Paramount prepares to scale Dune Paramount Pictures has appointed Taken helmsman Pierre Morel to tackle a new cinematic adaptation of Frank Herbert's 1965 sci-fi novel Dune, Variety reports. The movie will be based on a draft put together by producer Peter Berg - who quit the project to work on Universal's forthcoming Hasbro board game interpretation …
Personnel: Bourne backup writer, director of The Transporter, uncredited actor from a Will Smith movie.
Content: too much action, too much unwarranted cgi, too little story (and what remains will not be anything like the book), no magic.
Oh, yes. I can really see this seeing off Lynch with ease.
The lynch movie was not at all accurate to the book, but I probably have watched it more times than I have Star Wars IV.
It made me read the book, certainly, I would say Dune the book (well the first 3 books anyways), would be amongst the top space operas ever.
That miniseries was perhaps more accurate but I found it shockingly bad, I hated the actors.
I agree - the mini-series version is excellent and a true telling of the first two books.
Series 1
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Frank-Herberts-Dune-TV-William-Hurt/dp/B00005QG3Z/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1262696466&sr=1-1
Series 2
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Children-Dune-DVD-Ian-McNeice/dp/B001ATWK08/ref=pd_cp_d_h__1
The books are very cerebral. It gets more and more convoluted as the series progresses. I stopped reading them after I attempted God Emperor, and fell asleep.
I suspect that a lot of narration would be necessary.
Amazing story, though. The first three books would be worth a decent adaptation.
I thought the previous film was very poor. As a standalone story it was OK, but in terms of being faithful to the books it was dire. Weirding modules and rain at the end of the film were bad. Using condoms as worms was amusing though.
For a better interpretation, the Dune miniseries that covered the first three books was pretty good and did at least follow the story line.
Of course, now that his son has picked up the baton, there's a good storyline from the Butlerian Jihad all the way through to Kralizec at the end, so there's an incentive to stay close to what Herbert wrote.
Not Brian and Kevin's sequels, prequels and the rest, please, Nooooo!
I'm an easy reader to keep happy, I'll willingly suspend my disbelief as much as you like. I won't analyse too much (unless asked to), I'll just enjoy the journey and the fantasy world. The Brian Herbert and Kevin J Anderson books are some of the very few that have ever broken me out of the reading trance with thoughts about how cheap that particular plot device was, or how shabby the writing.
Hunters and Sandworms were basically an excuse to have their cliche'd two dimensional add-on characters interact with FH's and try to gain some legitimacy by proximity. They end in a huge series of Deus-ex-Machina events that are a poor excuse for not being able to write a real plot.
I know, I know, I still read them all. I'm my own worst enemy and I shouldn't be encouraging them to write more.
"suspiciously middle-eastern men fighting a guerrilla holy war against the people who have come to their desert in order to seize a valuable resource.
"I'm sure that'll go down well in some quarters".
Yes, that was what Herbert intended. He always had an understanding of, and empathy for, the underdog and suspicion of the establishment view. In "The White Plague" he wrote a few things that British people might find uncomfortable, too. While the Jorj X Mckie stories (The Dosadi Experiment, Whipping Star) are fundamentally about the necessity of subversion and the disastrous harm caused by monolithic governments. BuSab is one of the great creations of the human mind, IMHO. (As well as being riotously funny). See, e.g.
http://infohost.nmt.edu/~shipman/reading/mckie.html
... a new interpretation of a fantastic novel.
The '84 film was good in some ways (Sting) but a complete dog in so many others. Weak dialogue, crappy special effects, and so much storyline was skipped. Wonder if they're going to have a go at the whole 11-book series? If they can script it as well as the guys that scripted Lord of the Rings, it could be fantastic.
Oh, and I'm pretty sure "witer Josh Zetumer" is actually a writer - unless he's taken up where Michael Jackson left off...
If the studio gets their claws into it, expect:
Lady Jessica - Sandra Bullock
Leto Atreides I - Vince Vaughn
Chani - Kristina Kreuk
Paul Atreides - Zac Efron
Duncan Idaho - Will Ferrell
Also expect reimagining as "sci-fi action comedy" - except all the interviews will have the cast banging on about how "it's about the people so it's not really sci-fi".
