The Halls of Arrakeen - The Official D U N E and Frank Herbert discussion thread

On the album "Space Metal" by Star One there is a song about Dune. I love Dune, but I prefer David Lynch's to anything else, even the original novel!

 

Was perusing The Digital Bits.com's new John Harrison interview concerning his very interesting and overlooked early film Effects (had a bootlegged copy of this one on tape for years), when a subject of interest -- or displeasure -- to many fen in this forum came up:

John Harrison: [...] Meanwhile, Richard Rubinstein and I continue to try to explore the Dune franchise further. We're still trying to get a TV series going. We had a proposal for a Dune TV series that Sci-Fi didn't want to do, much to my dismay.

Bill Hunt: That's surprising, considering how successful the two mini-series were.

John Harrison: That's actually an area we're looking at now for straight-to-DVD. Dune is a huge franchise worldwide. And I'm also involved with Richard on the prequel books that Brian Herbert and Kevin Anderson wrote -- trying to get those going as projects.

...So there you go.

 

John Harrison: That's actually an area we're looking at now for straight-to-DVD. Dune is a huge franchise worldwide. And I'm also involved with Richard on the prequel books that Brian Herbert and Kevin Anderson wrote -- trying to get those going as projects.

What, miniseries for the prequel books? Gaaargh! I'm staying away from those.

 

Has anyone here read "Road to Dune"? I wasn't aware that so many chapters had been cut from Dune and Dune Messiah. I am wondering how good they are.

Also, anyone know what is up with the extended Dune (1984) DVD that's suppose to have come out in November? I haven't been able to find a copy, and I heard rumors it had been delayed. Anyone know what is going on?

 

Already answered that, Stryphe. Check midway through the last page.

 

You've got to be kidding me. Have they no shame? Have they no shame?

 

Has anyone here read "Road to Dune"? I wasn't aware that so many chapters had been cut from Dune and Dune Messiah. I am wondering how good they are

I've read it, didn't buy it, just sat down and read it in the bookshop.

I'll repost my thoughts:

 

Ah, OK, thanks everyone. When I was here yesterday the thread was overcome by spam, which I see our beloved moderators (aren't all moderators beloved?) removed, making it easier now to follow the discussion.

 

Those who enjoyed James McAvoy's performance in CoD (or just liked his topless look ), go watch 'Chronicles of Narnia'! I'm not saying it's an "OMG, perfect!11!" movie, but it is worth watching once, for performances from McAvoy and Tilda Swinton.

Hmmmm...Tilda Swinton would have made an awesome Lady Jessica. Especially if Lady Jessica gets to fight with two crysknives.

 

I just watched Children of Dune. Good miniseries.

 

The first part of CoD is still one of the best things I've ever seen on TV. Hell, at times it's better than many big-budgeted movies. Brian Tyler's "Inama Nushif" (song during the Godfather-ish montage) is simply awesome.

 

That montage is a very cool thing. The entire soundtrack is really good.

My only complaint- the CGI is out of date

 

My only complaint- the CGI is out of date

Hey, it's a TV production after all. At least CoD had bluescreens, the previous miniseries used painted backgrounds!

And yeah, the soundtrack is damn cool. The composer, Brian Tyler, is a fan of the Dune books and took his own initiative to research the Fremen language and come up with the 'Inama Nushif' song. He even went to find an Iranian (if I'm not mistaken) vocalist to do the vocals, while he himself performed the percussions.

 

Har har, I'm rewatching the first Dune miniseries. Good Lord in heaven, I had forgotten how bad this was. Right now I'm listening to Duke Leto speaking with his monotone and the Scottish Duncan ("Aah deeden meeen tooh starghterl yooh, mah lawd!" ).

And the music...gaaaargh!

Man, looking at the recent Narnia movie and PJ's LOTR, I feel sorry for Dune. CoD gave a decent adaptation for the second and third books, but alas, a decent adaptation for the first book (which actually seems more cinematic to me) is still elusive.

Oh no, now it's showing the Czech Fremen lady! Noooo!

 

I am about to get ill at Universal Pictures for its' continuing bad treatment of Lynch's Dune. The Extended DVD edition came out yesterday, and it's a very mixed bag:

GOOD:
-- Both the Lynch theatrical and Smithee television versions are present
-- Both are anamorphic and cleaned up picture-wise
-- The featurettes are okay (though notably shying away from the film's controversial history)
-- The deleted scenes (separate from the theatrical and Smithee versions) are fascinating

BAD:
-- This is on a Mexican-made DVD-18, so it's prone to stops and stutters
-- The Smithee version is presented without ANY fixes to its' numerous flaws. The missing Fremen eyes, bad ADR, bad music remixing, flipped and repeated FX scenes, test footage and lousy prologue are all here. (Kull wahad, most of those could be fixed on a computer in hours!!) If it weren't for the picture quality (which some reviewers have said is better than the theatrical version on the same disc), I'd almost say they didn't even look at the print before slapping it on disc!
-- The trailer, which was on the previous Universal non-anamorphic DVD, is nowhere to be found here
-- The deleted scenes section show tantalizing glimpses of other deleted scenes that, for whatever reason, they decided not to include in this release

Dammit, there is no excuse for this. Universal has had EIGHT YEARS to improve on the previous release. I can only assume the shoddiness of this is a public insult to David Lynch for refusing their offer to do his own extended cut. Oh well, at least I can look forward to a fan re-edit of the film based on the material presented here...

 

LMAO! The Extended DVD was that bad? After all the delays and the cat-fights, it was still that bad?

Maybe the first book is just cursed to an eternity of crappy adaptations.

*shrug*

 

Perhaps this is a bit of a digression but...

I just started re-playing Westwood Studio's "Dune 2000" computer game. I got it a couple of years ago but rediscovered it recently. It's a decent game even if no doubt entirely outsid eof the Dune canon. I can remember how excited I was ehen first playing it right after I had just finished Dune for the first time - getting to have my little Saurdukaur eaten by worms or having reinforcements flown in by CHOAM ships was very cool to me.

 

Just FYI Dune and Children of Dune are part of Sci-Fi's "month of minis"

Dune will be on Sci Fi tommorow night (4.18.06) with Children of Dune showing 2 days later on Thursday (4.18.06).

 

It was a pretty fun game, though i only did play thru it as the Atreides. Never bothered with the Harkonnen or the Ordos. Maybe i should try rediscovering it, too.

"Emperor of Dune" was also decent entertainment.

 

This thread lives! I figured they'd boot you guys over to SFF.

 

Ha, and with the resurfacing of this thread, i went over to www.dunenovels.com and checked out the latest. KJA is keeping a blog on the book's development (you can actually read drafts of the first two chapters if you're so inclined). According to his latest entry, the slated release date of "Hunters of Dune" is August 22, 2006.

Argh.

 

Even though part of me is dreading KJA and Herbert directly continuing Frank's saga I must admit that part of me is also curious to see where they go with his vision. And even though many of you are dreading these books too Im sure many of you will read them, too, if only to have a solid basis to complain on lol.

Anyway, I just watched the first Dune mini over the past few days, and yes, it was cringe inducing watching the painted backgrounds. God they were terrible.

 

Oh yes. Definitely dreading the continuation of the story, but at the same time.. They ARE continuing the story. As a Dune fan, i think you're required to read it.

Damn them!

 

Exactly. In that sense its kind of like SW and the prequels.

 

or like Star Wars and EU