ratios, but when a movie is this badly produced listening to itself stroke its own ego is mind numbing.
So this was a scathing review. I can't believe how many good reviews I read of it before I posted. These points are real, though. It troubles me to see what Herbert's family is doing with his work - they're turning it into Disney. This is more indication why the copyright laws in America are so fucked up - drain every penny you can from every franchisable idea you can scrape together.
This is drivel, like most of what comes out of the boobtube. If David Lynch had kept all of his cutting room floor crap, his would probably have looked as bad as this rendition. But at least he was smart enough cut out the bad stuff.
Ugh.
Rudy
1. 2.
Alright.. I am a bastard... I made it up in a moment of wishful thinking, hopeing someone who really follows such things might have some tidbit about a real project (or at least a script) to put Illuminatus on the big or small screen....
Has anyone written an Illuminatus script?
I can very well pass judgement on what I saw, and I saw that however good the story was, the visual qualities of the movie were distracting. I'll probably give it another chance, but so far, I think it stinks, and I'll probably just go read the book.
I agree with you on almost every point. The series really makes me realize how lucky we were to have a first-class director like Lynch do the movie. If only he'd had less constraints.
Or, if only the series had picked up quality actors and given a symphony orchestra to Toto for the score. That would have salved my wounds.
Can your IM do this?
"I remember seeing the movie with one of my friends when it was released. We left the theater laughing, though not bitterly disappointed. What was up with Paul & the Fremen riding the worms with "Queen" music in the background? "
I believe TOTO did the music to the movie.
qwisatch haderach or something
(spelling is off, but pronouciation of that is close to the movie...)
Need a Catering Connection
I realize lots of people thought the Dune miniseries (well, what they've seen of it so far, anyway) sucked. I'm going to ignore that, brushing it off mainly as the idle whining of fanboys who can never be truly satisfied. The opening episode last night was spectacular, and I have high hopes for the following two.
Now, with that said, here's the meat of the comment. Finally, somebody has realized that Dune is not the whole story. In fact, Dune is not really even all that integral to the story of Dune, except for being interesting history and backstory for the real meat of what Dune is -- the story about Leto II, and the enormous sacrifices he made on behalf of humanity, accepting a fate some would say is worse than death to allow his people to continue to live.
My only hope now is that they see this through. No stopping at "Children". Take it all the way through Chapterhouse, and tell the full story. Then this fanboy will be truly impressed.
It was when he and his mom where running in the desert away from what they thought was a patrol. It was seriously the worst attempt at running on a treadmill in front of a greenscreen I have ever seen. I could have done better with a projector and a piece of slick cardboard. Overall though, I liked it. Did anyone else see that?
Who is the master of foxhounds, and who says the hunt has begun? -Pink Floyd
> The fremen from the book called him their Messiah, I guess the director decided to take the liberty of Changing Maud Dib from the name of the small desert mice, to their word for Messiah. I must say though, if they don't call him Usal, I will break these people. As for the Tooth, that scene is somewhat in the book. He leaves the room and starts talking to himeself, you must remember, Baron Harkonen wasn't exactly sane. -GiH
It looked to me like the people who made these series read the cliffnotes, not the book. The acting is pretty average (especially from Paul, who seems to have 2 states: spoiled_brat and luke_skywalker), the story was sort of mushed togther, and the effects, though technically super-impressive, didn't create the same breathtaking feeling as they did in the original movie. Although I have to admit, the shield glow and the space-navigation effects were pretty cool. But in general, the entire show seemed pretty cartoonish, stylized and rushed. Of course, it could have been worse - it could have been Disney...
>|<*:=
and who the hell was harkonnen talking to at the end after leto screwed up with the poison tooth?
He was talking to himself... At that point, the floating fat man had gone completely around the bend...
I like you, Stuart. You're not like everyone else, here, at Slashdot.
What a waste of water!
--The basis of all love is respect
From the Internet Movie Database's entry for Dune (1984):
Contrary to popular rumors, no 6-hours long director's cut, ever existed. The only "director's cut" of the film was the one shown theatrically; Lynch never had a hand in any other version of Dune. Lynch's original intention was for Dune to have been about 3+ hours long. To that end, about 5 hours was shot. This is also confirmed by author Frank Herbert wrote in the introduction to the book "Eye". It would be impossible for a 6-hour version to exist and even a 5-hour Dune would mean the inclusion of many scenes never intended for the final version (for reasons of redundancy, etc.). It is only necessary to read any of the final scripts for the film to realize that there was never any intention of making Dune more than 4 hours in length at the very most: the script for anything more just was never there.
I don't think so... too much sex in Illuminatus trilogy. And also the whole point of the books are the rapid changes in point of view, and the unimportance of the ego...
the Reverend Mother's accent made me think of Ambassador Delenn
The movie was largely filmed in the Czech Republic which is geographically close to Yugoslavia, which is where Mira Furlan is from.
This is a boring sig
I would say Kyle did a better job, rather than a much better job.
Overall I like the Miniseries better than the movie as the storyline is much better developed. While the acting isn't doing a terribly great job of making the individual characters very believable, the situations (as presented) speak to me...
As an aside, MacLachlans' acting in the original didn't impress me terribly, and (humorous to me, though of no real relevance) there were those Kyle worked in theatre with in during highschool who thought he couldn't act his way out of a wet paper bag.
kthulhu for president
Anonymous Cowards need not reply.
When you live in a sick society, just about everything you do is wrong.
And Cartoon Network, and Speedvision, etc....
Are there any plans to release this on tape/DVD or to show it on USA or some other network with which Sci-Fi channel is associated?
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
I just saw Peter Jackson's feeble attempt at making the Fellowship of the Rings. Now, I have read the trilogy five times, and I didn't expect it to be that good, but it really sucked ass.
First of all, you can't really expect the beauty and scope of a 500 page masterpiece to translate to 2 hours of film? They shouldn't have even tried. WHY did they have to write such bad dialogue--it was not middle earth-like at all. And who decided to leave out Tom Bombadil? He was like the most important character. And It was stupid to introduce Strider after Frodo realizes about gandalf and the ring. The casting decisions were horrible--I didn't believe Sean Astin as a hobbit for a minute. The shrinking effects were horrible and not-too-compelling. The costumes were stupid--they dwarves looked like they were wearing Tevas, for goodness sake. And don't get me started on the accents--who would ever believe that Elves have an English accent, when we know that Modern English didn't come into use until at least 2000 years after all the elves sailed from the havens. I'm definitely not going to waste my time or money by seeing the rest of these marketroid potboilers!
Personnaly, I'm just glad that I can find joy in other's perspectives about the things I cherish, and enjoy revisiting a world that I found interesting.
- Keep the miniseries script. The movie version downplays the Fremen. The Fremen are only important because they are given a ridiculous "weirding" weapon. Nothing about how their adaptation to the harsh environment has made them great. They are the most interesting aspect of the book.
- Keep some of the actors from the movie: Patrick Stewart as Gurney Halleck, Jurgen Prochnow as Duke Leto (William Hurt is too soft), Jose Ferrer as the Emporer.
- And keep some actors from the miniseries: Whoever is playing Jessica is wonderful.
LovemonkSpice-addicted eyes:
Herbert describes the eyes of the serious spice addicts as blue-within-blue, no whites; some of the older Fremen eyes are even indigo. Later books mention being unable to see the pupils either.
The spice-essence and crysknives (made from sandworm teeth) are described as glowing, so maybe this is where they got the glow idea.
Neither the film nor the miniseries quite captured the "no whites" aspect of the eyes. I think they may have experimented with different eye looks but having solidly dark-blue or black eyes would look quite disturbing.
My biggest gripe with the eyes is that the UV-reactive contacts or whatever they used aren't always straight; they look crooked in some scenes. In the scene with Liet Kynes inside the ornithopter while the worm attacked the crawler, did anyone notice that one eye was glowing, one wasn't? This was distracting. I thought for a moment that maybe it was intentional, because they were trying to illustrate that he was half-Fremen ("Liet serves two masters").
Worms:
The worm definitely looked more lively and believable than the one in the Lynch film; however, the teeth were kind of large to be making into crysknives. Maybe there are smaller teeth inside.
Ornithopters:
The ornithopters are described as gaining lift from both flapping action and jet-assist. The ones in the series seem to have turbo-fans in wings that can be moved to aim the direction of lift. They don't flap, but it didn't seem too bad a compromise.
Missing Scenes/combined scenes/altered scenes:
(SPOILERS)
In the book, Princess Irulan does not meet Paul until the end of the book. Bringing her in with the Saurdaukar for the dinner party is an interesting move; it sets up a different dynamic, since he will actually know something about the woman he (SPOILER!) will marry for political reasons at the end of the story; there will be more of a three-way dynamic with him and Chani. Not necessarily a bad change, depending on how it is played out.
We've scene some of the Lady Jessica's special abilities with language, but we haven't had a scene where the Shadout Mapes tests her and gives her a crysknife, symbolizing her role in fulfilling the prophecy. Also, we haven't seen her use Bene Gesserit Voice to control the pilots, so we are still missing a sense of her special powers.
We don't know anything about the Bene Gesserit breeding program and their quest to create a Kwitsatz Haderach (super-being). It will be interesting to see whether this is played up or not in the mini-series. One of the big flaws in the movie was that Paul developed literal Godlike abilities; in the book, his only "godlike" ability is his prescient vision; he is also a master of the Bene Gesserit fighting disciplines, Voice, and has developed himself into a combination Oracle/Mentat, but he doesn't have any physical superhuman abilities.
The hunter-seeker sequence was done differently; another Fremen woman was in the room, but I think this was done so that he could explain what was going on to her, and thus, to us. This wasn't necessarily a bad change. It lets the directors avoid the excessive use of internal monologue.
The detail involving the Harkonnen water ritual (guests slopping water on the floor, natives lining up to buy the squeezings from the towels) is a good one. It helps to indicate that House Atreides is committed to ending the abuses of the Harkonnen period.
Guild Navigators
I thought the Guild navigator sequence was quite nicely done, actually. Herbert gives out almost no details about the physical characteristics of the Guild Navigators in the books, except that they float on suspensors in tanks of spice gas, and that they are altered human forms. I don't think it is accurate that no one has ever seen one. They have human attendants. (Funny hat people #3).
Mahdi
The Fremen are calling Paul Atriedes "Mahdi" in a sort of questioning way, wondering if he may be the "Voice from the Outer World" coming to fulfill their prophecy. They aren't sure yet. They aren't calling him "Muad'Dib" yet. We've only heard that vaguely, in a dream sequence.
Leto's Betrayal
The Duke's betrayal sequence was handled reasonably well; we have some understanding of Yueh's motivations. It wasn't clear that Yueh actually took care of Paul and Jessica by providing them with stillsuits and survival kits and left Paul, but this was implied because he left Paul the ducal ring.
Baron Harkonnen
Well done; he is very fat and carries his weight on suspensors, but he doesn't fly maniacally around the rooms as in the Lynch film. He doesn't have horrifying acne. We hint at his interest in tender young boys without resorting to the weird "heart plug" stuff where he kills them and smears himself with their blood; that was pure Lynch over-the-top psychotic.
Language/characterization
Gurney does not threaten to castrate him in the book. He winds up with his knife poised to kill him and says ("we'd have joined each other in death.") "singing soprano" just sets the wrong tone as far as I'm concerned. It's a bit too flippant. In this scene in the book, Paul is genuinely frightened by the viciousness in which Gurney attacks him, testing his training to its limit. He may be a snotty adolescent but he still has some respect for his arms-master and sword-master. Which leads me to...
Paul's Character:
I'm a big unsure of Paul's snotty, depressed character. In the book, he's very confident of his abilities, and troubled by his prescient dreams and by the move. I'm reserving judgment until I see how they develop his character. Remember, he is supposed to display such amazing charisma, loyalty, and judgement that the Fremen would willingly die for him. Some serious changes have to take place to make this believable!
Not exactly, Paul is supposed to be a boy who has been trained in the Bene Gesserit way as well as the Mentat way since before he could talk. He is no longer a boy, but a human who has faced the gom jabbar and lived.
No, he is not a teenager, especially a young or snotty one.
(Can we tell who read the book recently?)
Droit devant soi on ne peut pas aller bien loin...
Droit devant soi on ne peut pas aller bien loin...
Straight ahead of him, nobody can go very far... -- Le P
Oh, no. They tried and died.
Hooptie
"Heavens, it appears that my weewee has been stricken with rigor mortis!" -- Stewie Griffin
was that they stayed young looking for a long time. I really fail to see why people have so much against the '84 movie. Other than the wierding modules and the rain at the end (probably necessary Hollywood additions to make the movie palatable to the masses), the movie was very true to the book. Dialogue, characterization, plot, scenery... everything was very well done and accurate.
Regards,
-scott
Regards,
-scott
Ah, but they didn't deal with the most important detail, and certainly didn't emphasize it properly.
Suk training blocks violent thoughts or actions. That's why they all trusted him.
Personally I would have prefered it if they added the scene where he gives paul the little book of verse, and used that to elaborate on Suk training.
-GiH
7:15 Get home from salt mine
8:00 Junkyard Wars -- The Learning Channel
9:00 Dune Finale.
11:15 Sleep
Comparing it to Windows will be a moot point, since El Dorado is going to have a 40% larger code base than XP.
I was actually about to post such a comment myself, but now I'll save the trouble. I suppose the maneuverable stabilators with vectored thrust fans were a fairly reasonable interpretation. However I do think actual flapping-wing ornithopters were what Herbert intended in the novels; probably as another Baroque/Renaissance era evocation (cf. Leonardo, etc.). Here are some supporting points:
1. Advanced materials (e.g. nanocomposites?) would presumably be available with the necessary strength-to-weight ratios for birdlike flight.
2. The desert climate on Arrakis would provide significant thermal updrafts, which a large winged craft could use to stay aloft with minimal power. Add flapping and you get even more cruise time & maneuverability. And they almost certainly had high-efficiency, tiny power plants available.
3. Don't forget the whole Mentat angle - since the NeoLuddites (name?) trashed all the computers, basically all of science & math had to be reimplemented using only human minds. Maybe flapping wings seemed more natural or easier to develop (after all that's what most pre-Wright Bros. designs for powered flight seemed to try). Maybe they never rediscovered Bernoulli's work, and thus the properties behind the fixed wing's lift.
#include "disclaim.h"
"All the best people in life seem to like LINUX." - Steve Wozniak
#include "disclaim.h"
"All the best people in life seem to like LINUX." - Steve Wozniak
I wasn't let down in the least.
Before I go any further, let explain why I found the original movie so distubing. The main theme of the first two Dune books was that Paul Atreides, the Mentat Emperor, was not a god, but a man. It was his godhead which lead directly to his downfall. The later Dune books were not much more than a detailed analysis of power and it's consequences, both to those who wield it and those they control.
The first movie, though, completely threw all that away. Paul was able to shatter stone by the power of his voice, and bring rain to a desert planet. These powers were supposed to be figurative, not literal, and by granting them to Muad'dib, the director of the original movie showed a complete lack of understanding of the inner meaning of the books.
So when I heard that a new series was coming out, I didn't care if they kept the original dialogue. I didn't care if they played around with some of the characters' personas. I didn't care if the timeline was the exact same, or if the political manuverings were different. All I wanted were two things:
I think part I did a reasonable job of these goals. I could whine and bitch about the collapse of the terms "Lisan Al Gaib", "Kwisatz Haderach", and "Muad'dib" into one phrase, with none of the distinctions. However, a movie is not a novel, and I don't expect such subtle distinctions to be made. I could also whinge about the Lady Jessica being a whimpering fool, or Duke Leto looking like an insurance salesman, but these things don't change the meaning of the story.
This is not to mention that part I had some great things, like the casting of Duncan and Gurney. In the books, Duncan was a cat-like killer and lover of women. In the original movie, he looked like a Sunday school teacher; in the series, he fit the mold exactly. Ditto for Gurney; he was supposed to be a "great ugly lump of a man", yet he was played by Patrick Stewart in the original movie. WTF?
For those of you who are now noticing that I'm holding the two movies to a double standard, you're entirely correct. The series is making no effort to stay precisely true to every nuance of the books, so I'm not going to castigate it as long as it stays true to the meaning. The original movie, though, went so far as to include, verbatim, the inner monologues, so I think it's entirely fair to blast it for poor casting.
Given my two goals above, there was one very serious place where the new series disappointed me: ornithopters. WHY THE FUCK CAN'T SOMEONE COME UP WITH A GOOD CGI ORNITHOPTER? Did they try and fail, or did they fail to try?
In closing, though I'll have to wait for the conclusion to part III, I'm very optimistic about the outcome. If they plan on making DM and CoD, I'll be curious to see how the recharacterization of Princess Irulan pans out, since she plays a fairly large role in those two books that is not consistent with her current characterization. But I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.
Er, Sci-Fi is basic cable. They'll be blocking on drug and sexual content far more than they'll be blocking on anything else.
--
Kevin Doherty
kdoherty+slashdot@jurai.net
Kevin Doherty
kdoherty+slashdot@jurai.net
Did anyone else notice how the commercials were all geared toward the IT crowd? Sun, IT jobs sites, and fast food (KFC & Pizza Hut) were all dead on, and the Mitsubishi ads were o.k., if a touch downscale. Only one crummy psychic's network ad. Kinda makes you think that this was pretty well thought out by the network and advertisers.
~Religion is O.K., as long as it gets you laid.
A LOT of complaining going on...I thought I'd throw out an opinion...
