With another insane election year coming in the United States, “Dune: Part Two” might give welcome relief to lovers of aristocratic manliness, whether they know they love it or not.
This movie, the follow-up to Denis Villeneuve’s “Dune” and a continuation of that movie’s storyline, couldn’t be more admiring of some forgotten classical past if it tried.
I haven’t seen more shots of ducal rings ever than this one has.
Perhaps we are in “Lord of the Rings” territory, what with serious questions of whether the heroes should use weapons of ultimate power — both atomic weapons and religious propaganda — to control vast hordes of people.
You might know the story. And if you don’t, you’ll have to go back either to the previous “Dune” or to Frank Herbert’s original book. Either of which will catch you up on this dark, stark, bleak movie that has a winning character and story arc that pleasantly surprised me.
This probably is my favorite Denis Villeneuve movie so far, despite length problems and too many dialogue simplicities.
Regarding the story, the Campbellian hero-with-a-thousand faces, Paul Atreides, has to integrate into the cultures of the oppressed desert people known as the Fremen.
These people have prophecies about a Messiah who will save them. Paul’s mother, who becomes the Fremen’s own matriarchal “Reverend Mother,” wants Paul to fulfill this Messiah role.
The Fremen live on their home planet, Arrakis, which just so happens to have the most valued resource in the known galaxy: Spice. Everybody wants the spice, everybody wants to control it, and so the Fremen are the oppressed natives dominated by various wannabe colonizers.
In LOTR style, Paul refuses to accept his role as Messiah of the Fremen for a good long while. He doesn’t want the power to control them, to be the colonial oppressor like his mother’s people have — the Bene-Jezerit — for just about all the races in the galaxy. Paul would also rather not start the galactic war to end all wars.
But this is a massive movie epic. Wars we must have.
“Dune: Part Two” really eschews any individualism for any character, so that all must be part of a race or tribe, all must bow to hierarchical aristocratic power, and all must fight for their race’s rights to resources and power.
Paul has no good choice. He certainly doesn’t have the classic main-character’s individualistic choice of aligning with a group or being oneself. He’s either got to be a tribal leader of one people, or Emperor of everything, and not just another good-looking warrior dude with an admiring native ladyfriend.
The movie therefore is rife with talk about aristocratic loyalty, aristocratic power struggles, and war. Endless shots seem dedicated to Paul’s adaptation to the stark desert environment of Arrakis, in preparation for his ultimate fights against the Harkonnen invaders, the big white bald baddies who would kill every last Fremen.
About the Harkonnen, they are — in classic movie melodrama style — just plain bad. The overlords slash anybody’s throat, including their servant females and hesitating subordinates. You know they are EVIL because they only accept yes-men and they show off the stark aesthetics of totalitarianism, which aren’t much different from the stark aesthetics of everything else in both Dune movies, except for the male-pattern baldness.
So warriors must fight warriors, and freedom-fighters must assault their colonial overlords. Big guys with beards — played by the big Josh Brolin and the bigger Javier Bardem — root on their ducal hero, Paul Atreides, who they hope will be the manly Messiah who will lead them to the “Green Paradise.”
The women, meanwhile, plot as Jezebel-like manipulators. One of them, the Fremen native, fights on with Paul, tough-guy style. The rest of the females in this film look on and ponder their Machiavellian marriage schemes.
In its own way, Dune: Part Two might as well be “Barbie, with its separation of males and females into assigned movie roles. Only this movie lacks all humor; there’s no joking or winking about any of this stuff.
I can’t tell if this all means #MeToo has passed. Actually, I know what it means: it’s long past. That was so 2017. Now we’re back to big buff tough guys fighting other big bad tough guys, with a woman or two involved, while the Bene-Jezerits look on and plan their manipulative pregnancy and eugenics schemes.
“Dune: Part Two” brings back both religious rites and aristocratic values into our 2024 world, where democracies seem to be in chaos.
There are ducal rings galore, and the kissing of ducal rings and of the feet of overlords. There are scroll-like writings that tell prophecies of the future, and divinations and prayers to unknown gods. Everybody is wrapped up in the Dune universe’s giant aristocratic, hierarchical power structure.
And that seems good. By the end of the movie, big Josh Brolin is saying “My Lord” to his master, and bigger Javier Bardem is saying “You are the Messiah!” to his god-emperor.
Maybe this is all a dark salve, kind of like the “Water of Life” depicted in the movie. The aristocratic manliness is the poison that can make you live, in the end. Or make you forget for three hours that some ridiculous election is coming up, which feels like it can only end in chaos.
When we get to Dune: Part Three, we shall see if this series challenges the old-world values that it highlights.
However, I’m pretty sure that with this series there will be a continuation of one thing for sure: war, and lots and lots of it.