Dune (1984)

Welcome, everybody, to the Polarize podcast. This is a movie podcast about polarizing movies, polarizing movies in the sense of rotten tomato scores. We cover movies on this pod that are loved by audiences, hated by critics or vice versa. These are the movies that we cover here. And today we are talking about a pillar in the sci-fi community. We in prep for the release of the newer version that is soon to be out. Today we are covering Dune, 1984's Dune, mind you.

And the scores here for everybody is 37% audience or critics and 65% audience. Now, this isn't just a one man show. So you're not going to only be hearing my voice this whole time. We got a lot to cover on this epic. So I'm going to go, I'm going to cut out, you know, maybe a little fun. I don't know, a little fun solo banter stuff, not banter, but solo monologue. You stuff. And we're going to get into it and introduce my co-host. We also refer to him as the forever guest. Mr. James Lindsay.

How's it going? Hello. I'm back yet again on the icy cold planet of the Polarize pod. Yes, the opposite of Arrakis, it sounds like. Where I'm friend to both Brandini and other kind of kind of the leotkines. Occasionally, I don't know. Maybe you could, maybe you could say that. A CYTO Max von CYTO. Yes. Yes, we could. I'll take that one. Yeah, you got a lot of CYTO energy. I got CYTO energy, you say. Okay. Okay. If you were to be one Dune character, we did the name quiz earlier.

That was pretty fun. I wonder what other like Dune stuff they have out there. Like they should have like the Hogwarts thing like, oh, are you a Harkinin? Are you a treatise? Like I don't want to be a Harkinin. No, that's no one wants to be a Harkinin. Or you a Tleylax or I never know how to pronounce those guys. The Mentat guys. Yeah. Are you a grasshopper man that is a knows how to travel through space and time. But you have to be kept in a big tank. Yeah, I don't know if I want that.

I don't, I don't. Yeah, I don't. Maybe that's why the Hogwarts the Hogwarts quiz doesn't work out as as well because there's a lot of those things you want to like get out. A treatise. A treatise. A treatise. Right. There's yeah, there's a clear part of the the Emperor's crew, I guess them. That's that has a lot of pull. Okay. Yeah. For a bit. There's a how many houses are there and do excellent question. I don't know.

I'm sure there's countless when you really get into the nitty gritty, but there's got to be like the. I feel like there's probably six, maybe even nine. I feel like there's quite a bit, right? Yeah, I mean, the ones that are there's like the main ones that are mentioned and makes sense because it's all has to do with the production of spice, which is what the story is about and what is so important in this.

Lauren in this universe, but yeah, and even even like I have to remind myself and it's mentioned in the book and I'm not any sort of expert on the book by any means, but I love her. It's not experts here. Lovers, not experts. Yeah, but like in this, it is technically in the far, far future of our universe, which explains Duncan Idaho. You're not going to have a guy named a Duncan Idaho.

If you not silly name, no, it's such a silly name, but then like there's moments where they're like, Oh, have you heard of this place called Earth? That's where like our kind were like originally from and we, you know, bowl bowl fighting and all that stuff was, was a thing. And that's like what the tradies have, you know, talk about in their, uh, in a little bit more alluded to in the Villeneuve one where there's, you know, the bowl is like the, yeah, the basket. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Cause it's on the insignia and all that, all the good stuff because Duke Lido's grandfather died from a bullfight or his father. That's where the nitty gra, lovers, not experts, but one of them was a bullfighter right? I'd from it. Yeah. Yeah. And I feel like that might be like all the way back to like Earth. I'm trying to remember exactly cause like who's really fighting bulls in this, in this right? Yeah. But who knows?

We, yeah, maybe that is just such an honor tradition that goes so far, so far back. Um, and that's like the beauty of like a good sci-fi story is one that has so much backstory going in that you're already very curious for it by everyone's reactions and dynamics and personalities and relationships with each other going in the door that you gleaning those things from the story as it goes along can be a blast.

If you love lore and you love how they, someone like builds it out and you're like, Oh, what's this person about? Oh, you're going to get a little bit. I'm going to get some later. I'm sure I'm curious how they're going to come back very much like the Game of Thrones thing or whatever. But with this one where it just like is trying so hard to like face on screen. Show me what you got.

It's like trying to tell you exactly what everything is right off the bat and already just coming across so desperate for you to understand the material before anything has even shown to you. It's already like, I'm, I don't know.

It's like going into, and this is, this is by all means like a much more complicated than a board game or something, but like, Hey, maybe there's board games where it's like, you know what, before we barrel into the instructions, maybe let's just like play a play a little bit, which most people are on that wavelength.

See where we hit an impasse and then consult the rules and then could play a little bit more and you know, and kind of go instead of just like in a date you with all this information that's not going to register when you finally start to see some stuff.