I was 12 when I first tried to read the books. I don't know if any of you had this same experience, but I'd get 25 pages or so into the book and be completely lost. I put it down twice, but the third time was definitely the charm. I got through all of the books (the real ones, not the crappy ones by Herbert's son...skip that) and find myself entranced by the whole series. That being said, why do we continue to point out that the storyline isn't so easy to follow? That seems absurd that ANY director (even Lynch...) can make FH's presentation of a totally alien culture something easily understood. Isn't part of the fun the exploration of things that don't quite make sense? Aren't we just feeding into the MTV culture by spoon-feeding plotlines and characters?
I think the mini-series is pretty cool. A bit slow at times, but that's the editor's fault. Right now it feels like we could either get by with 2 episodes or put back some of the subplots.
There ya have it. 2 cents even.
---- Please be nice in case my Slashdot karma ~= my real life karma.
> Being a parent myself, I believe it's important to encourage children to explore their imaginations.
Well, I couldn't agree more. I'm a father too. And I think that if my child can't separed fantasy from reallity, then the problem is not with SciFi, but with the rest of the education I'm giving her.
All in all, SciFi is a pretty good imagination exercise I really recomend. Of course, if one wants the TV to babysit and to educate ones children in their place, then his problem are definitively not SciFi.
morcego
Does anyone know if there are plans to release the movie/series on DVD (think "Director's cut")? Dune was hyped as one might expect a feature-length film to be, and I can't see how a USA subsidiary would fail to capitalize on all the attendent benefits of the money-making machine. Did I like it? Yeah, despite the hammy acting, incongruent special effects and threadbare character development. In case some need their memories jostled, even halfway decent science fiction films are a rare commodity - refusing to suspend disbelief won't miraculously make the genre flourish. Besides, 20 million is really not that much when you're constructing a 6-hour movie - not that money is the litmus test for quality, mind you.
- Bachelorhood is the father of necessity.
The only quote that sort of annoyed me was in the dream sequence...
"Tell me about the waters of your world, Maud'dib" instead of "Tell me about the waters of your world, Usul"
What I did not like is the liberal way in which the screenplay was adapted from the original. Now there are a number of good reasons to cut dialog and scenes out when adapting books for movies. For instance, you cut dialog because the format is too short. Or you add dialog which explains what is going on.
But what I am to make of scenes where they altered the perfectly usable original dialog, for no good reason at all?
As an example, consider the scene where the Rev. Mum administers the Gom Jabbar to Paul. The Gom Jabbar scene in the show last night was just confusing, unless you had read the book. Practically all the dialog from the book was cut, but it cannot be for time since they spent plenty of time visualizing the burning hand. In the book, the dialog which they engage in while she holds the needle at his throat, explains: the test itself, the reason for it, and the reason Paul does not cry for help. Go reread the beginning of the book; you will see what I mean. In fact, this scene struck me upon rereading it last night -- it was written as if for TV, with what the characters were saying making plain everything the reader needed to know to understand.
This sort of thing bodes ill for this series.
Like when when the duke was going out to the desert and Paul's suit is properly adjusted and wuzziz name takes a five minute pause before speaking. Anyone who hadn't already read the book or seen the original movie would probably think "what's the big deal".
As for the ornithropters: they looked more like the moths in Lexx than how I would picture an ornithropter.
"I don't want to go to Dune, I was going to go down to Tasha Station and pick up some power converters"
"You can waste time with your friends later, Paul"
... since my wife hated the movie, hasn't read the book, but found the mini-series very difficult to follow because the voice-overs weren't there. :-)
Additionally, the '84 movie managed the visualization of the world of Dune much better than the mini-series.
Regards,
-scott
Regards,
-scott
>I don't ban SF entirely though - I just let them read it for a couple of hours a week. I decided on this action after reading about the Dungeons & Dragons teenagers in America, and all the reality-removed mischief they got up to, thanks to the influence of SF. ;)
Erg.. where did I leave my flamer. Er... rather.. I mean I am highly appreciative of your obviously well thought out argument that D&D promotes reality loss.
-GiH
Yes, it's hot down here.
I think Lynch managed to get as much explanation and character development into the original movie as could be expected, whereas the mini-series is seriously screwing this up even though it has more time to spend.
If you thought the movie was shallow (it was, but only in comparison to the book -- hard act to follow, non?) then you'll hate the mini-series. Shallow fluff, and badly done at that.
Regards,
-scott
Regards,
-scott
It is Gurney Halleck who goes to live with the smugglers. Idaho dies in that scene, though in the book he died fighting against Imperial Saudakar, of whom he kills 19 before they kill him. I was hoping for so much more from this mini-series, but it has failed to deliver so far. I am a huge fan of the book, and a Frank Herbert fan all around for his other books outside of the Dune series, and IMHO, this version has so far failed to capture the feel and the overall intelligence of the characters. Dr. Yueh was a brilliant man who was forced to betray the family he loved. The MS makes no mention of his role as one of Paul's primary teachers. Thufir Hawat is supposed to be one of the most feared men in the Imperium and the Master of Assassins for House Atredies, not an overdressed buffoon. The MS take on Idaho is passable. And Paul came across as being more of a weenie and a spoiled brat than Luke could have ever dreamed of. He is supposed to be on the verge of being a Mentat and nearly an adept of Bene Gesserit training, not someone who makes 5 year olds look mature and well-behaved. Impulsive, yes; sulky, no. There is no feel for the tension these people feel being made to move to Arrakis or the subtle political intrigues and awareness possessed by all of the major characters; especially the Duke, the Lady Jessica, Thufir, even Paul himself, except there at the end with Stilgar. Their portrayal of Jessica is pretty good. The Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohaim is poorly portrayed by the mini-series. There does not seem to be any compassion for what she knows is going to happen to the Duke or for Jessica. They also do not explain what the test is that Paul goes through or why they are performing it, unless they plan to later on, which would be acceptable. The costumes, however, looks like something out of Phantom Menace. I realize that I am a purist when it comes to the Dune series and to Frank Herbert in general, but that is due to the fact that he has given me many hours of enjoyment with his books ( Dune in particular). However, I do plan to watch the second installment tonight to see how they do things. I hope it improves and I haven't given up hope, yet.
I agree with the 1 book/season suggestion. Maybe if this were being done by HBO - like the Sopranos or Oz - this thing would have been amazing. Instead it's being done on Sci Fi.
... Starship Troopers". Now their thinking how much money that one made (did Robert get a cut?) and how many books he wrote...
Let's face it, the Sci Fi folks which brought your the extra-edited versions of Star Trek and cut every movie they ever broadcast shouldn't be trusted with showing very good and reasonably important works, such as Dune.
The thing looks like a bad episode of ST:TNG without the really cool effects or interesting characters. (Feel free to insert a P. Stewart reference or two here).
This series was made because they know they have a sizable audience that will sit throught even the worst adaptations of certain books simply because they are "their" books.
Let's admit that no matter crappy the previews looked we'd all be watching it because it is, afterall, Dune. Now, imagine what's going on in the Producer's office today. Three or four toadies are serving Lattes to some very greasy men (think the Producer in True Romance, for a second) who are rubbing their pinky-ringed hands together and saying something along the lines of "Not only will we be making the next two books, but I hear these same dopes like stuff by that guy who wrote
Get the picture? They hope you don't.
- I settled down long enough to write this and have now collected far too much dust. Damn Dust.
I completly disagree. The actors did a *much* better job in the movie. The actors in this series don't seem "into" it at all. None are displaying any emotion wahtsoever.
Paul: a complete wuss. he's a daddies boy, not the quizat haderak(sp?)
Gurney: another wuss. how is he Pauls mentor when he can barly stand up fighting him.
Feyd: he ain't Sting!
etc.
I'll watch the rest for the effects(worms are awsome), but the acting better improve!
"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:
having never read the book, or even seen the movie, i was confused by one thing which is really bothering me. that whatever-hunter thingimabob that comes out of the wall to kill paul, paul says it can only attack movement. he also says someone is operating it. how is it, that it can only attack movement, but it can go right up to the persons face and stare at it? obviously it isn't just htat it can only 'see' movement, as it goes right up to both of the people's faces and stares at 'um for a bit. this is really bugging me. help.
what hump?
At least they got the "desert planet" part right.
In the book and the original movie. He understood that the Baron was probably lying, but he held out for the remote chance that the Baron was telling the truth. Hence the play on "be reunited", etc.
;-)
"You can tell them apart by their hats, though. That's what they're there for. "
ROFL! That explains *everything*!
I think Yueh (yes, I spelled it wrong) was in there a few times (the first scene, actually), but I'm not sure he was ever introduced. The characters are so shallow as to be completely unobtrusive. The original movie's portrayal of Pieter, for example, was brilliant... in the mini-series he's practically nonexistent.
Regards,
-scott
Regards,
-scott
I figured they were just trying to make it something like cat's eyes: when my cat is directly facing me in low light, his eyes glow an incredible green color, almost village of the damned-like. Oh well, Bad CG does explain it a lot better I suppose :-)
Right on. The guild were much better in the Movie. They looked more sinister. They ruled the universe, not the emporer. He was just their pupper ruler.
"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:
I AM, therefore I THINK!
It was ok. Let's face it Dune is a well written book and as such is difficult to move to the screen. Poor development on exactly who Jessica is and exactly what the Rev. Mother is also. I thought that was a key in the early development of the book. I think the teenage angst of Paul is a bit overdone and very X-Gen and not at all like a young man raised to be a Duke from the day he was born. I hate it when SciFi just jumps to the special effects and forgets the characters. I have a feeling this might be a good movie for those who have not read the book. By the way - any comments on the Guild Freighter concept? Or the navigator? I thought the real one was a slug? Frank
errr...isn't the STORY which you refer to taken care of in the book? I mean, the book is genius, and the movie's story has nowhere to go but down. At that point, I'm watching for interpretation and fx...of which neither was impressive (in fact, it was mostly annoying).
The actors in the mini-series don't seem to have any understanding of their characters... especially paul. He was never a real person, he didn't make mistakes, and he was never suprised in any obvious way.
The conflict within paul is his humanity vs his divinity, not his "coming of age" any such bull shit.
-T
Old truckers never die, they just get a new peterbilt
Idaho wasn't a mentat until his ghola returned in the second book. In the first one he was simply a swordsman.
The mini-series so far has seemed to slavishly avoid duplicating scenes from the movie -- even where they were important in some way. Same goes for any number of actual lines/sayings that stood out in the book as important or very effective. If they were used in the movie, they were almost certainly absent from the mini-series.
A pity, because it really just didn't seem like Dune...
Madness takes its toll. Exact change please.
Don't forget that the 6 hours of which you and a few other posters speak includes lengthy commercial breaks. Total content is probably closer to 4.5 hours. Still plenty of time to work with though.
Stilgar, meeting Duke Leto? What the hell was that?
Stilgar did meet Leto in the book. It was a good scene, in the book that is. But I don't think Paul was there.
what is all this junk with the fremen calling paul "maud dib" before he even goes to the desert? I don't remember any of that from the book.
and who the hell was harkonnen talking to at the end after leto screwed up with the poison tooth?
and why the hell, with millions of dollars worth of CGI can't anyone make a decent ornithopter?
how hard would it be to animate a decent set of flapping wings????????????????????
the thing looks like a freakin fly, but the wings don't flap.
The difference between Theory and Practice is greater in Practice than in Theory.
fair enough...
Everybody here is tearing the miniseries apart pretty well, and I agree with almost all of the criticisms. Just to provide a little variety, though, I thought I'd mention the things that I liked about the miniseries, in comparison to Lynch's movie. (Incidentally, they really invited comparisons, didn't they? With so much material to work with, I thought that the miniseries would be very different from the movie, but at times it seems like a shot-by-shot remake... which just highlights its inferiority. The "worm vs. harvester" scene is an excellent example.)
Anyway, things I liked:
The interstellar spacecraft (what do they call it, a "highliner"?) was incredible. It was among the best CGI I've ever seen, and it had the right look, too. (Immense, alien, chaotic, etc.) They also get a consolation prize for the Guild Navigator, who was excellent, but not quite as good as Lynch's.
I like this Baron Harkonnen. The Baron in the movie was too over-the-top; I have a pretty strong stomach, but I still tend to fast-forward through most of his scenes on Giedi Prime. In Sci Fi's version, the gratuitous neck-breaking was sufficient to establish the Baron's evilness, and they wisely left it at that. I'm sure people will disagree with me on that point, though.
The sets were nice. They weren't as interesting as Lynch's sets, but at least I could tell them apart (unlike the characters). They just looked a whole lot better, even if they didn't fit the film as well.
And... that's it. It was pretty bad. I wonder what Lynch could have done with Dune if he had had access to the sort of technology that today's directors take for granted?
MSK
One thing I remember particularly strongly from the book is the epigraph to one of the sections, describing Paul:
Never take moderation advice from sigs, including this one.
Here, here! I agree, in general with your review. I found myself liking the first installment of the mini-series. But not as much as I had hoped. I found myself liking the Lynch movie's Harkonnen's better. They appeared more maniacal and vicious. The mini-series Harkonnen's were quiet evil but not enough. Plus some of the actors from the movie would have been excellent in the mini-series. Prochnaw(sp?) who played Duke Leto Atreides in the movie was very convincing. As was Max von Sydow as Liet. Very nice.
I will watch tonight. Perhaps my judgement will improve (or not).
-- What's this '-r *' file doing here? -- Oh well, a simple 'rm' should do the trick.
Oops, that's Lisan al Gaib.
Madhi is "The One Who Will Lead Us To Paradise"
-Mith
--
Maybe Sun Microsystems has relocated to Bene Tlilax or IX by then.
--
Thanks a fucking lot.... my 5 year old daughter and I were playing tic tac toe while I was reading /. I really appreciated explaining to her why those pics were popping up on my computer. Fucking asshole.
Paul: Agree with others -- too much Luke Skywalker. We'll have to see how he develops (the trailers looked promising). In the 84 Movie, Kyle MacLachlan was better as the pre-desert Paul -- sharper, more sophisticated, as one would expect of the heir to the Duke (though he did look too much like Speed Racer for my taste). Actually, the actor who played young Obi Wan in Phantom Menace would have done a good job -- I have to believe that the hyped-up martial-arts angle in PH owes something to Dune (as, of course, does much else from Star Wars -- for instance, compare the Sith to the Honored Matres from the later Dune books). The actor who played Duncan Idaho in the miniseries, when younger, also could have been a good Paul.
Leto: I think the actor in the 84 Movie (I think Jurgen Prochnow) did a better job than William Hurt capturing Duke Leto from the book, though I enjoyed Hurt's acting -- its just that Leto was a sharper-edged character than Hurt's dreamy benevolent-king characterization.
Shaddam IV: I liked the guy in the new miniseries better than the guy in the 84 Movie (I forget his name, but I think he was a noted actor). The miniseries Shaddam is more a schemer, kind of like a Godfather character, gone a bit soft from wealth and power, but still ready to get down and dirty, while the 84 Movie guy was too passive. (Speaking of The Godfather, Coppola would have been a great director for this movie -- its scheming houses is very Godfather-like).
Liet Keynes (sp?): I have got to say that I really enjoy the frizzy-haired guy who plays him in the miniseries. He does a great job of conveying an attitude. I don't remember him much from the 84 Movie -- the presence of Keynes in the miniseries says very good things about it, since he was important in the book in a way that is hard to convey in a movie.
Baron Harkkonnen and his Nephews: The Harkkonnens in the 84 Movie were vintage David Lynch -- psychopatically brutal -- but a bit too much to take. (I liked Sting in the movie, unlike many others.) In the miniseries, they are a little to soft, however.
Duncan Idaho, Gurney Halleck, Wellington Yueh, Thufer Hawat: As mentioned above, Duncan in the miniseries was great, but given too small a role (I guess I will have to wait for God Emperor of Dune to hit the small screen). Was Patrick Stewart Idaho or Halleck in the movie?
Guild Navigator: The Guild Navigator scenes were among my favorite from both the 84 Movie and the miniseries. I think the miniseries did a great job of illustrating folding space, and I especially liked the sorrowful look on the Navigator's face.
Effects: I think they are doing an OK job, considering the budget. I guess you have to spend a fortune before you get CGI that looks completely convincing. Liked the worms (I just saw Tremors with Kevin Bacon the other day on Sci-Fi -- they, like Star Wars -- definitely stole their worms from Dune.)
Sets: I was surprised how close the look and feel of the miniseries was to the 84 Movie. Additionally, many of the sets reminded me of some scenes from Myst and Riven. Overall, good.
Direction: Good. Didn't try to upstage the story, as Lynch did somewhat in the 84 Movie. As I mentioned above, Coppola could have done a great job on this. Chris Carter and others from X-Files also could have done a great job -- they really know how to string a story along from episode to episode.
Bottom Line: Liked a great deal -- we fans should be thankful that someone was willing to put this much money and effort into something with a niche following.
Dune was so much cooler when only the hard core sf fans knew about it, but now everyone will know, and it will get ruined.
Hmm, kind of like what happened to Slashdot, after all those 6 figure users showed up.
Who were these Sardukar escorting the princess? When I saw them I thought These are the emporors elite troops? They look like they need a nap! When Scifi shows this again, pay particular attention to the leader of the bodyguards when the find the princess hitting on Luke...er Paul. Doesn't his expression look totally vacant, like he's just had his brain removed and he hasn't slept in the past 90 hours?
I read the internet for the articles.
I think the actor who played Paul did rather well, Paul is supposed to be a young teenager, why young and snotty seems to befit what I think Paul should be. My main problem though is the whole oriniphropter issue, will anyone ever get those right? Hopefully they will broach the whole thing about how Lady Jessica is the Barons daughter and such. All and all the series is a lot more true to the book then the old movie.
That's exactly what I was thinking... I thought both the carry-alls and the ornithopters for the miniseries should have been scaled up straight from Dune II. As it has already been thoroughly trashed by everyone else, I will just leave it at: wow, did it ever suck.
