David Lynch’s Dune (1984) | RETRO REVIEW

Directed by David Lynch — Screenplay by David Lynch.

With the recent release of Denis Villeneuve’s hotly anticipated Dune: Part Two, it felt right to finally have another look at the first major adaptation of Frank Herbert’s 1965 sci-fi novel Dune — i.e. David Lynch’s Dune from 1984. Even after having ‘rewatched it,’ I’m, honestly, still not entirely sure if I had seen this before. I’m pretty sure I watched this when I was a kid and was obsessed with sci-fi (I watched everything), and, as I was watching it, it felt like I had seen a lot of this before. I asked my dad — who showed me Star Wars, Stargate, and whatnot — and he’s pretty sure he showed me Lynch’s Dune as well. But, hey, 7-to-10-year-old-me probably struggled with this as much as moviegoers in the 1980s reportedly did (Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert apparently both hated the adaptation). Now, it’s so interesting to view this after having seen Denis Villeneuve’s two-part adaptation and having read about 300 pages (or so) of the original novel. Now, I don’t want to take anything away from David Lynch because I think he is a very good filmmaker, and he, himself, has essentially admitted that he failed with his adaptation of Frank Herbert’s iconic novel, but, man, let’s just start by saying that Villeneuve’s adaptations are an improvement on Lynch’s film in every conceivable way. 

As this film looks retroactively at the Lynch adaptation and makes comparisons between it and Villeneuve’s recent two-part adaptation (both parts of which I have previously reviewed), I won’t give a detailed plot summary here, other than to specify that Herbert’s Dune tells a science-fiction story in the distant future, where House Atreides is assigned by an Emperor (played by José Ferrer) to be stewards of a borderline inhospitable desert planet known as Arrakis, which contains a powerful and valuable ‘spice,’ that the entire universe is built on. The Emperor’s intentions are not entirely good, however, and soon the Atreides family find themselves in harm’s way.

Now, I will say that Lynch does manage to cram in most, if not all, of the major story beats that Villeneuve’s two-parter gets through, so he should get some credit for that, even if it was, ultimately, unwise to do so. Frankly, I even think it’s fair to say that Villeneuve plays it safer than Lynch did concerning the Spacing Guild and Navigators. Villeneuve made smart omissions that prevented his films from being potentially inaccessible to new viewers. Lynch’s film, on the other hand, always feels insistent on cramming in as much as possible. That said, the various story beats of Villeneuve’s Dune: Part One are relatively close to most of Lynch’s film. However, Villeneuve’s interpretation focuses on the Fremen and Chani, and his opening works much better for the overall narrative than the exposition-heavy Princess Irulan, Spacing Guild, Emperor Shaddam IV, and Bene Gesserit scenes in the opening of David Lynch’s film. To completely alter that opening impression is one of Villeneuve’s masterstrokes since Lynch’s opening is overwhelming. 

Given that Lynch only had a single feature to cram everything into, he eventually had to speed up things, and this is especially felt in the section of the narrative that Villeneuve told in his Dune: Part Two. What Villeneuve took over two-and-a-half-hours to tell in Part Two, Lynch is forced to rush through in maybe thirty-to-forty minutes. Paul’s rise to power, his romance with Chani (and her character, frankly), and the ways of the Fremen are so frustratingly cut short, reduced, and sped through that your eyes glaze over in Lynch’s version. This also means that Lynch’s film actually is the white-savior messiah narrative that Dune shouldn’t be understood as. The grey zones that Villeneuve zooms in on with Paul’s arc in Part Two are nowhere to be seen in Lynch’s film. 

The problems with David Lynch’s Dune don’t end with it being frustratingly curtailed and having an overly talky and confusing opening. In general, the film over-explains and verbalizes the internal thoughts of people rather than letting subtle performance notes indicate the characters’ thoughts, some of the VFX — especially the major shield scene — is shocking even for the time, and Lynch also makes some questionable additions that are often so goofy (including, but not limited to, crazy eyebrows on Mentats and the Baron’s overall gross appearance) that it becomes a little bit difficult to take as seriously as I think the source material merits. 

David Lynch’s Dune adaptation is a fascinating misfire that can, however, still be somewhat enjoyed as a curiosity (perhaps especially once you’ve familiarised yourself with the overall narrative), even though it is somewhat of a mess. Despite its significant problems with pacing, goofiness, endless exposition, structure, and a lack of a complex central character arc, Lynch’s quirks, occasionally strong music, and his actually quite solid cast — Brad Dourif, Virginia Madsen, Patrick Stewart, Sting, Kyle MacLachlan, Sean Young, Max Von Sydow, etc. — help to make the experience of watching this fairly interesting. Even if it isn’t good, it does make for a super interesting feature to study comparatively with the modern widely loved two-part adaptation. 

5 out of 10

– Review Written by Jeffrey Rex Bertelsen.