And with some bad narration and some bad introduction to the sci-fi stories in this lore, I think that that's a fair place to start for me because I think you see the writing on the wall from the beginning of this movie and how much it's trying to tell you all these things rather than show you and really there's a lot of things to see that are interesting as well.

And it's a shame because it just is so desperate for you to get into the hard text of it instead of having it displayed in a way that's like you get it enough to be interested, but not overwhelmed. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And it's one of the main differences, I would say between the new ones and this one is the need to the lack of confidence that audiences will not understand the at a base level of this story, the plot of this movie.

If they don't understand a lot of the intricacies of the world and the new one has faith that people will. If they want to know more, they can go watch a lore video on YouTube, but. The new one is all about telling a very simple story that it doesn't feel the need to explain a bunch of things because it is pretty simply plotted.

And so you sure there'll be things that you don't understand as things go on, but you're always grounded to a very tried and true narrative that everybody's familiar familiar with. And yeah, that confidence. In the audience is so indicative of like. The fact that there's over explanation in this one and that there's none in the new one is so indicative of the time.

Because I think it's weird to say that, but I think it still holds true because there's also this looming thing of like, well, Star Wars has already come out and people by and large got that and there's a bunch of stuff going on. They had a bunch of crawling texts at the beginning of that. We'll just put someone's face on the front. That'll be the same. Sure, but like the. The scroll in the beginning of the Star Wars movies explains. It doesn't over explain. It just.

It just kind of tells you exactly what. You need to in a way. Yeah, I don't know it. It's again, I think it just has confidence that the audience is going to understand the basic narrative and you know, and they did and people love it and then people go and seek out all the lore outside of that even back in the day when those came out. They were everybody was hungry to understand more about the world. You know, yada, yada, but I mean. More casual movie viewer. Can easily understand the plot.

In the conflict in Star Wars, like it's, you know, there's a bad guy. There's a good guy and then you need to beat the bad guy. And then yeah, that's that's definitely more, more simple than a dude is a tough one to be able to not only make a film about or a story about, but just one film is almost impossible to try to make it good. And the way that this one feels rushed or feels like it needs to explain itself.

Is the main detriment already getting into those sides of it, but that comes into the latter, latter portion of the movie for me. And if we're getting into like the beginning of it all, it surprises me between all these lengthy exposition notes. There is a fair amount of text that is. Pulled straight from the book and appears both in this movie and then a new movie as well. And that was really fun to see because I. Watched the most recent one.

I, you know, I hope it's okay that we're comparing them so much because it's just it's coming around the same time. Yeah, I mean, that's kind of the reason why we're doing it now. Yeah, right. Totally. We're all hyped up on the new tune. I'm sure it works and what doesn't.

And yeah, you know, and then, yeah, like this, it's cool to see like the dialogue Frank Herbert, you know, the dialogue Frank Herbert, you know, dialogue Frank Herbert's the author of the, the, the story is words coming through in such a nice strong way. And of course fear is the mind killer, all the ones that you're definitely going to pull, but even like I should have married you and stuff like that. It's like something that's mumbled by Oscar Isaac.

And then like as he's going down the stairs in this movie, Duke Lito is kind of how I should have married you. I should have married you and in the way that it's kind of played out at the at the beginning here and setting up the stage is for the most part similar. And yeah, like those, those beautiful lines from Frank Herbert. And it's cool to see that they took the time to put, take it straight from the text.

And I know painstakingly this movie to its detriment as well was trying to adhere to that text so much so that it did not. It was not a tenable for the whole production and it ran dry near the end.

I believe, but you know, there's, there's some, there's some Dino, Dino De La Rantis meddling, you know, of course, of course there and nothing contentious between the two of them or anything, but it did not work out near at the end, you know, and the way that it was edited was, was rough and not split into two parts. I'm rambling here, but it's just, it blows my mind. I'll make this last time.

Let's talk about Dino and yeah, let's make this last point because I was thinking about this before recording too is like, man, like, and some of the behind the scenes stuff of why Dino and this lovely book Room to Dream by David Lynch and Chris Christine McKenna.

Why he would not want it to have a sequel is so dumb to me because like if you're going to, if you're a producer and he seems like someone obviously wants, wants to make money and all that good stuff, but it's like you see Star Wars is about he David Lynch turned down Return of the Jedi, the third one already and he's turning down the third one and it works to have sequels. Motherfucker episode four now and then five and six. They got to go backwards after this. Fill it out, baby. Come on.

Like that blew my mind. It's like you can make more move a lot if you stretch it like what's wrong with you. He's made and he's been successful on a lot of other ways. Obviously in a legendary figure in Hollywood, but it's legendary. Like one of the most legendary guys. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. And his daughter was integral and David Lynch speaks nothing but like so highly of his experience with them and his children and the family and working together and all that stuff.