How can you trash the movie more than this series? The movie wasn't completetly by the book, but at least Lynch isn't putting drama(princess and Paul) in their for ratings! The Lynch version at least captured the dark atmosphere of the Dune universe. The charactars in this series are all idots. Paul is a sissy and no other actor displays any decent acting whatsoever!
Did the first hour have too much exposition for anyone else? It really seemed to drag on quite a bit (though I guess I should expect that for a 4.5 hour miniseries!)
By my tape, there were just shy of 30 minutes of advertising. This is pretty remarkable, considering that most two-hour TV blocks contain over 36 minutes of ads (40 if you're watching certain cable channels!)
Online wrestling as a trading card game? WWF With Authority.
Whether the entire glowing blue effect is the right convention to portray spice addiction is a different argument entirely.
It seems that earlier posts have discussed the major problems with the MS, but I would like to add my own little pissed-off observations to add to the flavor. First, say what you will about the puss-filled movie Baron, but at the very least he scared the hell out of me. If memory serves, within a few minutes of his introduction he senslessly killed a servant by pulling the kid's heartplug while floating around and screaming like a madman. He was a creditable villan. Conversely, the MS Baron is a jackass who couldn't scare anyone to save his sad little life. He'd look more at home munching candy in a sweatsuit than actually plotting to take over a planet. While the performance indicates that he MIGHT (?) be some kind of brillant plotter, he's just not dangerously crazy enough to convey the novel's Baron. Second, if I hear another character say, "There's an old ancient saying that. . ." followed by some pathetic slogan or cliche from the contemporary United States, I'm going to be forced to hunt down and stab the MS's "writers." This kind of dumbing down of the novel's language offends the hell out of me and destroys the story's uniqueness IMHO.
Third, the acting is really, really bad. I mean the kind of bad that is usually only found in dinner theaters. It's been mentioned before but it can't be understated. It's that bad.
Fourth, the scene in the MS with the Harkonen attack didn't convey the sense of a true invasion. While the movie at least had a couple hundred Mexican solders as extras duking it out, the MS "invasion" was tiny. Also the Harkonen troops' costumes were terrible. Where the hell did they get those helmets? Maybe this shouldn't be too much of a suprise, given the overall level of costuming in the series.
For that matter, why did the MS screw up the practice fight between Gurney and Paul? That was supposed to be a knife fight? WTF? And they took out the part where Gurney immediatey attacked Paul after the later's "mood" remark. That was one of my favorite parts of the book. It really illustrated the pressure that the characters were under before their move to Arakas. Not to mention the novel's inner monologe where Paul questioned Gurney's loyalty during the attack. Talk about treacherous surroundings.
All in alll, I'm looking forward to watching the rest of the series so I can have more to bitch about. I guess that the SFC wins.
My spleen has been vented.
The thopters were the most annoying thing to me... an ornithopter is a craft who propels itself by flapping its wings like a bird. The only thing even approximating ornithopters in the tv series so far has been the Harkonnen aircraft (who weren't even supposed to be a strong force in the air) but they didn't flap their wings. And why the hell did the harkonnen aircraft use targeting computers? They completely forgot the whole butlerian jihad.
... and there is no doubt, that one day he will be
where the eye of his telescope has already been
Well, the inevitable comparisons to the movie might as well start now.
I found that they took alot of the ideas from the movie and did them with less style and in a cheesier manner than the movie did it. I thought the effects were distracting because they looked so computery, and what the hell was the idea with that guild navigator, it looked like some kind of retarded squid with huge earlobes. I also thought the acting wasn't as good as the movie, although the movie's nothing special in that department either.
However, I still ain't hating it. Mostly because I like the story and they have the luxury of taking their time with it so things develop alot more realistically.
I couldn't finish watching the show last night. I loved both the book and the movie (probably because I saw the movie first
The litany of fear - Left out "Fear is the little death." Nothing huge but still annoying.
The meeting with Gurney (ignoring the huge mischaracterization of Gurney in the mini-series
Then there were also several other missing items. Most notably the Glow-globes, the Mentat's stained lips (in the mini-series they just look like every other costumed idiot) and the bushy eyebrows of Thufir.
And of course I hated the portrayal of Paul and the evidentally early entry of Chani as the maid. (Though the Chani portion hasn't been proven yet but that seems to be the only explenation of their focus on the maid).
All in all it seemed like there was MUCH less information in the mini-series than there was in the original movie (or the book of course) yet it's going to be an hour and a half longer (or so). Seems like instead of making the book clearer they've just used it as a general guideline and added a bunch of useless (and poorly written) footage.
Argh.
-Zane
This sig is worse than my last.
As someone, I am ashamed to admit in such a forum, who has not seen the 1984 (?) movie, nor read the actual book (go lazy bums! yeah!), I thought the first part last night was very very cool. Very interesting, and I am definitely going to go back to watch the movie and read the books.
I mean, I have a general idea of the story from other people telling it to me, but that's just not enough for Dune. The whole plot line is just so complex and the characters are so interesting. I wonder how I managed to *not* read it all these years.
I realize all this is probably preaching to the converted, but I'd like to mention that at the very least this mini-series is attracting those of us who haven't had the chance to read the book or watch the movie yet. I'd say it's converting some people, which is probably always a good thing when it comes to SciFi.
The only part I *didn't* like about the show last night was my roommate saying multiple times, "It's not Harkahnnen, it's *Harkohnnen*." Sigh. Oh well. Time to sit down and read.
The Starlost
Disclaimer: Those that do not agree with my views and have their own opinions are not automotons, and quite possibly have "free will"
Capt. Ron
crazy dynamite monkey
but he wasn't that important character wise. He was only used to be a traitor.
Scuse me? Yueh not important. He was one of the best examples in the book of a person being forced to do something against his will. Basically he triggers the plot. As for Duncan being alive, Ghola's 'R Us...
People replying to my sig annoy me. That's why I change it all the time.
rest assured i was on the internet within minutes registering my disgust.
--
There are some people that if they don't know, you can't tell 'em.
Yeah, isn't it great!?!
... and buy some ornithopter models to glue together with my son.
I've already put my pre-order in for the Dune Commemorative Dinner Plate series, gold-trimmed, with sunken Dune lettering on the rim.
Now I just have to find the website for the action figures
--- Will in Seattle - What are you doing to fight the War?
Annoying little nit-picky, help-I'm-geekin'-hard, point of fact. Dr. Yuei is actually Dr. Yueh. FYI
"If you're going through hell, keep going." ~W. Churchill
Doesn't anyone else find it funny that there are computer ads during Dune? (a culture that does not allow computers )
-- 73 de KG2V For the Children - RKBA! "You are what you do when it counts" - the Masso
Looks like the Ministry of Silly Hats lives on. Someone had a lot of fun designing some of the stupidest looking hats ever seen on the small screen. Other than that, I guess it successful - we didn't even check out X-Files once.
One thing the mini-series misses big time is the total reverance for water on Dune. They pay lip service to it in a couple places. But they neglect to imbue the sets and the characters with it. There are no seals on the doors and the stillsuits are comical. Keynes is seen casually swirling a glass of water. He shows none of the respect for it that a true Fremen would.
The scene with the assasin running around makes the Atreides look like keystone cops. There is nothing to show the training, discipline and loyalty of the Atriedes or any of the forces for that matter. Remember, the Duke and his senior staff can issue orders with a hand gesture.
What I can't see is how anyone who has read the book can say this is good. It has mangled the plot and the characters. It has stripped away all the culture that Herbert created in Dune. It completely misses or ignores central themes to the book. I mean what is suppose to be good about this?
I am horribly disappointed in this mini-series. To someone who has never read Dune, it will leave them with the impression that this is just so much cheap Sci-Fi and hence why bother reading the book. The movie does a much better job over-all, with the exception of the sonic rays or whatever they were suppose to be.
I watched it. My overall impression is that this story is being written to appeal to young teens in love, rather than grizzled old science fiction koots like me. I got much the same feeling from seeing Starship Troopers boiled down to movie-going lowest common denominator thingie (Too bad; Starship Troopers had GREAT potentual as a movie.)
Ok, what I didn't like: whoever did the costuming on that show has got a real bad case of Kimono. Somehow, that look (which I like) just doesn't wash for me, in a Dune universe. Princess Irulian's butterfly collection was almost as bad as the Bene Jesserit's head adornment. The men's clothing just seemed thrown together from the extra's trailer. The Harkonen fetish for red outfits came through loud and clear.
The casting was so bad, the only two characters who presented even a shadow of what I think they should be were Liet and Mapes. Everyone else is just collecting a paycheck.
The mood: pathetic. Too well lit. The elder characters in this universe, such as the BJ witch, any mentat, and the "warmaster" Gurney should be frightening vicious creatures full of menace, like Darth Vader was. I felt like I could whip Gurney with one hand behind my back and with only the use of an unsharpened butterknife.
The whole story line is focusing on different elements than the book did. DUNE was about Byzantine politics, ghastly atrocities, and drug addiction. Just having characters in the series say 'the spice must flow' several times doesn't cut it the same way that either the book or movie did it. The only dream sequences are when Paul is actually asleep and dreaming; my impression from the book was that EVERYONE was essentially in a spice fog, to one degree or another.
The special effects were OK, some of them. The way personal shields were portrayed were a personal disappointment. The state of computer generated imaging these days is such that, given a typical Hollywood budget, there simply isn't an excuse for anything less than stunning results.
The most annoying thing about the show wasn't the production itself, but the SCIFI channel's need to deluge us with commercials. I frickin' HATE commercials. By the end of the evening, SCIFI was playing 6 minutes of ads for every 5 minutes of content. A signal-to-noise ratio of 50/50 just don't make it, for me.
But hey, it was free! So I'll still tune in tonite, though I won't waste precious VHS tape on it.
Cheap sets?
When I first read Dune, I couldn't imagine that anyone would even *concieve* of trying to bring the story to life. I get the impression that an awful lot of people on this forum take an awful lot for granted. I often wonder if the average age of the Slashdot readership even exceeds the drinking age.
It's not perfect. It doesn't have to be. Ever been to a play? Ever hear of suspension of disbelief?
All the people who worked on this project should be congratulated on their achievement. They spread thier limited funds a very long way. Their only mistake was to extend any effort whatever to placate the anal retentive geeks who have apparently wasted years of thier lives studying this stuff.
--Lawrence Lessig for Congress!
It may have been longer but you can't tell me that it's more detailed. It's far less detailed and part of that has to do with the lack of internal monologues. That's what Dune is. You can't have a decent screen adaptation without them.
For all of those who haven't read the book, the best part of the story is what the people are thinking. What they are thinking is far more interesting than the story itself.
Even the director/producer or whatever said in a CNN interview that he thought the biggest criticism would be over the lack of internal monologues. Most of the book was about what people were thinking.
Indeed. I firmly think that one key to a great story is a great villain -- and the movie Dune blew that badly with Baron Harkonen. The miniseries is a bit better, but still misses the mark.
I never pictured Harkonen as a fat, crazy King Herod knockoff, as both the movie and miniseries directors seem to do. I saw him as a cunning, smart, ambitions political and military Player. One who happened to be very obese and maybe a little crazy, sure, but not to the extent that those traits defined him.
When reading the novel, I pictured the Baron as Orson Wells, in his wine-commercial days, walking around with an unnaturally light step in phenominally expensive suits.
--------------------
WWW.TETSUJIN.ORG
- - - -
The real Tetsujin 28 is a giant robot.
I had forgotten that.
In general, ALL of the characterization was much better done in the movie.
Oh well... that doesn't mean I'm not going to watch the rest of the mini-series. Some parts of the story are just too cool to mess up.
Regards,
-scott
Regards,
-scott
Although I like the fact that the plotlines were much more in line with the book (though I don't recall Irulan and Paul meeting before the last chapter), I do have two major issues with this production:
1.) When is SFC going to realize that a budget is better spent on acting/directing talent than costumes and set design? Come on now: when I saw Shaddam IV's outfit, i said to myself, "Nothing screams 'assmuncher' louder than iridescence and poofy shoulderpads." I would much rather see toned down costumes and sets that don't look like some 1960's version of the future and more acting than the reverse. My god, I hope that 10,000 years in the future the human race is not that tacky!
2.) Maybe its just me, but I really didn't think much of the acting of anyone except william hurt. I got the feeling that some of the actors had done more plays than screenwork, but that's just a guess.
Usil is "The Strenth at the Base of a Pillar" ==>Lazn
The "neoluddite" uprising was called the "Butlerian Jihad".
Especially William Hurt. He seemed to be reading off of a teleprompter. And, what's with all the warriors (Thufir, Gurney) who are overweight.
Best Slashdot Co
Thufir Hawat, the old guy often seen wearing purple and a silly hat.
I reread the dinner party section as an example(page 142 for those that own the book :P) and there was a LOT there that was left out. the whole byplay where the smugglers side with the atredies, (and scare the crap out of the banker(the guy dressed in purple) who is trying to bait paul, and where paul shocks everyone by maneuvering him into a corner (verbally). Not to mention the whole plot of jessica being the traider. (and 1 sentance abotu 'imperial conditiong' certainly doesnt due justice to HOW deep that betrayel had to go.)
I was very disappointed by this too. This was one of the most interesting parts of the first book and I thought they'd surely include it in the miniseries. However, I guess that, without the voice overs, you wouldn't be able to understand the scene too well anyway. And the only way miniseries Paul could maneuver anybody into a corner verbally is by whining him into it.
I am surprised that you found the dialogue better than the movie. I thought the dialogue in the miniseries was awful. Yet I still have lines from the movie echoing in my head. It may have had too much influence from Lynch but I loved lines like the ones exchanged between Paul and Leto just before leaving Caladan about the sleeper awakening. This miniseries just left me realizing just how much I actually did like the original movie.
I know what you mean by the music. There are a few points where you hear the music, and I kept wondering if I was actually hearing the music or playing in my head from the movie. Or that the music that they did play was from the Movie.
As a rock-in-roll Physicist once said, No matter where you go, there you are.
I thought some things were improvements over the movie, such as the steersman/space travel scene, in which the special effects aged poorly in the movie. I also thought the acting was bad... William Hurt is a very bored (and boring) Leto. The accents SOME of the actors were TRYING to pull off were bad. As far as the Luke Skywalker stuff, that is intentional. He's supposed to be a spoiled brat until he goes into the desert, his father dies, etc.
The whole motivation for the Emperor turning against House Atreides, according to Thufir Hawat (in his conversation with the Baron Harkonnen), is that Duke Leto had trained a small military force to the same level of competence as the Emperor's Sardaukar, and was "in a position" to enlarge it. This was viewed as a direct threat to the Emperor's supremacy, and mandated the Emperor's conspiracy with the Harkonnens to wipe out the Atreides.
Until that conversation with Hawat, the Baron had not really understood why the Emperor had helped him on Arrakis. In fact, a large section of the book (the encounter between Count and Lady Fenring and the Harkonnens on Geidi Prime) is dedicated to showing the Baron's political naivete.
Then the Lynch movie wrecks all this subtlety with "weirding modules" and rain-making. Christ.
Has anything come out of the rumors that Sci-Fi channel will be producing an Illuminatus miniseries?
Better than the movie, yes. Understandable by people who have not read all the books. The addition of Irulan to the first part sets up some interesting themes but then again it could destroy the stresses that existed in the later books. Part of what makes Dune memorable was the strains between the characters. I can see some interesting paths not taken. Looking forward to the rest of the series.
One of the more common complaints I read yesterday was about how bad the CGI looked. Sure, it looked like CGI, but considering it's a made for TV miniseries with an appropriate budget I think they did a good job. And does it really matter that the FX aren't the absolute best? I'd rather have a good story than good effects--watch any British Sci-Fi show to see what I mean. Blake's Seven, Dr. Who, Red Dwarf, HHGTTG... all had pretty cheesy FX, but all had great stories that kept bringing me back for more. On the other hand, look at crap like Starship Troopers: ug, what a horrible movie.
I'll def. be watching tonight and tomorrow.
Nathan
If you don't have anything nice to say, say it often.
- Ed the Sock
I've always thought they were a pretty hokey idea, dating back from the early days of SF. I recall them popping up in some early Clarke, or perhaps Asimov work.
Hmm, I think it was Vance, used in some of his alternative civilizations. Also used in Michael Moorcock's Eternal Champion series of works at times.
--- Will in Seattle - What are you doing to fight the War?
Kyle MacLachlan did a much better job as Paul. Due to the pathetic actor in this series, I am abstaining from watching it.
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
first, let me state that i thouroughly enjoyed the david lynch version of dune, although it was by no means a conventional scifi action movie. lynch is an artist, asking him to direct a scifi action movie is like asking dali to design a logo for a fast food chain.
anyway, from watching part one, it looks like scifi has just remade lynch's version, but replaced eagle-eyed cinematography with phantom menace style costumes and effects. hemos saiys it is a "step in the right direction", but moving away from the vision of a brilliant cinematographer and towards an intellectual disaster such as the phantom menace is not the direction i want things to be going.
the story of dune is not an action movie, true fans of the novels know this. anyway, i'll reserve further judgement until i've seen more. at this point, a star wipe to jar jar in a stillsuit doesn't seem out of the question.
-=tonyt=-
I'm a huge fan of the Dune novel series, and the original Dune movie was fantastic IMO. I had high hopes for the mini-series -- according to a number of pre-reviews that I had read, the Director's aim for the mini-series was to be as faithful to the novel as possible. With 6 hours of time to use, I felt that the series had a good chance of achieving its aim.
:-) There was no explanation of the hand in the box scene, the initial meeting between Liet and Paul, or many of Paul's precognitive thoughts. Some of the scenes made up for this lack with extraneous dialog, but the characters came off as over-explaining in these scenes.