Woot! Anyone got worse suggestions than that?
how can you have a movie based on battleships? it's the stupidiest idea ever
perhaps it will have an M. Night Shyamalan twist at the end where, you think he'd finally found the 5 squares of the last enemy battleship, but it turns out to just be a submarine and a cruiser together in a line
The worst part isn't that they're making a movie out of Battleship, but that Peter Berg (whoever that is) apparently quit the Dune project to work on it. Huh? Say what you want about remakes, at least Dune is a story. I can't even imagine how you fill two hours with little plastic pieces on a grid.
Here's a little career cheat sheet. If you currently do any of the following jobs, trade it up to work on Battleship: The Movie:
1. Suicide bomber
2. Crash test dummy
3. Human resources
4. Fluffer
Anything else, be happy where you are.
...to properly restore / re-edit / FINISH the brilliant David Lynch version? This film could be a bona-fide classic if someone bothered to finish it.
Because, let's face it, any remake now is bound to be another Donny Jepp / Willy Wonka style atrocity.
(yeah yeah, I know it's all about money and doing it all in "3D" (more accurately called 'dodgy stereo').)
wHollyWeird is creatively bankrupt. That's why it has increasingly turned to doing sequels and remakes because it can trade on the original title's success rather than risk anything on an unknown.
It could be construed as their latest anti-piracy measure. "If we turn enough crap out, nobody will want to fileshare our titles!" Can you spot the flaw?
The Lynch movie was a mess. The SciFi channel TV adaptation was much closer to the novel, although it was let down slightly by the fact that the guy playing Gurney Halleck is one of the worse actorsever to be committed to celuloid/digital image. Guess he was always onto a loser though as his performance would get compared to Patrick Stewarts. Even so, he was dreadful.
@Runcible Spoon
SciFi also did a creditable adaptation of Dune Messiah/Children of Dune (unfortunately still with the same bloke cast as Halleck). No sign of God Emperor yet though!
Icon for the "weirding module" sonic weapon Lynch invented for his movie, along with the Sardaukar troops who coultn't breath normal air. Hopefully these will not be in the new version.
The Lynch film is what got me into the books in the first place, although personally I didn't like the rest of the series that much.
I saw Taken last year and I thought it was really good, so I'm optimistic they will be able to make something cool.
Personally I'd chop the story into three and make a trilogy so that there's no need to cut any of the material out. I'd finish the first film with the Harkonnen invading and taking over Arrakis again, the second around the time the Fremen take back Arrakis and then make the third follow the last portion of the book and then add a new bit covering the Fremen's Jihad across the galaxy. I know that's not in the book, but it should keep the Michael Bay audience happy with plenty of action!
OK, OK, he left out a huge amount of story and plot, and then re-interpreted and added to the story to get away with it.
But for picking the right people to play the characters....1st Class.
From the over-the-top excesses of all the Harkonnen characters (The Baron was spot-on) down to the seriousness and Discipline of the young Paul Atredies (one reason I Never got in to the mini-series - A PETULANT Paul Atredies!!) excellently played by Kyle MacClachan. As for Patrick Stewart as Gurney Halleck and Everett MacGill as Stilgar... Who could have asked ask for more?
Unfortunately, I reckon this will be TOO much like the mini-series and not concentrate on the characters enough (Anyone who has read a lot of Frank Herbert, not just Dune, will know that his books are all about the Characters to bring out the story) - It might make a passing semblance at staying true to the original story.... right up until there is the prospect for excessive but non-essential CGI or just to focus on Eye Candy - and you guys who keep saying that the mini-series remained faithful to the books should remember that the Irulan character (amongst many others) is virtually NOT IN the 1st Book at all, and yet there she is constantly appearing in the mini-series, with a whole new role added to the story just to keep the gratuitous glamour shots rolling in.
Get the right people, understanding and playing the right characters and the film will be a winner.
Oh Yeah - And No Condoms over Bent Wire Coat hangers for Sand Worms would be a bonus
As i read the books i imagined someone with the look, voice and demeanor of the D.Lynch movie but with the public persona and machinations shwon in the series. but given a choice i would get the lynch version, we know the plotting and scheaming was there, it was just an over the top performance, but in my opinion perfect.
Yes it was nothing like the book. But the imagary was great (Toto even did a good job of the sound track), it's a difficult book to put to film and appeal to the normal punters as it deals with with many social/political aspects, other than the main book, there is not much action in the others.
I read the books and have watched both the 1984 version and the miniseries and remain firmly of the opinion that Dune is simply unfilmable, there is simply *too* much happening to translate it from paper to the big screen and make it less than 8 hours long.
