D U N C: suks to be yueh

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > Cinema Discusso > D U N C: suks to be yueh

El Grillo: Jan 3, 2008; Fun Shoe

Went in with basically no preconceptions, I didn't even know it was part 1 of a two parter. I read the book when I was a kid and remember almost nothing.

I really enjoyed it and am psyched that I already agreed to go see it again with another friend next week. The whole experience was awesome. It's great seeing a huge sci fi film that isn't bad star wars sequels or superhero number 4257784 - this by contrast was lovingly made, with a huge amount of care and thought.

That being said it definitely felt like an opening act. And there are such massive questions it opens up about everything - the characters, the setting, the plot - that I will be very very surprised if the second film feels like it actually pays off everything it needs to. Which is fine. I don't need my movies to be perfect to enjoy them.

Neo Rasa posted:

Basically I'm hoping that with this being two movies, I mean I love the new Blade Runner flick but I hope Villeneuve uses all that time to develop these folks more instead of just showing extended establishing shots.

This comment from page 1 of this thread made me chuckle because it basically encapsulates how I feel after my first watch today. My only beef with Villeneuve in his previous films (all of which were also great) is that he has a habit of just going slightly over the line with the number of big slow 'WOOOOOOMMM' establishing shots - for my taste, anyway.
In this film, where it's such an awesome world with a whole host of cool characters we get to meet, it really kind of feels like none of them had time to get fleshed out. The only one who did is Paul... and I can't really tell you what his character is meant to be about. Visions, I guess? And being kind of perfect and wise and stuff. And sort of not accepting the Messiah thing only he doesn't really question it(/his mother) in any meaningful way.
I really hope they make up for some of that in part 2 somehow. It felt like we had a bunch of cool beginners of characters, and then basically all of them died, quite quickly and in a slightly anticlimactic way given how much foreshadowing there was of the massacre.
quote="Philthy" post="518690271"]
Yeah, I really enjoyed that the movie showed different branches of the future he was offered.
[/quote]
This was the only part of the plot that was actually interesting to me. The rest just sort of rolled on with a lot of foreshadowing and predictability. Maybe that's just the book though, i don't remember. The narrative was enjoyable but not particularly engaging; the visuals/production, and some decent (if minimal) performances, did the job of keeping things interesting and entertaining.

# ¿ Oct 23, 2021 01:14

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# ¿ Apr 24, 2024 18:08

El Grillo: Jan 3, 2008; Fun Shoe

Maxwell Lord posted:

Okay that and I feel somehow the siege of Arrakeen shoulda been better? Like there’s some cool parts but this is the big devastating scene where the bad guys slaughter everyone and it hits kinda soft. Honestly I think Zimmer fell short here, the scene’s got a lot of emotional beats and you can’t just have the same drone going through all of it.

The issue I had with it was, it was short, there was basically no real fight, and the actual cause of their demise was never shown or explained. Sure the trusted doctor disabled the city's shield and everything. But, uh, wait... how?? The duke's son had just been nearly assassinated, they spend the whole first half of the movie warning Paul about how everyone's going to try to kill them, but they don't have a fuckton of guards on their shield control room who won't let anyone anywhere near it, or they have that location totally secret or... any one of a million plans that mean a doctor would have to have a totally insane plan to be able to bring it down?

Maxwell Lord posted:

I feel like the spaceship shots are kinda important to the mood- you do need to convey the power of the forces at work, the mammoth machines dwarfing the men that control them and all.

I do find it curious that Paul never says the "I must not fear" speech- it's Jessica both times. Odd choice.

Yeah the long wide shots were important for tone and scale but I would've preferred a better balance with more character development as the other poster said.

Also if they had Paul doing the fear is the mind killer speech, he would have actually had to display... fear? I don't think he does at any point? He's way too perfect chosen one boy. Except for at the end before the dual

Steve Yun posted:

I feel like two or three Chani visions could have been traded for a couple minutes of

”Theres a spy!”

“Hey I bet you’re the spy”

“How are your mentat lessons”

“Isn’t it cool how I can float because of these repulsors”

“Did I ever tell you how I got fat and diseased”

This as well. There were so many. You could've had some valuable character stuff in there that would make the destruction of the Atreides a heck of a lot more impactful to watch.

Anonymous Zebra posted:

I don't mind the cuts because honestly Yueh and Thufir really aren't in the story past a certain point. Almost every character from the first part of the book dies in the attack or shortly thereafter. The only person close to Paul who really has something resembling a plot arc in the second half of the book is Jessica, so I'm not surprised they gave her maximum time in the movie.

I'd argue it's important to give Paul some proper interaction time with them in order to teach the audience about why the kid is who he is. But again that would have required some actual fleshed out character for Paul, and I couldn't detect much of that.

e: booking tickets for BFI IMAX screening next week, woop woop

El Grillo fucked around with this message at 09:49 on Oct 23, 2021

# ¿ Oct 23, 2021 09:44

El Grillo: Jan 3, 2008; Fun Shoe

Meh, it just seemed anticlimactic to me, trying to work out why

# ¿ Oct 23, 2021 10:17

El Grillo: Jan 3, 2008; Fun Shoe

I really hope they're not trying to force them to get it done by October 2023 because... that isn't happening, right? Not without it being a mess.

# ¿ Oct 26, 2021 21:38

El Grillo: Jan 3, 2008; Fun Shoe

feedmyleg posted:

Here's the latest.

I'm going to assume, for my sanity's sake, that they actually planned out Part 2 properly before making Part 1 because otherwise, uh, that is not good.

FLIPADELPHIA posted:

lol you think without shields, the soldiers of the far distant future would use knives?

The movie literally doesn't explain why in the far future soldiers use knives. We see that there are projectile weapons that can kill people & destroy things very effectively. It's a big ol' plot hole, unfortunately. There may be some explanation from the books about nuclear explosions or something but it isn't in the movie.

Mike the TV posted:

The Spider-Thing really grossed me out when I saw that it was probably a person.

This is one of the four billion totally unexplained things that I would like to be explained in the sequel lol.
Not going to happen otherwise part 2 would just be a full three hour infodump instead of a movie.

# ¿ Oct 28, 2021 15:39

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