:-) Princess Irulan wears a costume covered with butterflies, and the still-suits looked like something out of J.Crew.
:-) with no explanation whatsoever. None of the feel of the betrayal is captured, and the entire time spent on Caladan is portrayed in the first 10 minutes of the film.
:-) if you missed the first 2 hours.
The reality? Disappointing.
From the lack of the "voice overs" to a dismaying "modernization" of the language and outright re-writing of many scenes and plot devices, the mini-series is quite different and lacking in both atmosphere and execution.
Problems:
Lack of voice-overs: the "inner voices" were used with good effect to show the internal emotions and motivations of the characters in both the book and the movie. In the mini-series, many of the scenes are just stupid and confusing (for someone who hasn't read the novel several times like me
Modernization of the language: part of the impact of the movie was created through the wonderfully archaic turn of phrase used by the characters. Not in the mini-series. We have Baron Harkonnen babbling things like "Kinda like firing your boss, eh?", and Paul as a petulant rich boy without an ounce of his destiny showing through. Duncan Idaho has a gratuitous Scottish accent, too.
Costumes: One word: stupid.
Rewriting: Duncan Idaho is killed by a missile instead of a slow-stunner pellet (in fact very little is made of the shields, other than a scene with Gurney and Paul fighting where Gurney is made out to be an overweight, out-of-shape old man), and Paul and Jessica are somehow magically transported to the desert and found by Fremen (with Duncan and Thufir!) during the Harkonnen attack (instead of overcoming their captors with the Voice and crashing in the desert). Huge chunks of the Harkonnen attack and the days before the Atreides leave Caladan are just plain missing.
Characterization: shallow. I don't think I could tell you from pictures which characters were which among Pieter, Thufir, Duncan, or Doctor Uweh.
Sets: somewhat nicely done, although you can tell that most of the film was shot on a soundstage. Much of the baroque feel of the movie is gone, unfortunately, and while I wasn't looking for a clone, I feel that the atmosphere of the mini-series just doesn't do the novel justice like the movie did (light globes with wings, ornate controls on space ships, rain pouring down on Caladan, etc).
Music: there was music? Nearly unnoticed, unlike the movie, which had a theme that has stuck with me since the first time I watched it.
Direction: fairly good, but the pacing is off in several areas. As mentioned previously, Paul and Jessica appear in the desert (after a commercial break
All in all, worth watching if you are a Dune fan just so you can rag on the series. You're better off renting the movie (or watching one of the three versions you have on video tape
Regards,
-scott
Regards,
-scott
Quite a few things that they did better on the SciFi adaptation
-Baron Harkonnen was not the sick and gross individual he was in the movie (although, Fat Bastard was probably a closer match in my mind to the actuall physical appearance of BH
-The sets in this adaptation are much better, although that one symbol thingy in Duke Leto's chamber reminded me of a Nazi Symbol.
-SpaceShip Designs were less dorky.
-The movie flowed well without the internal monologue
-The Emporer's Daughter Irulan had some real dialogue, and while not quite up to Natalie Portman hottie-dom, she's up there!
Ok, on to some misses (mostly minor quibbles):
-Ornithoptors - at least the Harkonnen ones looked decent.
-Funny Hats! For Example, the Sardukar guards for Irulan looked just funky. What where they, French?
-Feyd, aka "triangle man". I mean, triangle man hates particle man, they have a fight, triangle wins, Triangle man! (TMBG)
-The defeat of House Atreides. Did I miss the fight on ann extended commercial break, or did they wimp out?
-House Shields and personal shields. That's one thing I really liked in the Lynch version.
-The Voice! Gak, it's like someone found a way to turn on Audio Boldface. Score another for the movie version, which was just creepy.
-The music is just not good. It doesn't work for me.
I do, however, like this adaptation so far, and won't miss a minute of it. Given that they're announcing a DVD of a behind the scenes documentary, any idea when the real DVD will be out? Right now, I'm as giddy as a little Girl....
From what I've read so far most posters (or those moderated up) liked FH'sDune. In light of this I must ask this:
What F*CKING show were you watching!! The effects made me think I was watching LEXX, you hade actors avoiding the cheesily painted desert backdrops, Duncan was yet again treated like an extra, Paul didn't come off merely moody (WTF is this Luke comparison) he was a spoiled brat!
What's a mentat? "Uh, some guy who help that fat baron dude"
What's the breeding program? "Huh?"
What's spice? "Um, something that flows and stuff."
Please! Harrison did to Dune what Jar Jar Binks did to Star Wars!
I can understand if Hemos and a few other people liked it, but to moderate up ONLY posts that liked it is going a bit too far!
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Hell yes! Dune looked stunning on my satellite dish. Hopefully (well, almost certainly) they'll release a DVD version so you poor cable folks can see what the miniseries really looks like :-).
I never pictured Harkonen as a fat, crazy King Herod knockoff, as both the movie and miniseries directors seem to do. I saw him as a cunning, smart, ambitions political and military Player. One who happened to be very obese and maybe a little crazy, sure, but not to the extent that those traits defined him.
I agree. I don't know why they keep screwing his character up. I actually think they made him worse and I didn't formerly think that was possible. He went from a David Lynch alter-ego (all of David Lynchs' villians are the same) to some poofed up drag-queen wannabe. Like the said in "Children of Dune," the Baron was consumed by excess. He wasn't really crazy. He was one of the smartest people in the book.
Am I the only one who thought it seemed an awful lot like a really, really long episode of Babylon 5? I can't say why, but visually, that's what it reminded me of. I think I liked the first more, just because it had more of that "movie quality," that something that says it's not just another weekly episode of Star Trek. The original movie seemed like a movie. Don't get me wrong on any of this: I did enjoy the first two hours so far...but it just doesn't have it, in my opinion. All of the effects and the like, they reminded me too much of a weekly series. And in my personal opinion, some of the casting was...well, not as good. For instance, while I think the current actor did fine, the first Baron Harkonen was much nastier as a human being, even with costuming aside. And Sting made a much better Feyd. Maybe I'm biased against this make of Dune just because I've always liked the first, but hey, that's just my opinion. Oh, and if you reply to this, don't whine about the spelling of names and the like: it's been ages since I read the book, and how we spell names is really not the point here. :)
Their may be a grammatical error, misspeling, or evn a typo in this post.
Thats what I did so I could get all these nifty channels. :)
I thought last nights episode was good, my ONLY complaint so far is the "teenage rebeling Paul Atradies", what's with that? Other than him I think it's good.
Age depictions: Paul is supposed to be 15. He looks a tad over 20 to me... but then again, maybe people age differently in the future. Mohaim looked a tad younger than I would have expected as well.
Character: Guildsman looked like a cross between one of the creatures from "The Abyss" and BatBoy.
Weaponry: The crysknives (if that's what they really were) look like polished metal, rather than "a milky white substance...".
The Litany: They recited the "litany against fear" incorrectly.
Yes, I understand. I may be overly-critical of this, but I just got a little disturbed with how many things I thought were just plain wrong in this (first part of the) miniseries. It just shocked me that this was supposed to be 6 hours long and it turns out that parts are missing from this that were included in the first movie (referring to the escape of Paul and Jessica as well as the slightly better character development of Dr. Yueh... he at least had more than 7 lines in the first movie!)
All-in-all, I think that this has been (so-far) a decent miniseries... but that's because I read the book(s) first. And we all know that to completely enjoy a movie and not have to sit through watching it nit-picking every little detail that the director interpreted in his own way, we should NOT read the book first. (Jurasic Park, Sphere, The Hobbit, Interview With a Vampire, Battlefield Earth (HA! Not that it was a good read in the first place)... need I go on?)
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From a first time stand point, it seemed that this version is more confusing to the first time viewer than the first movie was. It is missing a lot of details i.e. the mental thoughs of Paul. Remember his personal thoughs all thoughout the other movie. That is missing and it would be hard for someone to understand the story without those. Plus I like the darker nature of the old film in general. This one is very bright and colorful. What does make movies nice is when the are redone and new look and view is given to them. In life everything is one point with many views. All in all, this is still a great production and true Dune fans need to check it out.
P.S. The Fight scene between Paul and Gurney Halleck had better special effects in the old movie.
as they don't make it freakin RAIN at the end.
When I saw that I just about died.
A few other things they've thankfully dropped from the movie:
1. Stained mentat lips - bah! In the movie, they decided that the mentats used a drug to gain their abilities. In the book, only Piter had stained lips because he was an addict - that's partially how the Baron controlled him.
2. "Weirding modules" - wtf? Yes, a society which shuns high-tech will use technology to assist a messiah. Yeah, right.
3. Old Bene Gesserit. Remember, spice prolongs youth. Bene Gesserit were described as almost ageless.
As we go for parts 2 and 3, let's hope they don't make Alia a ventriloquist's manniquin. Let's hope they don't ride the worms like circus performers. Let's hope Feyd doesn't fight like a rock star on speed.
I personally thought it stank. The pacing was way too slow. At one hour in, it felt like 1.5. With 6 hours to work with, one should be able to include most everything and have it make sense. Yet the acting was so soporific that there wasn't any time to do so.
I was watching with a friend who hadn't read the book in a long time, and the friend was royally confused by it. I knew what was going on, but would have much rather had things better referenced and explained. Or at least properly introduce the characters. The secondary characters (Gurney, Duncan, Hawat, Yeoh) are almost indistinguisable and nonexistant. Jessica seems a background figure, an "Also starring" type.
And Paul and the Duke were so horribly miscast. Paul is intelligent, a born leader, a near Mentat, Benne Gesserit trained, even before getting to Arrakis. Yet this Paul seems like an even-more-annoying Luke, some whining, half asleep blond kid who hates where he is. And the Duke, he wants to come off as somewhat royal and impressive, he comes off as asleep.
Finally, there were changes that were just pointless. Why bring Irulan into the plot at all? She is something of a ghostly narrator until the very end. Why bring Chani into the plot as a servent (or I at least think that is Chani, if not, who is she and why bother)? Why change things in needless ways. You need to cut things (although cutting the Bull's head was annoying to me, it said a lot about the Atrades) when adapting such a large novel, but you shouldn't need to add random junk.
Nicholas C Weaver
nweaver@cs.berkeley.edu
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A point here. The books don't have them flapping all the the time - IIRC, ornithopters were jet-powered fixed-wings at speed, and only used the ornithopter principle for low speeds and hovering (mainly taking off and landing, plus as a weapons platform).
Incidentally, you don't need to be able to flap to use thermals - gliders do it all the time. But it's not a quick way of getting about - the very best glider pilots average a few hundred miles a day on good days, compared to the few hundred miles an hour of a jet aircraft which is required for cross-planet transport in a reasonable time (747's, etc).
Filming flapping objects is a real problem though, if you don't want it to look like a Harryhausen stop-motion thing. Even the BBC's "Walking with Dinosaurs" with a pretty serious budget fluffed the flying sequences - the gliding ones were OK, but anything that flapped just moved wrong.
On this subject... I find the whole thing of trying to justify the author with physical science a little bizarre. We're talking fantasy here, folks. He wrote it this way, in his universe it works, and suspension of disbelief means that for the duration of the book we're happy to accept that it works this way. If you feel the need to speculate about the underlying technologies required for each, you're looking so deep at the tree bark that you're missing the forest.
Grab.
There were a few accuracy issues... for example,
they got rid of the water merchant's daughter during the banquet scene, and replaced her with Irulan. Also, a lot of the lines were spoken by the wrong characters... I found that annoying. I figured there'd be changes; that much is pretty much par for the course. However, I didn't like
that they transposed lines.
The movie was produced by Dino DeLaurentiss and showed it. Everything he does looks like a Comic Book. (His other credits include Barbarella and Flash Gordon, which at least work as comics.)
I have to see I found this Harkonen far more sinister and threatening because he *wasn't* played over the top. Again, he was a real villian not a comic villian.
Hurt as Leto was a bit wooden, but I felt that was appropriate as it helped establish the wall between him and Paul.
All in all, the only thing I can think of that I missed from the disaster that was the movie was Sting as Feyd, but I'm holding judgement on the series' Feyd until he gets to do more.
All in all I think this is a much much better adaption then the movie was. The one defense of the movie is that Dune really CAN'T be told in tow hours. That having been said, the mvoie wasted a hell of a lot of tiem on trivialities and then skipped 95% of the story wiotha quick voice over.
And the Sandworm riding scene at the end with Italian surf music in the background was just awful. No two ways about it.
Granted, I read the book the first time was when I was 13, but the thing that made the biggest impression on me was the inner turmoil of Paul's character. The coolest aspects were the mind-over-body control he learned from his mother, and the prescience he was already experiencing before his drug-induced oddessey with the Fremen. Why do filmmakers insist on making this book into a bad set/bad costume extravaganza? When you read the book, you aren't overwhelemed by gratuitous costuming descriptions and pointless technology. The whole point of the story is the coming-of-age of a boy destined to rule the universe (with concommitant power struggles and 60's Green Party agenda). The political-religious struggle between the Emperor, Harkonnens, Bene Gesserit, etc. make this story fun - not the cheesy effects. Too bad they didn't treat this like a character study of power and corruption.
The Stillsuits looked very lame - once again - done better by Lynch. The castles, guild gear, Corinno ballroom, and scenes of Geidi Prime were far far more compelling and engrossing in Lynch's film.
The acting was terrible. Gurney was made out to be a tough dimwit. The actor playing Paul was bad in so many ways I can't count. The Baron's part was grossly overacted. William Hurt obviously did not enjoy being in this series - his lines are delivered in a perfunctory fashion, like he is waiting to leave.
It doesn't seem like any of the talent in this series outside of William Hurt is ready for even network TV.
My hope is that this series will be available on DVD so I can pick it up in the future. Sounds good from what I'm reading in here.
Remember, it's not about the people, it's about the world ;)
--
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
I liked the series, but thought the acting was bad. I actually liked the movie better. As a friend of mine pointed out, the movie is a poetic accompaniment to the book, not really something that can stand by itself. As a poetic accompaniment, it was excellent.
The series is a mediocre adaptation of the book to the screen. It doesn't appear to be a horrible adaptation, yet.
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-- Object known as a camera. Vintage uncertain, origin unknown. - Twilight Zone
One thing that no one hear seems to be mentioning is how they're mispronouncing so many names. I understand that there's no "real" pronunciation in a book, and that the Baron can, in earnest, be either "har-KOE-nin" or "HARK-ih-nin", but I take serious issue with the blatant mispronunciation that the director seems to hope will separate his project from Lynch's work.
To note: "EYE-trey-deez", Duke "LAY-to", and the Mentat "TOO-fur". My mind boggles. Tonight, I'm going to watch for when Paul meets "CHAIN-ee" and learns to transmute the "SPEE-say" of "LEEF".
---
---
Remember when "Truth, Justice, & the American Way" wasn't contradictory?
Is some of the after-the-fact added studio sounds. The qualities of microphone and environment makes it really obvious. Esp. when Irulan "slurped" the spice beer!
I agree on the ornithopters although I'll go futher and say that NONE were ornithopters. By definition, Ornithopters flap.
They're also slow which is probably why they went with the jet-fly-- so they could do a nifty high speed chase scene. Ah well, a small quibble in my book.
Yes I also really liked the blocky, early CGI sheilds in the movie. About the only thing, other then Sting, that I did like in the movie.
In re The Voice, both effects seem inappropriate but necessary to me. I don't see The Voice as making you sound either like a frog (the movie version or like you are standing in an echo chanber (the mini series.) The problm is, its really a mental power that I don't see as "sounding" like anything, but they need to do something to flag it so I find both equally annoying/acceptable.
At least (so far) they haven't turned it into a sonic version of scanner's blowing up heads like I recall they did in the movie (was a long time ago though so my memory may be fuzzy.)
My biggest complaint with the Voice scenes so far is that noone who didn't read the book will have a clue what was going on.
Somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but... The blades on a helicopter are wings. They are affected by temperature the same way a fixed wing aircraft is affected. right?
Defecation occurs.
Yes, I must be included in my own flames... ;)
I'm very much enjoying this miniseries. I'm sure all the critics on this forum, ironically, are watching the series in preference to anything else on television. Why, if it's so unenjoyable? To nitpick? For christsakes, loosen up and have some fun with this. Geez.
As for the characterizations, the comments I've read basically amount to "I had always imagined this character differently." Hmm, maybe the book didn't paint such a vivid portrait after all, if different people can come to have different perspectives on the same character. Or maybe that's just an inherent quality of literature, and people should get over the fact that no-one asked them for creative input during the production process.
I get the impression that people won't be satisfied until they are presented with a gut-wrenching vision that changes the course of history. People seem to take this story way too seriously, and are (surprise) disappointed that some director's interpretation doesn't live up to their expectations. I'm convinced that for this crowd, no interpretation ever will.
--Lawrence Lessig for Congress!
It's been a while, but IIRC Idaho lives on with the smugglers, plotting after Jessica, whom he believes to be the traitor (since nobody witnessed Yeui's actions and it was unthinkable for a Suk School doctor to break conditioning).
This next song is very sad. Please clap along. -- Robin Zander
6pm... when I watched, and then two more back to back showings following.
Here here. I also liked the Harkonens in the movie a lot better. I liked the whole dark atmoshpere of Geidi Prime in the movie. That's what Lynch excels at. And definatly, the actors in the movie were far better. William Hurt isn't very convincing as the Duke, who is supposed to be more repsected than the Emperor.
I'm also gonna stick with it, I just hope it gets more involved.
The OC bible? That raises the whole trouble with bringing Herbert to the screen -- all that backstory (never mind the introspection).