Lynch's 84 version received a lot of poor reviews and he removed his name from the credits using the Smithee alias. The film was bandied about between various people beforehand (pre-production started around 72) including I believe the likes of Ridley Scott before Lynch got a hold of it, having turned down Return Of The Jedi (*sob*). 84 version of Dune was going to be split into two films but it never happened and we ended up with a pretty poor version that only vaguely resembles anything in the books, weirding modules etc. Please don't film this, it simply cant be done proper justice.
The Lynch film was crap - all the way from the terrible effects (worms obviously made from sections of radiator hose, ridiculous ornithopters) and bad casting (why did Baron Harkkonen look like everybody's favourite roly-poly uncle?) and a travesty of a plot with little more than the title in common with the book. I can't ever remember being more disappointed by a film.
The only good thing about it was Sting, who had the right air of menace to play Feyd Rautha.
Unfortunately Herbert is a very patchy author, averaging about one good book for every three or four pieces of dross. Dune was great, but the rest of the series weren't. The disconnects between books didn't help one bit: the Face-Dancers, who first appeared in book 2, were far too influential to have not appeared in the first.
The one Herbert book I want to see on film is "Dragon In The Sea", which could make a wonderful suspense film given a good cast and director and a script that sticks to the book. Due to the limited sets needed for any submarine film it should be cheap to make too.
With your Lynch Comments (or the Baron Comments) but couldn't Agree more about Dragon in the Sea... would make an excellent film.
I'd add the Dosadi Experiment (although it would be difficult to do but the lead character was just too damn good), White Plague and definitely Hellstrom's Hive
Making a movie of Dune is just as hard as (for example) War and Peace - because both books contain far more important information than can possibly be crammed into a 2-hour movie. There are individual episodes that would fit the movie format quite neatly. If anything, Dune is more challenging because there is so much to be told simply establishing the alien future universe. It's one thing to be told that the Russians fought Napoleon in a big battle, and describe what an onlooker witnessed; it's quite another to explain who the Bene Gesserit or the Fremen or the Mentats are - especially as Herbert had a way of bringing in ideas indirectly, with passing comments.
Although the subject begs for a big screen treatment - especially scenes like the sandworms and especially the final battle when the Shield Wall is breached - I think the only way to dramatize Dune would be as a TV series. Given, say, 20 one-hour episodes, you could do a fairly thorough job.
I thought the Lynch film was a mess, but I was not unimpressed by the two miniseries. It is possible but unlikely that a new film will be worthwhile.
But why do so many people here want a movie of God-Emperor? It was by far the worst book in the entire Dune canon - it was probably the worst book Herbert wrote. The only use I ever found for it was as a cure for insomnia.
There are good points and bad points of both adaptations. The casting for the film was almost there, and there was a certain majesty about it being filmed on an actual desert. But the effects were terrible and worse, distracting, and the interpretation of the various clothing/building styles wasnt great either. Also, it was probably 'inspired' by Dune the novel, as opposed to being a filmisation of due to the swathes of material either not filmed or cut or new material added. The eyes of the 'Ibad' were well dodgy too.
The mini series won points by being more faithful to the book and also having more Duncan Idaho, as the film sadly lacked more than a tiny bit of that character. But it looked cheap, the desert was filmed on a set, and the majority of the characters portrayals were rubbish with the exception of James McAvoy who did a decent job of Leto II in messiah.
The best adaptation? In my head every time I read the books although I would like to be surprised by a new adaptation. I also thought that LOTR couldn't be filmed and I was wrong and pleasantly surprised there too.
For the simple reason that too many of the Dune books suck.
The original "Dune" story worked. "Dune Messiah" worked too. But "Children of Dune" was a mess, in particular because there was no attempt to preserve continuity with the characters or culture established in the first two (the preserved Muad-Dib being the biggest balls-up in that book). And "God-Emperor" - please no. Just no.
I'd rather they did adaptations of some of the later novels in the series. I'd much rather prefer to see the stories involving Miles Teg, the Idaho Ghola, and the war against the Honored Matres to yet another rehash of the first two or three novels.
Better still, would be if they got the same treatment as the tv miniseries from a few years back - CGI has obviously improved since then, so the effects could be even better.
