New podcast, old story—today, Ryan Shinkel (editor of Athwart Magazine) & I complete our discussion of Frank Herbert’s Dune, the atheist’s guide to religion, the cynic’s guide to moral heroism, now adapted to the screen with remarkable, perhaps unexpected success by Hollywood’s only writer-director wth a reputation for beautiful images & for blockbusters, Denis Villeneuve. He has made two movies & might make a third, the budgets so far have added up to more than $350 million, never mind the marketing costs, & for movies coming out in the death-of-cinema post-Covid era, they’re surprisingly profitable, grossing more than $1.1 billion worldwide.
This success was not a foregone conclusion, even leaving aside Hollywood’s attempted suicide in the COVID years. The first Dune, in 2021, only made about $100 million in America, which is a very bad start for a major franchise. Moreover, Villeneuve had previously made Blade Runners 2049, which also failed as a blockbuster. The unimpressive box office might have something to do with a GenX sensibility. Villeneuve, born in ‘67, is slightly too young to be a Boomer, & came of age in the ‘80s. Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner came out in 1982, then David Lynch’s Dune in 1984. They’re both unusually romantic visions, which was not forbidden at that time, though still rare; they were both box office failures, perhaps because they lacked the pop enthusiasm of other ‘80s entertainments. They’re cult movies, as they say, & while some cult phenomena have become popular across the generations, most haven’t.
Another problem for the movie, perhaps the least talked about aspect, given our gynaikocracy, is that it’s a movie for young men. About 70% of the audience is male in an industry that’s as openly anti-men as it is possible in America. My guess is that the insistence on avant-garde music & amazing visuals are both appeals to the male rather than the female audience… Of course, from another point of view, the fact that half the audience was young & overwhelmingly male might be considered a good thing, since it makes the movie profitable & the guys go the movie in groups & enjoy themselves. But this is not the view taken among our elites.
My friend Ryan had a very funny experience in the theater—lots of kids started shouting jihad in support of protagonist Paul Atreides. Another funny thing, among elite liberals, director Villeneuve explains that the movie is all about undermining rather than supporting Paul & that he made the female characters take charge of that needful activity. So it’s hard to say what will come of Dune Part Three…
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Enjoyed the podcast and the insights presented about the director. On one of these sultry, desert-like nights I need to nest-in for a rewatch of both Dune movies.
What are your thoughts of the lack of emphasis on the spice guild (perhaps the Davos-crowd equivalent) in Herbert v. Villeneuve world?
As a new subscriber, I was enthralled by your observations on Dulles airport. (I retired in 2008 with extreme prejudice, from UA in Virginia. I've lived and worked near D.C. for over 40 years, and nothing gave me greater pleasure and pain than the airline industry, its reckless march from hopeful to hopeless.)
From your post observations on Dulles...
"it’s a job of work to prevent the silent contempt one feels for this malfunctioning industry to turn into self-contempt. If someone fixed the misery that is air traveling, he would do Americans the great favor of restoring to them a measure of self-respect."
Respectfully, BOR