Whenever I think of Dune, I remember the insanely great miniseries done by the Sci-Fi Channel (known since 2009 as Syfy, ew, wtf). If you haven’t seen them, I strongly suggest to look them up: Dune (2000) and Children of Dune (2003)

So going to the cinema with these in mind, I left the theater thinking:

Don’t get me wrong, Villneuve’s Dune is a well-made movie. Insane budget, great cast, but something didn’t click. It’s a chemistry thing, I guess. The only thing that’s more bland than the sands of Arakkis are most of the performances: Timmy Chandelier was a sub-par Paul Atreides, Rebecca Ferguson barely looked old enough to be his porn step-sister, Jason Momoa’s fight scene was cool, but far from a decent Duncan Idaho. The other A-list performers were meh as well (lol Zendaya). I’ve seen this movie a few months before writing this review, and I swear there’s no performance worth mentioning.

It’s a great looking film, the money thrown at it really seem to work, but it landed a bit sideways. The fact that it’s also one half of the first story also made it bland, because in general it looks like we’ve been watching a two and a half hour trailer. Hope they’ll make it back somehow in the second movie, but this is a movie I’m not eager to re-watch.

Later edit: I’ve seen that this movie has got an Oscar Nomination for best picture. It’s nice to see a sci-fi pop in that list, but I don’t think it has a chance of winning.