So long as they don't try to cram Dune into 2 hours. It really does need to be a 4 hour movie. I think with careful editing and selection of the main plot elements from the book, you could do it but it would take a lot of dedication and refusing to toe the industry line to do it. You would also have to make that difficult choice of whether you assume the audience is already familiar with the Dune universe or not.
Script writers should forget about “familiarizing” the audience with the Dune universe, just write the story as it is in the book but cleanup up for the big screen. Do as Star Wars did on the original trilogy, give no background on chars or tech or situation just to give a frame of reference, is a waste of time an always does more damage than help. Let people intrigued (at least those who haven’t read the whole book series) about what the bene gesserit, the bene tleilax, or the landsraad really are or how they work, just move the story ahead. Is the script is good, the movie goers will care not aout these things… until they leave the theater and then Google it :p.
Good things: The cast. The direction. The visualisation and especially the House "styles", very good.
Bad things: The needless attempt to "modernise" it for a rayguns and spaceships audience. Er, that's it. All the other faults stem from this. I found this far more annoying than watching some SciFi "B" movie that's supposed to be modern but where any "science" content is woeful bollocks.
I want pointy nosed rocket ships*, swords, howitzers, the family atomics and personal shields that actually fucking mean something rather than being relegated to being an irrelevant plot device in one scene. "The slow knife penetrates". A key background setting point in the book, reduced to meaningless cobblers in the film.
Ok, it'd be a prize turkey at the box office, but at least it'd be a classic prize turkey. For me, Lynch's version is a travesty that promises so much in its presentation but ultimately fails, falling between the two stools of the material it's based on and some studio exec's idea of what the market wants.
*Ideally with visible rivets on the outside.
I quite liked the previous Dune film; well apart from the wet stormy ending where it turned out all was ok because Muad'Dib was some kind of superman Kwisatz Haderach, which apparently explained it all. Ye Gods, what an embarrassment. But it did suffer throughout because no one is going to sit through a film that is as long as the book takes to read. Major scene setting and development was often rushed by. Particularly disappointing was the growing romance between Paul Atreides and Chani which seemed to be introduced and established in the blink of an eye.
Personally I think it will always prove difficult to distill that masterpiece into a few hours viewing.
"""The first attempt to translate Dune to the big screen was in 1974, when a French consortium bought the rights. It planned a "10-hour feature adaptation", with the remarkable list of David Carradine, Geraldine Chaplin, Salvador Dali, Alain Delon, Mick Jagger, Gloria Swanson and Orson Welles linked to the project."""
How could you forget to mention HR Giger, Jean Giraud, Pink Floyd and Alejandro Jodorowsky? :)
http://www.duneinfo.com/unseen/
Since when has David Lynch ever been interested in commercial success? Only as far as being able to make his films. Stoopid studio! Wonderful casting and some great production design on that film though. In fact it was a great, but flawed film. If only it could have been about 2 hours longer than it was.
As long as the new film doesn't have a colon in the title, it'll be better than 98% of Hollywood output.
I'm quite baffled by the folks who like the miniseries...I found it irredeemably dull and soulless, to the point where I didn't bother with the sequel. Being "more faithful" to the book doesn't help when it's done without any apparent interest, passion, or skill on the part of the producers. The 1984 version was indeed flawed, but at least it was interesting.
I did like God Emperor and thought it was rather fascinating, but I was maybe 12 when I read it, so I think it's best to leave it at that and not ever re-read it....
Provided they edit out the endless references to "enzyme bonded concrete" and put in a chase sequence at the end that's worth the time and trouble.
Hamilton's books have some great ideas but suffer because he doesn't know when to stop writing.
As for Dune, I'll reserve judgement. I don't blame Lynch for what happened to his version. I gather there was a lot of studio interference.
And yes, the best version ever is in my head.
from a book; the worst one was "The Keep" 1983 who the writer of the book F Wilson said "Visually intriguing but otherwise utterly incomprehensible."
Funny thing is Herbert liked the film of his book.
BTW the remake has a budget of $175 million the 1984 version was about $42 million which is close to $90 million in today's money mmmmm
the movie kept the book title, and maybe were within spitting distance of one or two of the books ideas, but was total crap.
Loved Franks books growing up, but a bit more critical now. Certainly I see nothing worthwhile at all in Brian Herberts milking of the franchise.
The Dune story was too big to be made into a movie even back in the eighties, now with reduced attention spans and instant gratification, there is no chance at all.
"Express the plot and culture of the dune universe, in 120 characters or less....."
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