This next song is very sad. Please clap along. -- Robin Zander
I think this is what bugged me most about it; they apparently switched the casting for the old witch and Jessica. Jessica is supposed to be very young looking and VERY sexy; she came across as rather plain at best. The witch (Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam) was supposed to look old, even ancient; despite her grey hair she was more attractive than Jessica (not saying much). What's up with that? I can't imagine that they were so hard up for actresses that they would cast someone who didn't match the physical profile. Even so, haven't they ever heard of makeup? A lot of plainness can be made for with the right techniques.
Oh, well, whatever.
"Space Exploration is not endless circles in low earth orbit." -Buzz Aldrin
Oh my, here I read about the series like I were to see it someday soon now.
Pity us Nordics - give us our fix,
oh mighty ol' feeders of analog pics
(you know, those pricks who barely know *nix)!
This time I won't even go into my typical "blah, you yankees don't even know good old Lem^H^H^H..." - won't.
TV should be not only digitized but netified sooner than it's going to be. Oh well.
I think, therefore thoughts exist. Ego is just an impression.
Nuh-uh! In Herbert's books, Harkonnen is always described as "cherubic". I always thought of the Baron looking like a chubby baby, but with true evil in his heart. A much more sinister character that I think plays much better. His ugliness comes from his evil, not from pus or weeping wounds. That was just laziness on the part of the DeLaurentis production, IMO.
"If you're going through hell, keep going." ~W. Churchill
What do they do? THEY CUT EVEN MORE OUT. There is LESS in the Miniseries
You hit the nail on the head. I'm not sure this is even possible in a 6 hour miniseries, but they managed to get in far less than the movie was able to get in by this point in the story.
Paul picks his name, Muad'Dib And it dosn't mean "Messiah" it is the name of a desert RAT.
So far the movie has been faithful to the book in this respect. They were calling him Mahdi (the Messiah), not Maud'Dib. That's straight out of the book.
Whoever wrote the miniseries must not have EVER read the book.
Oh come one, you are just nitpicking. Only minor things have been changed so far. Less than what has been changed in the movie. But the acting sucks, the costumes suck, the casting sucks, and the screenplay doesn't explain enough if you haven't read the book. Other than that, they have been pretty faithful to the book even if execution is poor.
Hey, at least they have the head covering and mouthpiece...
Yeah, but they had open windows in the palace and no airlock on the garden. Fix one nitpick, create another...
Naked.
How's that for a controversial subject line?
In general I liked the costuming over-all. It visually made the point, at least to me, that the emperial characters were all to one degree or another a spoiled, decadent over-caste.
I'm truely sorry for those that don't like the production. I'm really looking forward to going home and firing up the ol idiot box tonight. I wish I could share that feeling with those who aren't.
The only thing this new mini-series did was make me appriciate the Lynch movie. Granted the movie had a few problems but overall it did manage to capture the mood and atmosphere in a manner that seemed compatible with the books.
This new mini-series had horrible writing, direction, casting, costuming, and scoring. The effects seem shallow and cheap and the sets do little to increase the impact of the story. Its nice that they tried to be more true to the book but I'm not willing to praise such a compromised effort. I'm sure the actors could have done much better given proper material so I can't place any blame on them but I don't see how this mini-series is going to do anyone's career much good in the long run.
A few obvious nits:
Maud'dib - doesn't mean 'messiah'. Maybe they were thinking of the Kwisatz Haderach?
The planet is 'Arrakis'. Was this mentioned even once in the MS?
CHOAM? Excuse me, but the political situation is far more complex than the MS makes out. Its like the MS expects that we've all read the book and are just hanging around for their eye-candy. Mentioning CHOAM might be wise if they want to try and make the MS more than just a stupid action flick.
I could go on for pages but I'll stop now.
*sigh*
I always liked the ornithopters from the game DuneII. You can't see them really well, but they look sort of like a dragon fly, large thin rounded wings that can flap and a jet thrust for propultion. Those scaled up and shot on screen would look amazing.
I think they have done a really good job with this version of the screenplay. I especially like the fact that they are telling more of the story than in the original film. The plot flows better, and the scenes don't seem so disconnected from one another as they did in the original.
I agree about Paul; he seemed a little too impetuous. However, William Hurt made a great Duke! I haven't decided about the Barron yet.
I'm out of my mind, but feel free to leave a message.
More of Irulan - She really got cut out of the movie. I liked the interplay between her and Paul, even if it is completely fabricated.
:)
Then again, maybe I've been watching too much A&E
It was actually filmed overseas(Germany I think), not in Hollywood. But I get your point.
I think this is what bugged me most about it; they apparently switched the casting for the old witch and Jessica. Jessica is supposed to be very young looking and VERY sexy; she came across as rather plain at best. The witch (Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam) was supposed to look old, even ancient; however, despite her grey hair she was more attractive than Jessica (not saying much). What's up with that? I can't imagine that they were so hard up for actresses that they would cast someone who didn't match the physical profile. Even so, haven't they ever heard of makeup? A lot of plainness can be made for with the right techniques.
Oh, well, whatever.
</rant>
"Space Exploration is not endless circles in low earth orbit." -Buzz Aldrin
What was the deal with Piter? When you first see him, he looks like he's reading his lines from the script! And what's with a mentat needing to write a plan down on paper anyway? And to reference that paper when asked about the plan? Sheesh, I mean I know Piter is supposed to be a flawed Mentat, but come on!
I DO agree that the mentats were downplayed and thats unfortunate. Harkonnen's mentat at least got some exposure, but didn't Atriedes have one too who was important? (Its been quite awhile since I read the book.)
That having been said I still think this is already much better then the movie and I'm enjoying it.
I've seen a fair amount posts that read something like: "You whiny fanboys will NEVER be satisfied and have nothing better to do than pick nits. C'mon! It is awesome....." Bullshit! Harrison made a big deal in interviews of following the book closely. The drubbings are well deserved. There were a fair number of things that were questionable but forgivable like the butterfly guild navigator but things were going downhill well before then.
:-)
Paul is depicted as a petulant spoiled brat. What the hell was up with him getting an attitude with Gurney and throwing his shield belt on the floor? His personality didn't improve much after that either. All of the Duke's lieutenants are badasses who can give orders with hand gestures. Where did they find this used up preachifying idiot? The Paul of the book was disciplined, loved his mentors and VERY competent.
The pain box scene was a total waste. This mysterious woman shows up to torture Paul's hand just because "He's getting Bene Gesserit training too." There was nothing at all about the difference between a human being and an animal who happens to walk on two legs. Come to think it, no explanation of the Bene Gesserit is offered whatsover. They're just these strange women who can order Jessica around and torture hands.
The Atreides in the book were painfully aware they were being set up but they hoped they would be able to find their way out of the trap. These Atreides are goony faced fools who are delighted at all the money and influence this is going to bring them. There is also no real introduction to Paul's mentors other than the total botch of a Gurney. "Singing soprano." Sheesh!
They completely glossed over Yueh's betrayal. If he wasn't wearing one of those stupid hats I would have been hard pressed to tell him from Thufir (say, what happened to the Butlerian Jihad and the subsequent need for human computer/advisors? We aren't even properly introduced to him before he betrays the Duke...yeah they explain it afterwards but it's totally one-dimensional. Yueh was an anquished soul thirsting revenge against the Baron. Not this wooden martinet SERIOUSLY expecting to be reunited with his wife.
I could go on and on about the wooden acting and the shallow (and dead wrong) characterizations but my hands would get seriously tired. I WILL touch on the unforgivable travesty they made out of the dinner party scene. The book's dinner party featured cuttingly witty schemers probing for weaknesses. The series dinner party is nothing more than a device to wrongly insert Irulan into the story. This was predictably followed by some 90210 romantic tension with Paul. It was made clear in the book that Paul did not like her and only used her as a means to ascend the Imperial throne. He never even consummated the marriage.
I'm aware that some artistic license has to be exercised to adapt a large story to the screen. In short, I know some things have to be cut and condensed but ADDING anything whatsover is unforgivable especially when important details have been glossed over. Harrison should have his artistic license revoked. (And yes, that means he can't play Chromium or read his mail with XFmail either
is scifi.com down, or what?
Why not have a 12+ hours version of dune? Instead of making it into a miniseries, make it into an one-season series. Plenty of time to explain the book, and because of filler and the director's changes, /.ers will find something to flame about.
I think the problem is that ornithopters would be very difficult to CGI and have them look realistic . The Harkonnen flyers at the end looked like they might could have pulled it off with those long wings though.
HAHA. He looked like Skywalker, and his voice sounded just like him.
M$ stock dropped in 1/2 since last year. If you are a MCSE, you will be broke.
The first episode of the Mini-Series is awsome. A few parts went into a great deal more detail than the movie some parts weren't. The special effects were fabulous. My only major beef was the fact that they were never on caladan (sp). And Paul reminded me way to much of Luke Skywalker. He even had that weird mole thing on his cheek goin. I said to my romates taht they should have casted Mark instead. And where can I get some Spice Beer? Two gulps! He was gone! I want! Im sick of having to pay for atleast 6 Beers at the Bar.
--------========+++Dont Feed The Lab Techs+++========--------
Well I missed the first part last night. So I tuned in tonight hoping to be impressed. First let me say that I am a hugh Frank Herbert fan. Now I understand nothing can be perfect but the 15 minutes of the show I watched tonight was horrible. I did not watch enough to see if the acting or plot was any good but I could not get over how horrible the effects, costumes, and sets were. The desert shots were obvisouly done on a small sound stage. you could obvisouly tell they were using back drops. The cosutmes were probably the worse. The still suits looked baggy on the people, and they where a light color. Now the still suit is a very important part of the book and the beatiful part about how Herbert wrote it is that it actually works. The suit is supposed to be skin tight for a reason, it keeps the mositure in. The things they had one looked baggy and made of fabric. Fabric breathes, a still suit cannont breathe, it defeats the purpose. Well that is my 2 cents worth. In the end I have no plans to watch the rest of Dune or any of the other ones for that matter, not until Sci-Fi decided to spend more then a few dollars on sets and costumes.
Ifyou haven't read the book(s) or at least watched the movie, this is not a good place to start. However, I do not think it was ment to be for someone who has not read the book before. Things I liked: Paul: I agree he is kinda of the Luke Skywalker Type, but in the miniseries, he is presented as obviously having flaws. To me this makes him more real. In the movie, he is seen as too perfect. Duke Lito: I can't remember who plays him, (he is the only American actor i recognized). We get to know more of him and the life he has created for Paul and his house. Guild: Contrary to most they looked closer to what I pictured when I read the book. They look as if they, at one time, were human. Also the movie showed the actual folding of space. Cinematography: Hands down awesome. The cinematographer( I forget his name) is great and expensive. He is doing this basically for free. The series was lucky to get him and they wouldnt have unless he himself didnt love the story. More of Duncan: He was in just a few scenes in the movie eventhough he pays an important role in Dune and in all the other books (he is cloned like 67 times!) THINGS I didnt Like: To Bright: Yes the cinematography was spectacular, it was just all too bright. I Liked the dark almost pure industrial look of the movie. Jessica: Bad acting, When the duke dies, her emotions are pitiful(my humble opinion) Lack of Voice overs
There are many wonderful points here of how the Sci-Fi channel has managed to totally defile the beauty of Frank Herbert's universe. Not the least of which was making the horrible mistake of trying to "update it for the kids" and re-write the dialog.
My biggest beef is with the mentat actors... WTF is that all about?! The original Piter (Brad Dourif) caputred the essence of what a mentat was ment to be. It took me the first hour and a half to figure out who the hell the mentats were! Everyone was too busy running around in horribly overwhelming colors. When I did finnaly figure out which one was Piter I weeped openly.
Brad Dourif portrayed a true mentat, with his wild eyes and shifty manners. A real tweaker right there, not a friggen comatose weirdo in 13 colors! Perhaps if a passionate director were on board for this miniseries we could see some life from the current actor.
I also echo the several thousand complaints lodged here, but I won't repeat them.
disc-chord --- would pray the end is near if he had a messiah
I hear they spent three whole months on the post-production and it shows!
The WB has never seen anything like this before. Take that, 7th Heaven!
www.ridiculopathy.com
But now he is not alone. I do not remember the name of the director of the mini-series, and I dont care to. He has taken a work of art (the book) and turned in into utter crap. The plot changes are pointless and serve only to diminish the potency of the story. The casting is horific, the Duke is no duke he is a bitch, and if I ever meet him on the street, I will make him MY BITCH as I kick him around for such a poor job of portraying a fascinating character. Oh, my apple IIC is capable of better CG then this movie. I am going to go sulk and then re-read the book now.
OK, I haven't seen it, it may never even come out here, but are you serious? Paul Atriedies is not Luke Skywalker! He is noble heir, a mentat, trained as a soldier, general, politician, priest and more. He is not your average 15 year old :)
:)
Skywalker, OTOH, also has good breeding, but he was raised on a farm! Not the same thing by far.
Besides, Skywalker is a dyed-in-the-wool good guy. Mau'dib is better compared to Genghis Kahn or Alexander the Great
> I decided on this action after reading about
> the Dungeons & Dragons teenagers in America,
> and all the reality-removed mischief they got
> up to, thanks to the influence of SF.
Do you realize this is an urban legend?
Even if they totally glossed over the subject of the book, I'm more interested in seeing dr Yeui brought foward, at least enough to match his pridominance in the book.
One other note though, I loved that scene where the assasin is running, and Gurney takes him down, all my friends and I were certain at that moment that the story had been re-written with Gurney as a bad guy.
-GiH
First I must take issue with the costuming.
Why were the emperor's elite soldiers, the Sadurkar (sp?) terror troopers, etc, etc, wearing giant poofy berets? And did anybody else expect Shadam the IV to break out into 'I Will Survive'? The costuming was confusing at best, and outright silly at worst. Irulan's butterflies were really surreal, and having to listen to my husband sing 'Triangle Man' every time Feyd was shown with the surreal triangle plastered to his back got old. ;)
And then there was the casting...
Now not all of the actors suffered from blandness disease, but a lot of them did. These are very -vibrant- people in the books, and in the Lynch film. And yet so many of them this time seemed to suffer from 'Blah'. They also seemed mis-cast. Stilgar in particular drove me nuts. He's supposed to be this very thin, powerful looking warrior from the deep desert, and instead we get a pudgy generic sort of fellow. I could forgive Gurney having gone to weight, but Stilgar, who must actively fight in an environment of limited water? Couldn't they at least have tried with makeup or something to make him look a -little- less like a stereotype of an accountant? Kudos however, to Baron Harkonen, who managed despite weak writing to manage as best he could with the part. I loved the actor as Potiphar in _Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat_ as well.
Confusion?
Did anybody else have trouble guessing who was who half the time? I don't think a very good job was done with character identification. For me, this hurt the story. It didn't mean much that Yueh was the traitor when we didn't know who he was. (And well, who can beat Dean Stockwell in the Lynch film? Admittedly, it made it harder for me to watch him as Al in Quantum Leap, years later, but it was still a great performance.)
I won't even begin to touch some of the weird stuff, like Irulan showing up way too early, and the apparent switch between nice expensive visuals and really -cheap- sets. There are, after all, limitations to what one can do with a complicated story like Dune. I was a just disappointed, I guess, with the director. He did Earth 2 as well, a series I really enjoyed. I was expecting a lot more. Still, I'll keep watching it, for scenes like the one with the fountain and the water squeezings, bright moments of redemption in what otherwise manages to be a farce.
Not correct Duncan is still alive but paul doesn't see him till after he joins up with the fremen
> Do you realize this is an urban legend? Ummm...no, I knew Dallas Eggbert. He was quite real, and quite troubled. Oh, and you should recognize a troll when you see one. ;)
No cable here, thus no sci-fi channel. (just moved, flat broke, yadda yadda) The withdrawls are terrible, but now i am dying to see Dune. Anyone tape it that is willing to share? Will cover cost of tape and shipping if you can help me out. Email me with your list of demands. alt145@yahoo_dot_com.
I said no text damnit!
"The best special effect is one the audience doesn't realize they've seen."
This is a near-quote from George Lucas w/r/t episode I.
When tricks like the blue eyes work so seamlessly, you stare at the pixels on your screen to see the vibrance, or the details of the worm, that's when it works.
I love B5. The fact that so many scenes were shot on 'virtual sets' (aka blue screen matte chopped through a computer) and the damned show still looks real was one of the things that attracted me to it.
Too bad Netter Digital has gone bankrupt.. and I can't try to get one of those SGI 540's.. drool...
I used to be someone else. Now I'm someone better.
Real life is underrated.
Did it have the death of Thufir Hawat? That was in the script, and mentioned in the making-of, but didn't make it to the version I've seen.
OK OK So its really just a stage play. So its an "adaptation" But where in hell are the wierding modules?????? weren't they an intergral part of the story???? What the hell???
May I have the curved deoscibule, please? It's not here, Dr. Banzai. Ahhh... let me have the straight one then.
So his nickname therefore is "Toofy"?
Sure but if you didn't read the book or watch the movie, you'd have no idea what he was trying to do. You would just assume that people like usig freaky voices in the future.
That was Gurney Halleck. Idaho was killed in the
Ecological Station, after meeting up with Kynes, Jessica and Paul. In the book, he died fighting off a hoarde of Sardaukar; here, he ate a missile.
hmmmm..
Maybe it was just me.. no.. I just checked the tape.. Look at the Harkonen craft if you want 'true' ornithopters. I believe however; that some of you have taken alot of what appeared in the games, and what others wrote after Dune, and applying it to the vision expressed by Herbert. The simple fact is that he rarely talks about wings flapping on the ornithopter (In fact, I can't remember even on time.. but I give the benefit of doubt), only setting them to certain degrees.. ie when taking off to escape the worm, Leto set them fully back and fired the engines, risking the destruction of the wings.. which also suggests that the wings themselves ARE post-wright brothers design.