And they just didn't see eye to eye on the end product, but that contention is a polarizing feature that is in within all the people that are viewing the movie, but then also the people that are making the movie. So that's definitely worth seeing as well. This is like a contentious start to get this movie made. They're going to do a Joe Darafsky version with a bunch of HR Geiger shit. I highly recommend that documentary. If anyone, if you haven't, have you seen that movie that?

Sorry, the documentary, Brandon? I haven't. I've heard about the HR Geiger stuff in relation to this movie because still suits and stuff still kind of. There are a fair amount of stuff that hold up and you know, we'll ultimately get into a bigger discussion like Geiger stuff. But the visuals in this movie, there's a lot. I really enjoy. Oh yeah. I don't know if I appreciated when I first saw it because I feel like I first saw it a long time ago and it might have been on TV.

And so this was kind of a I got reacquainted with this version again for this podcast. And there's a lot of stuff I enjoy about this movie. Big time. Yeah. You know, because you everybody hears about this movie being like, oh, it's so shitty. Like everybody logs in and says like, oh, it's terrible. You know, it was a huge flop. Yada, yada, but there's some cool ass shit in this movie that I really enjoyed.

Especially in like something that I appreciated for this one in comparison to the new one is there is a lot of crazy artistic choices in this. Yeah. The new one is so grounded in reality, which is awesome. Like I do love that. Don't get me wrong. But like it's pretty fun to see some wacky ass costumes, like machines. Also to the miniature stuff in this, like a lot of miniatures loved a lot of minute, you know, a lot of that stuff. Big time.

But yeah, the opening, the opening set, like we got to talk about this opening set and this kind of first beginning scene with all the all these people meeting with the giant grasshopper in the tank. Before we do that set. Oh my God. Yeah. Before we do, I just want to talk about how weird it is that David Lynch directed this movie. Absolutely. I mean, it's insane. His experience on it.

I can, I can, if you want to just talk a little bit about that, because like he met with and because this was after a racer head. This was after the elephant man. Elephant man is the big one. He was kind of hot shit after that. And it was so funny to one of our favorite podcasts as a friendship, Brandon and I is blank check in this room to dream book.

It literally said blank check for like after David Lynch made, you know, the elephant man and what do you know was going to give him for elephant man. But what Dino told him for this movie was to, you know, he, well, he, he hated a race. He hated a racer head. He said, I want the, I want the director of the elephant man.

I don't want the director of the right, which is bonkers to me is to, to find that the, the creator of the elephant man is going to be your creator, which actually was his daughter. I should be even more precise. It was Dino's daughter. It was like Raffaella or something, I believe something like that. And she was the one who brought David to Dino. And yeah, David was take like Dino's got to be a super charismatic dude. And, and, and, and, and loved, and they loved each other.

It sounded like, and, and we're happy to work together, but to turn down return to the Jedi from George Lucas. Yeah. And then, and then do this, I would imagine the reason that he did it because they seem similar like a sci-fi thing is like, yeah, I kind of wanted to make his own vision about it instead of trying to finish up, do a sequel to someone's already thing, already going thing. Cause what he told George Lucas and yeah, there's a clip of it.

I can, I can show it as well, but he tells, you know, George Lucas, like this is your thing. You go direct it yourself. You know, Yeah. After I think it's like watching that clip. Cause I think it's, I think it's pretty entertaining. What were you going to say? I was going to say, we'll see it in the clip. Yeah. And George Lucas foot directing style was return in the Jedi. I was asked by George to come up to see him and talk to him about directing, which would, would be the third Star Wars.

And I had. I remember the name of this zero interest. I've never seen this. Does what he loves. And I do what I love. The difference is what George loves makes hundreds of billions of dollars. So I thought I should go up at least visit with him. And it was incredible. I had to go to this building in LA first and get a special credit card and I had to get a special keys and a letter came in a map. And then I went for the airport and I flew up and then they had a rental car.

He's a rack and tour this guy. He's like, let me tell you the story. And I was to drive to this place. Getting a star. I came into an office and there was George. And he talked with me for a little bit and then he said, I want to show you something. Now right about in this time, I started getting a little bit of a headache. Just, you know what I'm talking about. You know what you're talking about. Yeah. Yeah. This guy knows what I'm talking about. And he showed me things called wookiees.

And now this headache is getting. It was like as he mourns Cassin's sitting there or something. He's like, yeah, I know what you're talking about. And different things. Then he took me for a ride in his Ferrari for lunch and George is. It's a Ramah. It's all about Ramah. And he was almost laying down. We were flying through this little town up in Northern California. We went to a restaurant, not that I don't like salad, but that's all they had was.

Then I got a really almost like a migraine headache. And his book is really like this. It's pretty fantastic. I recommend it. And I even before I got home, I kind of crawled into a phone booth and phone my agent. I said, there's no way. I know no way I can do this. He said, David, David, David, David, calm down. You don't have to do it. No way. And so George blesses heart. I told him on the phone the next day that he should direct it. It's his film.

