And speaking of pleasing, it leaves a very nice smoking hole that’s quite photogenic.
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I’ve often wondered why people are so negative about Lynch’s “Dune”. The movie effectively used so much dialog from the book (including internal comments of the characters) that maybe her issue might not have been the script, per se, but the actual novel.
I saw it in a packed theater (in Tejas, no less!) when it was released and people like a lot. I remember them applauding at the end. But even back then, some of the effects were HORRIBLE and I think it rightly gets dinged on that. But it does have moments of grandeur: the first appearance of a Guild Navigator was stunning. In the recent (overrated) version, they’re just guys in bulky NASA spacesuits. BOOOORING!!!
Anyway, this is why I cannot vote for Joe Biden.
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The 1984 movie lost me when they turned the ‘weirding way’ into these weird sound gun-lile things. Lynch also made Baron Harkonnen into such an over the top evil character to be comical. The remake did these things much better, including casting Jason Momoa as Duncan Idaho. Though, no offense to Josh Brolin, but nobody beats Patrick Stewart as Gurney Halleck.
But let’s not let that distract us from ‘Biden is OLD’ and ‘Biden is DOOMED’.
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For me, Lynch’s Dune (and it shares this with Bakshi’s LotR) fails as story-telling. If you can’t make sense of the movie unless you already know the story, it’s a failure. Compare these to another intially confusing-as-hell movie, Pulp Fiction. In order to make sense of Tarantino’s movie, you have to disassemble it and reassemble it in the proper time-line. He’s messing with you by doing non-linear story telling. The bits are all there–they just have to be reassembled. (Incidentally, it’s Bruce Willis’ story that provides the framework for reassembly.)
But Lynch and Bakshi weren’t doing non-linear story telling. They just grabbed a collection of (presumably) their favorite scenes and forgot to ask, “Now, how do I tell a coherent story with these scenes?”
Note that I wouldn’t object if they told a different story than Frank Herbert and J.R.R. Tolkein told. That’s their privilege as the storyteller. What I’m objecting to is the fact that they failed to tell any coherent story at all. The story Lynch comes closest to telling is the vendetta between the Harkonnen and Atreides clans, but even there he fails–or least he fails to make me care about the vendetta, mostly because he’s off telling other fragments of Herbert’s story.
@sonsofares she’s not much of a SF fan, so that’s a possibility. But I think her bigger issue is the failure to tell a coherent story, and I agree with her there. I am a huge SF fan, and I know the Dune universe pretty well. I can make sense of it (despite the cheesy special effects), but Lynch failed to make me want to make sense of it.
Finally, the initial theatrical release cut (which is what HBO is apparently showing now) has an epic fail of an ending. Alia says (in a hissing pseudo-three-year-old voice), “He is the Kwisatz Haderach!” (and jump-cut to the credits). Now of course, what they were counting on was starting a franchise, and that was a huge cliff-hanger ending. At least Herbert had the courtesy to clean up the various loose ends that were hanging everywhere after Alia says that in the novel.
@noonm yeah…in the novel I always interpreted ‘the weirding way’ as some form of martial art, not any kind of physical weapon. That was another fail.
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Who somehow continue to demonstrate their hatred for the mothers of their children …
The reviews for the second Denis Villeneuve Dune movie are pretty over-the-top positive. I’ve been a Villeneuve fan since “Arrival” – which I thought was magnificent. While visually stunning, the first Dune had a bit too much of the late Lucas stiffness in its narrative joints, that is, the plot points were offered on decorative trays rather than evolving from development in the characters. Which often happens in adaptations and epics, and I suppose then especially in epic adaptations. Still, it got so many things right, from the sandworms to the Benjamin Clementine cameo.
Which is, of course, why it is impossible to support anyone over 80 for the presidency.
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I was away at the store (working) and we had two goat mamas deliver today.
Is TIFBG still immune from prosecution or did SCOTUS smack down his claim? 700 responses to the MM is just a bit much to wade through…
There’s conch left for commercial consumption? Grouper used to grow to the size of VWs, not anymore.
I’m far more irritated with the white American folk who moved down there and changed the whole Florida vibe into raping the land, trashing the beaches and beach views (especially A1A) with condo after condo, hotels & resorts and forcing their religion and “conservative values” on everybody.
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I’m not against non democratic libs. But the media framing of Bernie VS Hillary gave Bernie much more credit than it’s giving Haley in Haley VS Trump.
You sound even more disappointed than me. Good to know.