Just because wings move, and they author misnamed the machine, dosen't mean it's a mechanical bird.
-GiH
I found this Harkonnen more charismatic - I could BUY him as a leader. I can see him as dangerous because of his mind and a disarming sense of humor.
"The Sage treasures Unity and measures all things by it" - Lao Tzu
I read the CNN interview, and that was enough to push me to the side of "wanting to see the mini-series"..... with the director claiming to adhere to the novel very closely...
Just a note to the director...
NEXT TIME TAKE FUCKING NOTES!
Come on, Paul was raised to be royalty, he was raised to respect himself and the people he was to rule. His father was a man of action, not some mumbler. Irulan and Paul meet???? Huh ? Must have been the comic book series I missed... and then to top it off, he botches his script by switching lines among SIMILAR characters, guess one fighter is just another to him. Yueh was a major factor in establishing the story, and he is practically brushed off in the equivalent of one page of script (probably double spaced at that)
Effects can be tolerated, the worms are pretty cool... but apparently thats supposed to sell the movie.
The movie, while it had some faults, did at least look right. Better yet the movie came closer to matching the appearences described in the book (like hair color). The movie looked very rich, and decadent, a near perfect portrayal of a bloated government more trapped in its trappings than in actually governing.
No, this is quickly turning into not-DUNE.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
I wish Paul was more SERIOUS and disciplined. Oh its good that he acts like a human but I always thought of Paul as a 40 year old in a teenage body- never having a childhood. The movie losses all that and it is missing the meat of the political intrigue. As has been noted by some, he acts like a young skywalker when he SHOULD act (to stay with the starwars theme) more like the young Obi One Canobi[sic?] (in The Phantom Menace).
I miss the Karma Whores.
John Harrison should be taken out back and whipped with a switch. I've heard people say that his version (fabrication) of Dune was better than Lynch's. BS. No way! Hasn't anyone noticed that Harrison's version is NOTHING like the book. It's a complete fabrication. Now he gets the right to destroy Children of Dune and Dune Messiah! Unbelievable. People...this version sucked. Let's all admit it!
No...it's okay...I wasn't using my Civil Liberties anyway
Of course we know Lem.
Edith Keeler Must Die
not great. I think so far that the mini-series is better than the movie - I really didn't like it, even though I'll watch it whenever it's on - the one thing that they could have done better fairly easy was the blue-on-blue eyes: why not just use totally blue contact lenses? The eyes glowing in the dark - and not blue at all in the side-shots - really gave the thing a cheesy look. Other than that I'm glad that Baron Harkonnen looks like a real person - just fatter than hell - and not some acne-gone-wild puffball. No voice-overs is good. I'm waiting until the whole thing is aired and then watching it back-to-back on Sunday (didn't somebody mention that) to digest it and then decide. I'm glad it's on, tho; Dune rocks my socks!
"shop smart:shop s-mart" ash
Okay,
I'll first reiterate that i think its MUCH better then the worthless movie.
That having been said, even with the drecrease in the cost of CGI in recent yearts, the clearly did not have the budget to do this the way we'd all like to see.
6 hours just isn't enough to tell a story of this depth and complexity. The plot "feels" greatly accelerated and jumps at tiems for no well motivated reason.
And there were a numerb fo desert shots tonight where they tried to save money by using a static backdrop for the sansd that just didn't work.
Al lthat said I'm STILL enjoying this. There is a lot thats good about this production. I like the actors and the director's visual sense, and the interiors are rather stunning.
All in all, after two nights, I give it an 8 out 10 for a valient and reasonable effort.
But there is still room for someone to do the 20 hour epic and do it right.
Has anyone else seen the ad for Evil Dead: Hail to the King?
It was on during the DUNE break.
It was GREAT!
I now know what it would be like to hhave Bruce Campbell chasing me down a suburban neighborhood!
I was wondering if anyone can point me to this ad online.
I was not impressed with what I saw. Bad costumes, bush-league acting, banal dialog, and amaturish cinematography. Maybe it was just a poor scene, but I didn't stick around and wait to see if it got worse.
Are sci-fi junkies really so un discerning? Ealier that evening I saw some of a really terrible Voyager episode about renegade holograms. I realize that Voyager isn't the best thing to come out of the Star Trek genre, but the plot of the episode was so idiotic it was insulting. It's a shame. There's a lot of sci-fi material out there, and so little of it is worth watching.
However I will say this about what I have seen so far:
Would comeone tell me what the hell "Stellar" means?
Your point would be much more salient if the director himself hadn't made such a point of reassuring all us nuts that he *would* be following the book(s) *much* more closely than Lynch did. His Irulan fiasco is lamentable, and sadly the best scene in the series so far (as far as character development is concerned). And I've seen more comments on the crap acting and cheap sets than on the fact that Paul can't remember the Litany Against Fear word-for-word.
In conclusion: hrumph yourself.
-Mith
--
Granted the scenery and attention to mysticism was better in the movie but Sc-Fi's Dune is a different world alltogether.
The new Dune is more sc-Fi than the movie. By that I mean, we see the classic bright sharp lines that movies like 2001 showed us. I do admit that i preferred the dark ancient feeling that Lynch showed me, but I also enjoy this interpretation. Overall this visual interpretation boils dow to this:
As for the script, I think that Lynch had a deeper feel but Sci-Fi has more time to develop this. For instance we begin to see the mysticism of Dune through water in the Arakis headquarters when the wet rags are collected. They also demonstate how the non-Fremen are not as mystical as they splash water on the floor (an obviously elitist act). If you notice only Lady Jessica mentions this. This also demonstrates how the Bene Gesserit have ancient roots. Sci-Fi is slowly bring out a sharp contrast between 'Believers' and the rest of the lansraad.
I hope my suspicions are correct and that tonight we will see the seeds of mystery unfold. Unlike Lynch who had to spill the beans all at once due to time constraints.
Lemme count the ways... Irulan is _not_ supposed to be a major character until
the end of the book. Herbert did this for a very specific reason. Note that her
name is an anagram of 'Urinal'. Chani is apparently a member of the household
staff??? wtf. It's never explained what Suks, Mentats are, which would make
this miniseries very hard to understand for anybody who hasn't read the book.
Duncan Idaho gets pulverized by a missle???? Again, complete nonsense. Yueh's
role is made very minor even though his actions are _very_ important to the
development of the novel. And Paul is _not_ supposed to be whiny and stupid.
At the beginning of the book he is already very well-trained. And the costumes
were pretty uniformly ridiculous. The CGI was also quite bad, no better than
Babylon 5. You can say I'm just nitpicking, but John Harrison stated in many
interviews about how he's following the book faithfully, blah blah blah. He's
either lying or he never read the book. I guess I never should have expected
more from a Sci-Fi Channel production. The Irulan scenes are just unforgivable.
Just out of curiosity, what was it about that movie you especially disliked? Was it the movie itself, or the fact that Verhoeven had $100mil to do one of the greatest sci-fi novels ever, and did "Alien: 90210" instead? Was it the lack of armored suits, which was what bugged me most? (unless you haven't read the book, in which case I assume it's just the movie) Personally, I find Dune much more annoying- it's attempting to be a real interpretation of a great novel rather than a trashy multiplex flick, it makes less sense with more beer, and it isn't long enough to do the job right. And it's a shame Lynch had to change some minor things that just aren't what Herbert wrote (like the weirding ways).
As long as I ignore the mental image of Heinlein crying at what they did to his book, I find Starship Troopers quite enjoyable. Drugs and alcohol help a lot, too- it's a lot more fun watching it in my dorm room Friday night than it was in the theater. It's a crappy movie, but a very well made and watchable crappy movie. No artistic value whatsoever, but that goes for most movies nowadays.
The one thing about that movie that is terrific is the CGI. Wow. Really, no other movie I've seen has used so much computer animation and made it work. Star Wars Episode I? Garbage. Verhoeven's bugs rule.
I thought Usul was the name of the little mouse that does the "pop-pop" thing? And didn't, in his dream, they call him Usul and Muad'ib?
Whoops! It's been a couple of years since I last read the book. Maybe I just have a mental blackout whenever a character named "Duncan" gets the chop. :)
This next song is very sad. Please clap along. -- Robin Zander
You know... I wish I could -1 Flamebait this... but instead, I'm gonna give you the flame you're looking for.
You, sir, are an idiot. To prohibit something from your children on the basis that it's removed from reality? I supose you don't let them watch Loony Tunes (that'd be Bugs Bunny and Roadrunner cartoons), or for that matter, Teletubbies (which is about as removed from reality as you can get without chemical influences).
And, just since I'm a gamer geek... those things you read about 'Dungeons and Dragons teenagers in America'? Hogwash, all of it. And that wasn't even sci-fi. If given a choice between my kids stabbing an orc or shooting a robot, I'll take shooting the robot.
If you're going to make a life-altering decision for your children like that, at least make it in an informed manner. If not for sci-fi, many of us would have grown up to be low-IQ auto mechanics or drunken sluts. If we grew up at all.
Let them decide what they want to read. Only step in if you find them spending too much time on it. Pre-emptive banning is only a good thing when drugs or other crimes are involved.
I disliked the Sci Fi Channel's production of 'Dune' on many levels, most of which I'll try to describe and rationalize here (although I wish I'd had a notebook handy while watching the movie). Also, I wish I could say more, but I'm writing this from work, and must be brief.
Before I continue, let me say that I don't believe the movie was intended to meet the high expectations I placed upon it. I am a notoriously harsh judge of literature and movies. I am of the opinion that Hollywood has lowerd out standards of what dictates a 'good movie', and of the many productions released to the public every week, almost none are worthy of attention. I feel that 'Dune' is not far off from Hollywood's ideal of a 'good movie'.
I feel I should also recognize that many of you probably liked the movie quite a bit, and may even be offended to hear me speak so lowly of it. Let me assure you, I criticize only the movie and not its viewers. If you liked it, I truely envy you. I regret that I couldn't sit down and simply take the movie for what it was. When given the choice between disappointment and satisfaction, believe me when I say I'd choose the latter. I only wish it were a conscious choice.
To summarize the previous paragraph, I'm not trying to force my opinion on anyone, nor am I saying mine is better than anyone else's. My opinion is exactly that, so please take it as such.
Moving on...
Actors
Alec Newman
Its interesting that Hemos should mention Luke Skywalker in his post - my roommates and I made the same comparison last night. Alec Newman was a horrible choice for Paul Atreides, and played a big hand in ruining the movie for me. As an actor, he had far too much animosity and angst than seems appropriate for Paul's character. I realize that Paul is a teenager, but he's also had a fine education, Bene Gesserit training, and has been staring responsibility in the face his entire life. Alec Newman portrayed a somewhat spoiled little boy who seemed upset when he didnt get his way rather than the proud, diciplined, selfless heir to the House Atreides. I'm not suggesting that the book-bound Paul Atreides was the perfect son and student, but at least he portrayed a noble upbringing. Alec Newman came nowhere close.
William Hurt
I wish I like William Hurt. He seems like a nice guy with a bunch of potential, but his way of droning slowly and unemotionally through dialog make me dislike the characters he attempts to portray. Not that I've been exposed to much of his work. To date, Dark City, Lost In Space, and Dune have been all that I retain in memory. But if these three are at all like his other works, I'd rather save myself the frustration and simply dislike his style altogether.
Ian McNeice
I don't have much to say about Mr. McNeice, partly because he's so unremarkable, and partly because I'm taking time out of work to write this.
He wasn't a bad Baron Harkonnen per se, but he was leagues away from being compelling in the least.
General Environment
Sets
The 'sets' looked more like today's insta-offices with a futuristic pastel twist. You know, those types of offices usually used by new dot-com'ers that can be erected in a day or two. On the surface, they present an acceptable look for conducting business, but closer evaluation of materials and style show haste in construction and generic, bottled stylistic themes. Honestly, the color motifs chosen for this movie made me want to gag. Everything had disgusting amounts of white, blue, purple, and bright red. This was especially noticable on Arrakis, which should have portrayed a desolate and worn appearance, but instead reminded me of my company's reception area.
On top of that, every wall, floor, decoration, and piece of furniture that we saw in the movie was perfect and unblemished. Everything was bright and cheerful. Nothing looked remotely, lived in, tarnished, used, or even broken.
Extras
So did they borrow the extras from MTV music video shoots or what? Especially the extras on Arrakis, those who were supposed to be Fremin. They had the slightest of five o'clock shadows set on perfect, clean, unblemished faces. No one in this movie - let me stress that: no one - looked like they had ever seen a single day of hardship. Dressing actors in rags does not present the image of a virtually indentured labor class.
Sardaukar
There was a confrontation between (I believe) Gurney and a Sardaukar soldier. Does anyone remember this? Does anyone remember thinking the Sardaukar looked stoned? If anyone should have looked fierce and intimidating, it should have been the Sardaukar. The movie's Sardaukar looked like they would turn tail and run from a pack of wild dogs, much less the Atreides and Fremin.
Character
Or rather, the lack of. There was nothing distinctive about any character in this movie. They were all extremely bland, reciting their lines in an almost monotonous, can't-wait-to-get-back-to-my-trailer kind of way. I feel that people watching this movie with no previous knowlege of the story would have quickly become bored with character development, since there was virtually none at all. Alec Newman gave Paul Atreides something of a personality, even if it was Luke Skywalker-esque. But the Duke Atreides? What happened to the powerfully compassionate leader who's people showered him with love? What happened to the sensuality and mystery of the Bene Gisserit, those who weave destiny, those whos' accumulated knowlege is incomprehensible? What happened to the mystery and awe behind Paul's destiny? Just because the messiah-like nature of the Paul's character is a common one in SciFi/Fantasy stories doesn't mean it should be cheapened down to just another sub-plot.
The characters were so uninteresting that I wouldn't think of suggesting this movie to someone wanting to become familiar with the Dune experience.
CGI
The money that should have gone into finding good actors and designing convincing sets were wasted on bad special effects. My definition of 'bad special effects' could be synonymous with 'obvious special effects'. CGI looks like CGI. Its too shiney and perfect to be convincing, yet its the best we've got. It appears that the makers of this movie decided to throw money at animators to have an abundance of 'extrodinary' visually appealing scenes, but I think they missed the fact that the story is what captivates most people, not the mental image of what the future will be like. When I read Dune, I experience the thoughts and emotions of the characters. That I can relate with these characters emotionally is what makes me revel in that experience. That such careful planning and plotting is etched into the story makes it intellectually appealing. Is this just an action-adventure flick or the retelling of a unforgetable tale of love, hate, mystery, romance, and politics?
Conclusion
This was just another Sci Fi Channel made-for-tv flick. Most Sci Fi Channel productions (both TV series and movies) lack for the same reasons Dune lacked, because they all have the same weak points: bad acting, (poor) over-emphasis on the appearance of the physical environment rather than the characters and their uniqueness, unbelievably clean-cut environments, and more. (Personally, the clean-cut environments are what really run these productions into the ground for me.)
Am I alone in thinking this? Am I wrong? Am I right? I only know for certain that I'm tired of being disappointed.
Nick
ps
The last half of this post is kind of rushed, and was thrown together in bits and pieces of free time over four hours. Sorry for any jumbled thought flows, I'm trying to get everything posted before this topic dies. (This also means 'no spell-checking'.) :-)
Thanks!
Good points:
The bad:
Overall? I'm taping it and watching it (heck, I got off-LINE to watch it). Not perfect, but a damn sight better than a lot of stuff out there. I hope it encourges more risk-taking and miniseries (instead of over-extended series).
"The Sage treasures Unity and measures all things by it" - Lao Tzu
Subj.
Anybody knows why? Lots of Dune fans or just network irregularity?
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Hyperom.com
I think the new Dune miniseries clearly owes more to the old Batman TV series than to Frank Herbert's or David Lynch's work. Although there have been a few parts that seemed well-dramatized, for the most part the zany costumes and comically exaggerated overacting (from both accomplished actors and unknowns, so I have to assume it was a decision of the director) scream camp. Although the novel has its flaws, and sure, in places it lends itself to a campy adaptation (esp. the earlier scenes with the Baron), the miniseries looks like it will pass on the opportunity to draw from the depth of the novel.
I suppose I am obligated to indicate how many times I've read Dune and the rest of the series. I have no idea though. Probably 30 for Dune, average of 5 for the rest.
dan
ps my subject line is not intended as a reference to the use of the word "batman" to refer to the character Patrin who shows up in heretics of dune.
One thing that I did note... It seemed to skim through a couple details here and there. The perfect example of this was Leto's new "tooth". In the book the tooth was extracted, the new one put in, and it's purpose explained. In the movie, it was just shown and mentioned. While this is fine for those of us that have read the book, my wife, who's never read it, was confused.
I suppose it's a good thing that they didn't feel the need to waste time explaining minute points.
One minor nit... At times the accents (Duncan's especially) were so thick that it was dificult to understand what they were saying.
If thats the worm....SHOW ME THE TEQUILA!
yah, they were better when they still played with the original Fremen...
"They think its sexist"
"They think its sexist"
"Well, whats wrong with being sexy?"
I've seen several comments along the lines of "the bastards don't know what an ornithopter is!"
I strongly suspect that they do know what it is, and may have tried to portray them. I happen to think that a flapping machine is just gonna look dumb, no matter how large the special effects budget is. I suspect, for the non-die-hard Dune fan, having an ornithoper is just gonna be too weird, and get in the way of their enjoyment.
I've always thought they were a pretty hokey idea, dating back from the early days of SF. I recall them popping up in some early Clarke, or perhaps Asimov work.
It was ages since I read Dune, but I don't seem to recall that ornithopers being more than just mentioned in passing. Is there a reason why people are so insistant that they be a part of any canonical film version of Dune?
Is there any way to view those films from europe ? Would be great
Will it be rerun? I wonder if anyone mpeg'ed it or recorded it in some way? If so I'd like a copy.
