Dune: Part Two

Official Australian release date: 29/2/24. Viewed: 29/2/24.
Director: Denis Villeneuve
Actors: Timothee Chalamet, Zendaya, Rebecca Ferguson, Javier Bardem
Genre: Sci-Fi / Drama
Rating: M

‘Dune: Part Two’ comes 2.5 years after the first film, and hopefully a final film to make it a trilogy in 3-4 years. It picks up pretty much straight after the first film, with Paul (Chalamet) and his mum Jessica (Ferguson) being shown how to live in the Arrakis desert by the Fremen, particularly Chani (Zendaya) and Stilgar (Bardem). There they continue to fight a guerrilla war against the Harkonnen.

To go along with the ‘big bad bald’ Baron (Skarsgard), we get his two nephews – the angry Beast (Bautista) and the psychotic Feyd-Rautha (Butler), who has a big role to play in the final act. We also get introduced to those pulling galactic strings from another planet, the Emperor (Walken) and his daughter, Princess Irulan (Pugh). There’s a few chess pieces in play, but even though it goes for 2 hour 40min, the pacing is generally quite fast and everything really comes together at the end, with Paul embracing his “messiah” role.

I’ll need to rewatch this, but it’s certainly up there with some of the best sci-fi films – better than the first film, and certainly an excellent sequel, similar to ‘The Empire Strikes Back’. The cinematography, costumes, score (or lack of in the final fight), set-design and CGI are all superb. It certainly makes it feel like you’ve witnessed something special and want to see what comes next.

Overall: Epic that delivers

Gav's Rating: 4 stars.