Movies
Denis Villeneuve’s adaptation takes us down a straight path into the antihero’s journey.
Warner Bros. Pictures
When we last left off in Dune—the first film in Denis Villeneuve’s multipart adaptation of Frank Herbert’s sci-fi epic about a power struggle that unfolds on the water-deprived desert planet of Arrakis—the young duke Paul Atreides (Timothée Chalamet) and his mother, Lady Jessica (Rebecca Ferguson), had narrowly escaped an Atreides massacre that claimed Paul’s father. The movie ends with them finding refuge among Arrakis’ sand-dwelling native population, known as Fremen, after Paul is victorious in mortal combat.
Now, Villeneuve’s Dune: Part Two is here to finish Paul’s coming-of-age tale. The sequel, critics almost unilaterally agree, is even better than his “awe-inspiring” first installment. If Part One is all world-building and exposition, Part Two finally sees Villeneuve take on Herbert’s probing depictions of power, religion, government, and technology. In this installment, Paul falls in love with a Fremen woman named Chani (Zendaya), learns the Fremen way, and becomes a leader and religious messiah among them as they attempt to overthrow the colonizing, sadistic Harkonnens—nephews and laymen cronies of the Atreides’ sworn foe, the fascist Baron Vladimir Harkonnen—who see control of Arrakis as a path to the throne.
While the first film stayed incredibly close to the book’s early chapters, this follow-up makes a few fundamental changes. Entire characters are cut (sorry, Count Fenring!), and the timeline is reordered and altered, meaning that the reasons why characters make certain decisions also shift. But perhaps the most important divergence concerns religion, to which the film takes a darker approach. This seemingly small, yet significant, choice creates a meatier role for Zendaya’s Chani, as well as a clearer path for Paul’s descent into antihero territory. It’s thrilling.
Those who have seen or read Dune will know that the Bene Gesserit—the matriarchal order of clairvoyant and hypnotic women, of which Jessica is a member, who surreptitiously control and maintain the political order of the entire society—plant seeds of religious prophecies that take root in specific populations to potentially exploit later on. Jessica, given her Bene Gesserit training, becomes the Fremen’s prophetic Reverend Mother, while Paul is rumored to be their savior: the legend implanted amongst the Fremen known as the Lisan al-Gaib. As written in the book, Paul is only somewhat hesitant of fulfilling this prophecy and moonlighting as the Fremen’s chosen one. At the start of his time with the Fremen, he doesn’t readily convince the doubtful that he is their messiah, but neither does he staunchly downplay or negate the notion to those who suspect he is. Propelled by the desire to protect his loved ones, the young duke eventually gives in to his destiny by drinking a poisonous holy water that, should he survive, promises him full powers to see into the future and the past. Survive he does: He is cemented as the Kwisatz Haderach, an all-seeing male Bene Gesserit that the order of women simultaneously anticipate and fear.
Villeneuve’s Paul, on the other hand, distrusts his mother and the Bene Gesserit, believing their actions to be those of manipulation rather than of faith. This Paul keeps Jessica—painted here as more of a villain, rather than the book’s gray-area character—at arm’s length as she urges him to drink the holy water. He even goes so far as to reject the building belief that he is a chosen one, stating, “I’m no messiah.” Paul has visions showing his mother’s path, should he follow it, as one of mass devastation; he understands that Jessica’s motivations come in part from a selfish desire to see if she could be the one to birth the Kwisatz Haderach. In this version of the story, it takes a shattering blow to the Fremen to tip the scales. Paul, disquieted that he hadn’t seen the attack coming, follows his mother’s advice, drinks the water, and becomes both the Fremen’s Lisan al-Gaib and the Bene Gesserit’s Kwisatz Haderach.
But Villeneuve’s changes are best exemplified by Chani. Herbert’s Chani is a fierce warrior, but she’s also attuned to the religious beliefs of the Fremen people, as someone who is gifted with prescient weirding abilities. Narratively, Chani isn’t involved in much of the action, but rather exists primarily to bolster Paul’s arc. She teaches him the ways of Fremen life, sticks beside him as he ascends to messiah heights, and has his son, Leto II, which effectively removes her from the battlefield. Eventually, when the prospect of marriage becomes a political strategy for Paul to secure his place on the throne, Chani is offered the position of Paul’s concubine.
But in the movie, Chani all but spits on the idea of an emancipator—“You tell people a messiah will come, they will wait for centuries,” she criticizes—instead lambasting the Fremen leader of their group for his blind allegiance to ideas she suspects were planted years ago. In this version, Chani believes not in a savior figure, but in the power of Fremen as a people capable of saving themselves—a strong and clearly articulated rejection of the stereotypical white savior figure that Dune is often criticized for portraying. Chani pledges her only allegiance to her fellow Fremen guerilla fighters and to her love, Paul. Here, religion drives a wedge between Chani and Paul; the closer he gets to choosing the path of the messiah, the further the rift between them grows. Instead of Chani decamping from the battlefield to birth Paul’s son, the couple’s future together is dubious. Villeneuve’s depiction of a more empowered and ferocious Chani—played with emotional complexity by Zendaya—and a couple fighting their fundamental difference in values is compelling, both visually and narratively.
It’s no secret that Herbert’s tale, skeptical as it is of religion, depicts not a hero’s journey, but an antihero’s journey. The film’s changes simply make that distinction much clearer, further and necessarily clarifying the undertones of Herbert’s scrutiny of society. It’s a bonus that this choice also happens to give these talented actors even more material to work with, contributing to a work that is not a mere carbon copy of its source material, nor a complete departure, but something even better: an adaptation that stands as well on its own as it does paired with the book, equally palatable to both Dune believers and nonbelievers.
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