I pulled out copy of Dune and did some checking.. Paul is s'posed to be 16 (And Jessica about 30ish-14 when the Duke took her).. The movie meeting of Paul and the Reverend Mother was more accurat(dialog/the voice/etc.) than the MS is .. It was raining in the book (as it was in the movie).. Ane prolly lots more *reading book as quickly as I can and still comprehend it*
UPS Sucks
It's like masturbating with a cheese grater - sort of interesting, but mostly painful.
"Reality is independent from perception." - RDH
Observations on "Dune - The Suck Ass Mini Series"
When they originally announced that Dino was going to do the Dune movie, I was just certain it would suck. Considering the limitations of special effects technology at the time - Dino did one hell of a job. The casting was excellent, everybody could act, and he followed the book pretty closely.
In fairness to the makers of the mini-series, they didn't do *everything* wrong. As far as I could tell, all scenes were well focused. Good camera men.
"Help! I'm getting dizzy! The spinning!" - Frank Herbert (from the grave)
"Reality is independent from perception." - RDH
Personally, I liked the Luke-ish qualities of this miniseries's Paul. It seems to me that a younger person in his position (having his life and essentially, his freedom, taken away by the responsibilities imposed on him by his position in society) would be quite likely to have a somewhat more rebellious outlook on life. At least, I sure would. I like the new Paul.
--
SecretAsianMan (54.5% Slashdot pure)
Washington, DC: It's like Hollywood for ugly people.
What about cartoons? Do you limit certain cartoons that aren't based on reality?
Being a parent myself, I believe it's important to encourage children to explore their imaginations. How dry every piece of literature would be if one's mind were not allowed to wander into the unknown. We would have no Jabberwocky or Grinch. No Aladdin or Little Mermaid.
--
Wooden armaments to battle your imaginary foes!
the longer length by itself is enough to make this a better effort as the director can now put more of the details and story into the MS than the movie could ever manage. am i the only one here who thinks that lynch's "internal monologue" technique was stupid? it breaks up the flow of the movie completely! i always thought of it as a cheater's way of expressing emotions without doing any work to try to translate those emotions into film. we might as well have the actors just sit up there and read from passages in the book then. the internal monologue thing reminds me of deanna troi in the first season where all she did was state the obvious-- "I feel pain" or "I sense confusion". just stupid. and to those who think the new paul is whinier than luke skywalker... you need to go back and see episode 4 again. paul's not even in the same whining league. at least they picked an actor who is vaguely the same age as the character rather than more than a decade older. another thing i like about the ms that i hated about the movie is the stillsuits. the movie's stillsuits had a completely open face. at least the ones in the ms cover mouth and nose. how am i supposed to believe that the movie's suits can conserve all that water when you're blowing out water constantly through vapors in their breaths? the shields are actually more accurate in the miniseries, since i recall that the shields were supposed to be invisible. the movie effect was kinda neat (if a little gaudy, but hey it is lynch) but not accurate to the book at all.
"No, no, no. Don't tug on that. You never know what it might be attached to."
Did anybody notice that the House Atreides symbol looked like the Atari 'A'?
That being said, it's been a lot more faithful to the book so far, though there have been some irritating deviations and omissions. It is definitely nice to see the Baron being played closer to the book than the moronic pustule Lynch gave us. It's also nice to see the role of the Bene Gesserit being given its proper weight instead of being totally glossed over the way it was in the Lynch film. And I have to agree that Paul-as-Luke-Skywalker is really irritating, but it is worth noting that he does begin the book as a rather spoiled teenage boy, however disciplined he might have been.
Despite being mildly disappointed, I'd keep watching just 'cause Irulan is a babe.
--
Proud member of the Weirdo-American community.
Idaho wasn't a mentant until he was ghola-fied. And he was supposed to die battling 12 sardukar not some cheap ass missle strike.
Peter Horoszowski Children's Television Workshop
Looks like when it came time for hiring cast members, the budget was a little thin. Fortunately, there were a few dozen second-rate German TV actors ready and rearin' to go.
William Hurt was a poor choice as Leto, he has no "presence" whatsoever. I can't imagine that Leto being "popular" or inspiring loyalty in the most desperate Harkonnen slave. More disappointing is Paul, I can't imagine him leading a Jihad on a thousand worlds. The liberties with the plot (like Irulan showing up on Arrakis!) would be fine, if only there was some feel of character. (Notice too how the fremen reverence for Jessica just appears without Jessica doing or saying anything at all remarkable).
Was anyone else upset that the Sardaukar looked like an aging troupe of gay thespians?
BTW, it's spelled "Dr. Yueh".
Everyone knows that damage is done to the soul by bad motion pictures. -Pope Pius XI
You are robbing your kids from great experiences. One of the benifits of sci-fi/fantacy books is that it opens a kids mind to new ideas that they didn't think of. A lot of the sci-fi can found to have drawn from reality--usually in the form of cultures.
I grew up with sci-fi. My father was a bug sci-fi fan. I saw all the Star Wars movies in the theaters (both old and new). One of the older Sci-fi (1800s) predicted the fax machine before it was ever conceived.
Sci-fi also plays out things that could happen and presents new ideas. In some was sci-fi/fantacy is needed in society. Without dreamers, a society can become stagnent(sp?). It is the dreamers who pave the way to the future. Sci-fi/fantacy helps to open a child's mind to these new possibilites. Sci-fi/Fantacy helps them view a new future that contain new devices and technology to improve (or hurt) "modern" life. Some great warnings can be found in sci-fi/fantasy.
By banning your schild from reading modern sci-fi/fantacy, you are hurting your child in the long run. You allow them to read King Arthur and Camelot? Which versions of the legends? They have change over time. Those stories, the Arthurian legends, are Fantacy for a different era. In some ways you are like the person who refuses to use a car because it is new.
These are but a few of the befenits of sci-fi/fantacy. The problems you complain about only occur if you allow your children to become so immursed that they lose touch with reality. That problem is not limited to sci-fi/fantacy. Do you not allow your children to read Sherloc Holmes? They want to copy the vialians. My point is that a child can become so involved into something that it can distort there precetions of reality. To limit your children's reading of sci-fi/fantacy becuase of what they might do if it takes over there life is ridiculous! The same thing can happen with other things.
If you do your job as a parent to insure they get a wide exposure, and not just one type, you won't have a problem. A lot of those kids that got involved in the miscief that they did had other problems that were not addressed by there parents. They sought escape form there problems in D&D instead of dealing with them, and that is what you need to provent. That can happen with any liturature--even King Arthur!
At the next eco-hypocrisy-meeting, count the private jets used to get to the meeting. Should be interesting to see that
I think the worst is Jessica, who looks all dowdy and motherly, with no grace or self-control at all. Actually, that goes for almost everybody -- the characters look and act like mall-going, bar-hopping, SUV-driving "just folks" rather than highly trained and disciplined people who regularly rely on their wits and cunning to survive.
And the desert shots were just painful. It's distracting to me when the lighting in the painting on the screen five feet behind the characters is completely different from that on the characters faces, or there's a clear horizontal demarcation between two completely different colors of sand. My favorite shot was at night, a blue cast on everything -- except the dunes behind the characters, which looked like they were still in daylight.
This show really makes me wish I were a dot-com billionaire; then I could afford to have a good version of this thing made.
The mini-series actually got it right. Harkonnen is a Germanic sounding name, it is pronounced like the German "Harkönnen" (that's an o with an umlaut, pronounced like "could".)
Meldroc, Waster of Electrons
"Looks like Dune was pretty succesful last night. The SciFi Channel has already announced that Dune Messiah and Children of Dune will be produced. The sequels will be also written/directed by John Harrison."
Feh. What I want to know is, will SciFi be doing a release of National Lampoon's "Doon"?
"I must not have fun. Fun is the time-killer. Fun is for children, common people, and the help..."
Overall, I thought the minisereis started out good. The acting, with the exception of Duke Leto, was good. I think that the charachters were fairly true to their lierary counterparts, in terms of the feeling they created. Liet Keynes was a particularily well casted charachter, so was Rabban. Another thing I did like was the Guild Heighliner, very cool loking ship, but the navigator looked, well, ridiculous.
Yet another thing I did like was the worm graphics. The rest of the CG was merely passable, but the worm shined through-it had a great sense of size and power. Finally, I liked the fact that, unlike the movie, the director did not try to directly translate the book for the movie. The story was somewhat rewritten to be more appropriate for the format, a prudent decision.
Nothing is perfect, and this movie is no exception. While I like the fact that it is interpreted version of the book, some changes are almost too egregious. The most anoying thing of all was the romance between Princess Irulan and Paul. In the book, Paul did not like Irulan, he never did, and she entered into the story very near the end. Further, Irulan did not at first like Paul either, though she did later, in Dune Messiah.
Also paiful to watch was Gurney Halleck telling about his days in the Harkonen slave pits. Duncan Idaho was the one in the slave pits. The last major problem I saw was the ornithopters. Only the Dune computer game has got it right so far: they should flap their wings like a bird.
In any case, it was highly enjoyable to see this not suck.
Yes, I'm still a junky. Are you still a bitch?
Or what about a comic book? 'The Dark Knight Returns' is a good example of how the medium could be used.
- First take an established novel/film franchise and photocopy the script. Add no more than three additional scenes and take out a great deal of drama and character development- as well as any pesky inner-dialogue.
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Begin shooting. Cut together the dailies and find that the show will run short- very short.
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Have the actors talk slower. Hire Bill Hurt to slip into a coma on camera.
-
Lengthy landscape shots eat up loads of time (See: Prince of the City), but they are expensive.
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If the actors refuse to speak more slowly, run the footage at a lower fps.
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Sell the DVDs before anyone sees a frame of it.
the sleeper must awaken!Most of you are acting as if you just endured a Vogon poetry reading. (Under no circumstances should you allow a Vogon to read poetry at you...) while I am reacting like Arthur Dent. (Actually, I kind of liked it.)
Geez, some people need to get a life.
Meldroc, Waster of Electrons
OK, I haven't seen it, it may never even come out here, but are you serious? Paul Atriedies is not Luke Skywalker! He is noble heir, a mentat, trained as a soldier, general, politician, priest and more. He is not your average 15 year old
Relax, it's not that extreme. He's not your average 15-year-old, but he is a 15-year-old. There's just a slight twist of rebelliousness (and aloofness, too) about him compared with the Paul in the original movie, that's all. It's not a total Luke conversion. Indeed, that would be bad.
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SecretAsianMan (54.5% Slashdot pure)
Washington, DC: It's like Hollywood for ugly people.
My problem wasn't the development of the Doctors character, since it wasn't all that developed in the book either (more than the movie, but he was never a central character except in the one act of betrayal - well - double betrayal)
My problem was what didn't get explained. Part of whats importent about the Dr is that he is Suk trained. It was only mentioned once in the movie but, supposedly a Suks training to be loyal can't be broken.
There were alot of little things like that. Stuff that is easy to explain in a book format, but not in a movie, since it has to be worked into the dialog somehow.
Another similar problem - the sheilds. The sheilds deflect a fast blow, but admit something moving slowly. This is a very important aspect of the fight.
Also... Guild navigators were never seen or even described in the physical sense until the second book. Also, I seem to remember Irulan being blond.
Also...I seem to remember more dialog with Piter and the Baron.... again another unexplained thing - whats a mentat? Or the fact that Idaho is a mentat.
The book was still better, but this blows the original movie out of the water. I can't wait for tonight.
-Steve
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
Dune should have stayed small instead of selling out anyway. I still think "The Starlost" was an awesome Sci-Fi show, and I hope there are others like me who enjoyed this show.
Capt. Ron
crazy dynamite monkey
Or the fact that Idaho is a mentat.
Idaho isn't a mentat... yet. Idaho became a mentat in the second book ("Dune Messiah") when the Bene Tleilax 'regenerated' Duncan Idaho in their Axlotl Tanks from some of Duncan's cells. They then 'trained' Duncan to be a mentat and gave him as a 'gift' to Paul Atreides. (I'm trying to explain this with revealing as little as possible. =)
Number9
I think, however, that the thoroughness of the adaption (as seen so far) is its greatest weakness. Herbert's novel was not written to act as a screenplay, and I think that this adaptation would probably play very poorly with someone who was not very familiar with the novel's material. The novelization allows the characters to be developed in ways that arguably should be compensated for in a screen presentation (presentation of internal monologues, detailed background descriptions, etc.).
For these reasons, I actually thought the scene that was least faithful to the novel was also one of the most dramatically effective -- namely, the encounter between Paul and Princess Irulan.
Finally, on an unrelated note, I was hoping for a slightly more epic score. Granted, writing for a six hour miniseries is a daunting task, but an epic story like this deserves music which paints in broad, thematic storkes.
The characters were miscast. William Hurt was terrible. I found the acting flat and uninspiring which didn't lead to good character development. The character development was in the book but the acting failed to translate it. I felt no empathy to the characters. To quote Homer Simpson...BORING!
Let me just say that I haven't read the book or seen the prior movie, and was just trying to enjoy it on it's own.
My entire enjoyment of the show was destroyed by the villains. I couldn't get past Harkenin (sp), the non-threatening, one-dimensional obese plotter and his lieutenant, the one-dimensional rage machine, who keeps getting sent to screw up plans for the obese plotter.
Plotter: "Ha ha ha, my evil plan will gain me power as I betray everyone. We've always hated the good guys."
Lieutenant: "Grr. GRR!"
(foppish minions laugh aristocratically)
I'm thinking to myself: -This- is who prompt the spoiled brat to become a hero? You're kidding! No sense of menace or dread at all.
I imagine it must be much more rewarding to see a great book given life in another medium, but as an open-minded outsider, it was pretty tough watching.
I taped it, so I'll go back and look, but at one point I thought Duke Leto said very plainly, "Who is this Muad'dib they are talking about?"
Regards,
-scott
Regards,
-scott
Dune was so much cooler when only the hard core sf fans knew about it, but now everyone will know, and it will get ruined.
Rather than getting upset that lots more people are getting into and enjoying Dune, why not aim for an attitude of smug superiority and condescension instead? I'm sure you'll find it much more pleasant.
America was so much cooler when only the hard core Indians knew about it, but everyone knows, and it has been ruined.
When, in the book or movie, did anyone walk around outside without a stil-suit? Open windows? What's with that triangle that a snotty Feyd is wearing? How 'bout those scary Sarduakar Terror Troops with the floppy William S. attire? The hats were funny. When did black leather cease to be bad-ass clothing of choice? Does eveyone in the future dress like a dink?
I LIKE the new stillsuits. Well, I like them better than the ones in the Lynch movie. The Fremen look more like I thought they were described in the book, with robes and masks. They have a genuinely frightening appearance coming up out of the sand. I never cared for the whole bondage look that Lynch did, and could never figure out how those little tubes were supposed to capture moisture when everyone is talking and breathing through their mouths.
As far as the story goes ... the novel has too much depth and is too long for even 6 hours to do it justice. Lynch dealt with this by cutting giant chunks of the movie out, but he pretty much explained what was going on in every scene he used. This mini-series make some huge assumptions, and the decision to eliminate the characters internal monologues was a huge mistake, since the novel depended on them so much.
I don't much care for the pronounciation of various things in the Mini. Like, "Harkonnen" and "Chani." The pronounciations in the Lynch movie pretty much matched what I thought they'd sound like when I read it the first time. PLUS, Lynch had access to Herbert, who was still alive when in 1984. I even had a tape of an interview with Lynch AND Herbert ... wish I could find it so I could see how Frank pronounced certain things.
Interpretive dancers doing the post-water-of-life orgy scene??? Huh???? Well, it's TV I suppose. And why did the hunter-killer look like a sperm? They pretty much ignored the doctor and his imperial conditioning, and covered up his forhead HIDING THE DIAMOND TATTOO. C'mon, you know we were going to look for it.
The Chech actress playing Chani is a better choice that Sean Young was, I thought. I dunno, maybe the accent. The portrayal of the Barron in the mini is, I think, better. Evil and nasty, but not stupid...and not oozing slime on the floor either.
Fans of the book (and Dune is on my Five Favorite Novels list) can fill in the blanks in the mini and probably enjoy it.
One-ton tomato
Lady Jessica (Francesca Annis) - Current lover of Ralph Fiennes, who is 20 years younger than her. (Hurm ...)
The Emperor (Jose Ferrer) - Dead.
Nefud (Jack Nance) - Dead.
Thufir (Freddy Jones) - Dead.
Barron Harkonnen (Ken McMillan) - Dead.
Alia (Alicia Witt) - Not dead but I bet you didn't know it was her.
Chani (Sean Young) - Career Dead.
One-ton tomato
I think the screenwriter, the director, and the actress went way overboard with Jessica's grief after Leto's death. Yes Jessica wept in the book, but there wasn't all the limp-wristed wailing and sobbing (and gnashing of teeth) that is portrayed in the miniseries. Jessica is a Bene Gesserit witch after all -- I think the screenwriter may have gone too far distancing Jessica from the other Reverend Mothers the miniseries presents to the viewer.
Jessica is flawed by love, but that doesn't make her the snivelling, swooning charicature of Helena Bonham-Carter that we're given from the miniseries.
I finally figured out who the character of Irulan has become -- the screenwriter combined Irulan with Fenrig's wife. In part two she seduced Feyd and she's the one scheming behind the scenes. Fenrig is reduced to a bit player, and his wife is non-existant.
IMHO combining Irulan with Fenrig's wife simplifies things and lets us see more of one of the better actors in the production. BUT, again we see the lesser Bene Gesserit reduced to nothing more than scheming Dynasty wenches. Change the makeup a little bit and Irulan could be Donna Mills.
I like my ladies a bit more butch. <g>
My two cents.
Get off my virtual lawn, you damned virtual kids!
Yeah, it was a sign of Imperial conditioning. I haven't read Dune in awhile and posted that at work without the book around.
Thanks, I figured that out when I got home and looked in that list of the terms used in the book at the end of it. Still, they should have named him Usul first. And what was up with that sudden appearance of the term Kwisatz Hadarach last night? Why bring it up in the middle of the movie. Did they cut something at the beginning about it?
It seems like one of the cheapest ploys in sci-fi to make differences obvious is to give a character or community some silly hat. Reverend Mother Anteac looked like the fairy queen; the Sardaukar looked like a bunch of 10,000th century frenchmen ("Wanna buy some used imperial lasguns? Never fired and only dropped once!").
I think that the broad rewriting of plot and dialogue done by Harrison works well for the purpose of translating a terribly cerebral book to the screen. My only real irritation is that it seems like the casting was done in an Irish pub - Gurney, Duncan, Liet-Kynes and Stilgar look like they consume a gallon or two of Guinness every day. They don't project the sort of cultured-killer auras they have in the book (then again, with the imperial Sardaukar looking like a bunch of frogs from across the channel...).
I wish they'd pulled a few of the cast from the Lynch's version: Max von Sidow as Liet-Kynes; Jurgen Prochnow, but cast him as Gurney.
Anyone who loves or hates any language, platform, or manufacturer, doesn't know what they're talking about.
The lack of realistic Ornithopters is, in my opinion, a good use of artistic license by the producer/director. Why? Because "flapping wings" on an aircraft is a terrible idea from an engineering perspective. With all due respect to Frank Herbert's vision, this was a good cut in both the movie and mini-series.
Now, let me start with the down points (a littl more refined a list than I put in yesterday's story):
- Casting was ok to horrible. Hurt is a good actor, but should never have been made to play Leto. The guy playing Paul was good (see below), but the Barron was just not imposing enough.
- Paul was written all wrong. Read the book and pay attention to the turmoil that Paul's going through. He senses his destiny, but can't put his finger on it. He's moody, but he's also a brilliant leader by nature. Not much of this comes through in the character in this miniseries.
There are some thing I would liked to have seen, but most of it is secondary to those points.On the good side I point to everything that I liked about the book. The fremen are still a mystery at this point in the story, but I love the whole guild idea and the machinations between house Attradies and the rest of the empire. Jessica is weakened slightly in this telling, but I still love her character.
Feyd is well done, here. A real mad wolf the way he comes across in the book. Can't wait to see how they handle the final fight.
Some odd choices were made. Paul voicing lines that were his father's in the book (about how to deal with the smugglers). The princess showing up early and playing nice with Paul. Some of it, I'm sure, was because he felt that the audience couldn't keep up with the story, given how much he had to cut out, but I'm not sure I like the changes.
There's still some questions that I have. Without doing the David Lynch style voice-overs, how do they intend to handle the water of life? For that matter, what about the confrontation with the emperor at the end where about 50% of what's going on is in Paul's head? That could be handled very badly, but we'll see.
So far so good. I'm actually excited to see what this guy does with the rest of the series.
That's right! I had forgotten about the conditioning part. Time to read the series again, 15 years is too long.
Anything is possible given time and money.
I can't believe all the good words this miniseries is generating. I gave this show 90 minutes last night before I finally turned the channel in disgust. Perhaps for the novice/new Dune fan it may have been entertaning. I found it to be very unsatisfying. After what I consider 2 failed attempts (the movie the other) at trying to recreate this world I've come to the conclusion that Dune is too complicated of a story to translate into a comercial movie/mini-series. The only way to accuratly portray this would be anime. So until then I'll just re-read the book.
Ignored Since 1973
Is this post meant to be flame bait, or does it just seem like that to me?
Okay, look--you're allowed to raise your kids anyway you see fit and that's great. I mean it's great to hear you're actually taking an interest in how they develop unlike some parents.
However, I have to disagree, at least a little, with your criticisms of sci fi and fantasy.
Firstly, I'm not sure if you're aware of this or not, but Dune is a fairly oldish book. This is not some recent thing. If you saw the movie and thought, "Wow, this new fangled SF things just keep moving farther and farther away from what's real," then you are in error insofaras you may have thought that the story itself was new--it isn't.
Second, whether or not something is "removed from reality" depends on how you look at it. Obviously the fictional world of Dune is not the real world we live in. But look at the themes and ideas in the story. Those characters have thoughts and feelings and have to fight battles and wars--just like people have had to do in the past and still do today and will have to do in the future in our world. It's not really so different from the real world when you break it down to the fundamentals. Of course they have fantastical creatures and powers in their world, but that's partly just to keep things interesting and give the reader/viewer something new to think about. You can learn a lot about the world you live in by reading about some fictional world and comparing it with the real one.
I guess I can understand you wanting to keep your children mentally "grounded on this plane of existence" so-to-speak, just please don't go overboard. Maybe when they're a little older, like fifteen or sixteen, you might want to consider letting them play some D&D on occasion, if they're still interested. After all, if you don't let them, and they really want to do it, they might just do it anyway behind you're back--and then you'd have no control over it...
Furry cows moo and decompress.
I think you're trolling, but I'll respond anyhow. SF can be superior at providing "life skills and insights", compared with "traditional" fiction, in much the same way that a metaphor can be better at conveying a message than an anecdote. Your children are missing out on a wealth of experience simply not available in non-speculative fiction. There's not a single sentance in all of Hal Clement or Robert Heinlein that could harm a child, and much that made me who I am today.
Two points:
-- Jeff Paulsen
somethings were certainly done a LOT better than the 1984 version .. (where there just wasn't enough time) and the SFX were a lot better. The costuming - well .. i just never pictured paul wearing a leather leaotard when he was walking around in the desert.
I have to say the dialog between characters is a lot better .. however .. no matter HOW faithful they planned to be to the book there is just too much there.
I reread the dinner party section as an example(page 142 for those that own the book :P) and there was a LOT there that was left out. the whole byplay where the smugglers side with the atredies, (and scare the crap out of the banker(the guy dressed in purple) who is trying to bait paul, and where paul shocks everyone by maneuvering him into a corner (verbally). Not to mention the whole plot of jessica being the traider. (and 1 sentance abotu 'imperial conditiong' certainly doesnt due justice to HOW deep that betrayel had to go.)
im also a little dissapointed at the death of duncan (ESPECIALLY if they are going to film the other books), and a lot of the political intrigue is gone. I mean , i read the books .. i *knew* he was going to die .. but when I watched it . i had NO idea he was just killed. (till the 2nd time) with a plot line THAT important to the book .. you would think they would have made it a bit more clear.
paul acting like a brat is ok .. since he WAS .. untill he went to the desert. (even if I'm not sure how he just appeared there .. without a stillsuit - commercials are great)
i would also have like to seen the 30 mins they took out for the american version ( nudity smudity .. im hoping they put some plot back in.)
all in all .. we have to take all this with a grain of salt . its a movie .. not the book .. when is a movie EVER as good as what you can imagine by reading the book ? ill watch the epispode tonight .. but it will be a flip on tuesday .. the girl in dark angel is kinda cute :P
--Ne auderis delere orbem rigidum meum, non erravi pernicose!
What if Einstein was restricted to reading fiction only? What about all our great explorers of the mind/reality? Thinking outside of reality is fiction. Adding scientific accuracy to this is science fiction. Can you clearly define the line between Camelot (A place that never existed) and Star Wars (just another place that never existed)?
:-) It's simply part of becoming an adult and defining the line between what is ideal, or fantasy, and the hard truth of reality.
Science fiction is stuck in reality. It is tied to reality. The science backs up the fiction but it's simply a artistic tool used to accentuate the circumstances. In DUNE the underlying theme is not "look at this fantastic world removed from reality", it's "look at this fantastic story of a boy's journey to manhood and the people's basic need for freedom of thought"
*note - when totally left to their own devices, teenagers inevitabley will find trouble. I think even if you simply gave them two sticks and nothing else they would somehow find a way to burn the house down
The movie managed to get more done in a shorter amount of time.
The mini-series is so much more confusing than the movie was -- I think the lack of voice-overs was an extremely bad decision on the part of the director.
On the whole, the movie was a much more accurate portrayal so far.
Regards,
-scott
Regards,
-scott
I enjoyed last nights episode immensely.
And hrumph to all the mewling anal-retentive critics who's idea of analysis is to to nitpick how precisely the adaptation matches the book. And hrumph especially to the nitwits who simply view this as an excuse to prattle about their knowledge of CGI idiosyncracies. And then there are those who for some reason feel compelled to compare to Star Wars!?
If you must have the book: turn off the TV, and read the damn book then! If you can't let your mind go enough to overlook the limitations of CG technology, you'll just have to wait awhile before you can enjoy these kinds of escapist fantasies. And if you think Star Wars is the yardstick of all things SciFi, well, I don't know how to help you.
This was good entertainment. I hope future such projects aren't put off by the lamentations of a few detail-obsessed nuts who haven't the faintest clue how to do better.
--Lawrence Lessig for Congress!
Well, since somebody already asked the question about commercialization of Dune, I thought I'd go on and point out a Dune concept album that was recorded in 1997 and released in 1999, I think. You can't tell from the picture, but the album cover also features Pi to 100 digits.
Personally, I think the second two-hour bit of the miniseries was pathetic. It was painfully obvious where the actors were walking in front of a static background (no green-screen points for this folks).
It was also really really hard to believe that in a society that values the conservation of water SO much that people would be so casually removing the mouth coverings on their stillsuits or worse yet walking around UNDER THE OPEN SKY without they stillsuit on (scene where Stilgar sees the spiceblow, both Stil and Paul are NOT wearing stillsuits).
Also, where did these people learn to pronounce some of the words. It's har-CO-nen not HAR-ka-nen. It's FEY-da-keen not fah-DI-kin. The fremen seitches were IN the rock, not surrounded by rock. The fremen children didn't laugh, chase each other around and play. They were just as much a part of the _warrior_ culture as the adults. Baron Harkonnen was incredibly fat (400 kilos I think) not mildly pudgy. Paul and Gurney run into each other in the middle of a heated battle not knowing the other is still alive, Paul doesn't see Gurney and decide not to attack the smugglers.
One of THE MOST UNBELIEVEABLE scenes was just after crash, Paul is calming sitting IN THE SAND UNDER THE OPEN SKY WITHOUT A STILLSUIT ON. The book does not mention that. The book repeatedly reminds us that NO ONE goes into the desert without a stillsuit. And where did the 'fall down a dune' thing come in? If I remember, Paul steps on drum-sand and that's what brings the worm.
The actors involved were pathetic as well. The sets were weak (see above). The special effects weren't awe-inspiring. Maybe it's just me, but even in rags, the Lady Jessica also (in my mind) would hold herself regally, not like a weak servant.
The miniseries, quite plainily, was a waste of howeever much money they spent on it.
The only GOOD things that I saw in Part II were the worms (much cooler than the movie), and the fact they there was something that approximated an ornithopter on the ground with a Harkonnen patrol next to it (of course the patrol was soon dispatched by fremen who mysteriously burst out of the sand like baby worms).
--Maarten
I did not like the Dune Miniseries the settings looked more like a videogame than a movie the worms were cheesy as were the settings and the actors rushed there lines out which made it look unbelievable and in the original dune movie you could here what they said in there head you lose a lot without that.
I am a major Dune fan (read all the books many times) and I've got to say that the mini-series is leaving me feel underwhelmed. I was hoping for something that felt more comprehensive that the movie, not less. It's probably due to a lack of voice-overs but I wouldn't know what the hell was going on if I hadn't read the books.
I was never one who slammed the movie because I was amazed by how much they managed to fit into it. You may have needed to watch it a few times to fully understand it but it was there to understand. In the miniseries, you would have no idea about what was up with the voices (in the Paul-Reverend Mother exchange) if you haven't read the book.
The acting also sucked big-time. Even William Hurt. And I don't really notice acting unless it is really good or really bad. And well, I noticed it. The costumes also sucked it up. And although the Baron Harkonnen had his leanings, shall we say, in the book, he was a creature of excess, not some poofed-up faggot. He looked like Liberace. I figured that anything they did with the Baron would be an improvement on the movie. I was wrong. Neither ever properly reflected his genious.
Not all was bad though. The ships were cooler. I actually like the ornithopters much better. The worm kicked ass. Much better than the commercials had initially lead me to believe. No screwed up animals hanging everywhere (David Lynch is a freak when it comes to animals). No telepathy. No wierding modules (cool idea but they under understated the Fremems' fighting abilities). Gurney and Idaho were alright. They were the only actors I could tolerate. The shield belts were also cooler. The depiction of how the Guild navigators fold space was an improvement.
Back to the bashing though, what was up with Jessica and Paul suddenly ending up in the desert with no explanation whatsoever? There was just no coherence at all. I preferred the movie look as well. It was more appropriate for a post-Butlerian Jihad era. And I never god the feeling that Paul was a mentat, much less the Kwisatz Haderach. I guess that the feeling wouldn't mean anything since there was no explanation of what a mentat was. Or a Bene Gesserit for that matter. The various mental disciplines throughout the Dune novels was the core of the story for me. You can't have Dune without explaning, on some level, that people have abandoned most technology in favor of being able to do for themselves. That feeling of evolution needs to be there to understand Muad-Dib's place in the world.
All that being said, I love Dune. I'm glad to see any interpretation of it. I'm glad that they are making "Dune Messiah" and "Children of Dune" as well. Although I thought they were the weakest books in the series, if they do well, they might do the last three books which kicked ass. "God Emperor of Dune" was as good or better than the first novel and I would love to see it on my big screen.
Perhaps not knowingly, but you did start a personal attck on me. By saying that sci-fi is dangerous and that it can cause problems in children, when I myself had read more sci-fi by age 12 than most people (/. readers excepted) do in a lifetime, you implied the belief that I was a sci-fi-driven loony. You compounded this by refering to American teens having problems with reality due to games like D&D.
/. was -not- goin to get this sort of response?
I certainly hope you do not continue this blasie attitude of yours that by hiding 'the dark side' of the human psyche from your children, they won't be affected by it. They will. When they smoke a join in the bathroom with a friend at age 11, they'll have to deal with it. When they're beaten by classmates for looking funny, they'll need it. Sometimes, the story of a man who protects aliens from people who hate them can be far more comforting to a child than simply being told "Well, hit them back then."
That, and I'm somewhat bored and feel like ranting about stuff. Honestly, did you think posting this to
Basically, what I've seen so far is far superior in terms of a representation of the written work on the small screen than Dune The Movie was.
There are a few exceptions - the stillsuits in the movie were far superior than those in the series, for example.
But, the ornithopters were killer, the acting is much more balanced and believable, the feel is very good. Cinematography, if not quite so epic, is much more believable. And that, alone, makes this a good TV series.
People forget that all science fiction requires that the viewer suspends disbelief. This acheived it; the movie did not. I'm not saying the acting is better, it's just more balanced, more in tune with the written work it's based on.
But hey, what do I know, I'm just a lifetime member of Cinema Seattle, and watch a few hundred international films every year.
--- Will in Seattle - What are you doing to fight the War?
Mainly because of the nudity, from what I read. It does appear that this was one of the cuts that was made, but what a bad cut to make. I could have done with fewer shots of the Arrakeen city model and that little completely-made-up scene between Princess Irulan and Paul.
Regards,
-scott
Regards,
-scott
The mini-series seems to come off as being a lot less corny than the movie.
The new Dune seems a lot closer to the spirit of the novel than the movie, which I though was a bit too "Desert-Punk".
I remember seeing the movie with one of my friends when it was released. We left the theater laughing, though not bitterly disappointed. What was up with Paul & the Fremen riding the worms with "Queen" music in the background?
Oh, well. Dune is a splendid classic and it's good to see it given another chance.
The novel(s) I really want to see turned into a movie(s) is Ringworld and Ringworld Engineers! Now that would kick ass!
The only thing that we learn from history is that nobody learns anything from history.
I do not think the miniseries could have been any worse had it been made by 4 year olds.
Come on, the book was great.
The movie was good. They did not have enough time to do the whole book, so they had to cut some.
Now comes the miniseries... They have 6 hours in which to correct the mistakes of the movie.
What do they do? THEY CUT EVEN MORE OUT. There is LESS in the Miniseries, and MORE ERRORS than in the movie.
What dogshit.. If they had not called it Dune, perhaps it would be OK, but it dosn't Follow the book AT ALL.
Paul picks his name, Muad'Dib And it dosn't mean "Messiah" it is the name of a desert RAT.
The Harkonins were not kicked off Arrakis because of low spice productions, nor was Rabban in charge of Arrakis before Duke Leto. Every 100 Years the CHOAM contract changes, the Harkonins had to give it up, 100 years had passed.
Duke Leto did not say "the first defence against a trap is knowing of it's existance" Thufi (SP?) did.
Paul was not a Sniviling brat of a boy eather. He was a respectable young man, almost ready to be duke.
Whoever wrote the miniseries must not have EVER read the book.
I mean come on, the emperor's daughter was a bookworm and historian not a dancer.
The list goes on.
If Frank Herbert was alive today I am sure he would be mortified by what was done to his book.
Take an epic masterpeice, make a movie of it, then take the script of the movie, tranlate it into chinese, then back again, then have a toddler draw on it with a marker and have someone who has NEVER read the original book, but saw the movie 10 years ago try to make a miniseries with what is left and you would come up with the exact same thing as what we have now.
I mean you have 6 HOURS to work with, and you CUT MORE out than what the Movie had? I mean COME ON.
==>Lazn
On the plus side, the set design is adequate, and they did a good job with the worms. Here's hoping that it will improve with the next installment.
Meesa Bad.