He invented everything about it, but he doesn't really love directing. And so someone else did direct that film, but I did. I called my lawyer and told him that I wasn't going to do it. And he said, you just lost. I don't know how many millions of dollars, but it's okay. It's okay. Oh man. Because then we got, because then we got doing instead. Yeah. And we're better for it. And we get sick about it. I mean, I could only imagine David Lynch return of the Jedi.

There's some other original movie that he was talking about making run. Run rocket, something like that. And then blue velvet, I think was starting to be in the works as far as is him writing it in the screenplay for blue velvet. I think he was starting to kind of work on the screenplay a bit. And I think he had brought it up with Dino, but I don't think Dino wanted the weird, weird stuff. And they were, yeah.

And this was after, after doing, he was able to make blue velvet and he never wanted to do anything like this again. And he wanted to do weird something weird in his own thing. And that's why we were able to get blue velvet because had this been successful, I don't know, maybe he would have continued to do it. Who knows.

But he cites in, it's telling all about Dune and all the awful experiences he had, which I can share some of those as well where he thinks the awful experience at least just so that it brought him to be able to do blue velvet. Yep. And that's, it was a video that I saw of him talking retrospectively about that process. It was really interesting because it feels like because the, because the experience was so terrible for him, it really like drove him hard into the opposite direction.

And so that's, you know, it's almost like that. Yeah. It's, it lit a fire under him to be like, I never want to do this again. So I'm going to try to succeed as much as possible at doing the things that I do enjoy. And that's why, you know, blue velvet, I think really works. I think is really interesting movie.

But I just want to you as Kyle McLaughlin and he was an unknown at that time before this movie and big search for casting Paul and they found him in Seattle and yeah, I never been in front of a camera before and he just talks about how he's kind of embarrassed watching the movie because he's so green in it. And yeah, he's, he's a young little baby Kyle, Kale as, as David calls him, Kale. There's a real tick tock that reached me where it was a video of Kyle.

Like, I can't remember where in relation to if it was like during or after, but like really close to making do and he was just talking about how crazy of an experience it was to go from next to nothing to all of these meetings with all of these high powered individuals and how overwhelming it was. And you can just tell that this guy is like Kyle McLaughlin seems so cool. He seems like such a absolutely. Oh, yeah, that guy seems awesome.

Yeah. I mean, Twin Peaks is just a performance that goes down in the books forever as far as like a just a personality of almost like the best at being a persona for David Lynch in a way in, in that, especially Twin Peaks. And I think having that parallel between the two just works so fucking well and to have that guy in your corner. And it almost reminds me of like the Sam Remy Bruce Campbell relationship or something to it.

You got this like this 10 out of 10 actor or something that's willing to just give you a really good looking guy to give you everything. Yeah. Like, you know, totally kind of question a little bit like career could have been a little whatever. It's still a great career, but it's like, I mean, I would love to watch Bruce Campbell or Carl McLaughlin like in a lot, a lot of stuff, but they still had both great careers.

I was going to say, yeah, I mean, I don't know being on Twin Peaks, it's a really good career. Kyle was on Kale was on Sex and the City, I believe. Pretty sure. Yeah. He was also in Portlandia. Super funny. Oh yeah. He's a mayor. He is such a funny follow on Tiktok. He just does silly stuff all the time where he yeah, he just tries to make trends on that are popular on Tiktok his own. And he's so funny about it, you know, because he's so not self serious and just I yeah, he just has such a like.

He enjoys doing like enjoys acting enjoys the craft enjoys being creative and making things. And it's yeah, him and there's a ton of people in this movie that end up being in Twin Peaks regulars. Yeah. The guy who's still Gar is definitely in Twin Peaks. The even the little girl I shows up in Twin Alia, I believe is in Twin Peaks. She is. Yeah. You're right. Oh, that it's it's cool to know that David Lynch is the kind of person to forge those relationships.

I feel like in it and he also is really great at using amateur actors in his films and projects, which is a big part of Twin Peaks and in various, you know, other other sort of stuff where he just his whole casting thing is just picking someone off of a headshot and doesn't really need to feel the need to audition them or hear them speak or move or anything. Just how they look just fills exactly what his vision and his mind is. No, no, you know, meaning anything to any of the actors in it.

There is like that essentially comes helps come across as like the campiness comes across the surreal attitude comes across the camp. There's definitely campiness in this movie. It veers like wildly between nearing on Flash Gordon a little bit and then, you know, going going back to Star Wars and then, you know, with the with the Toto soundtrack and everything, it's got a real flash Gordon like the last like whatever 40 minutes and everything is like essentially like a big Flash Gordon battle.

However, in Flash Gordon, there is just such like a more joy to the characters and what's what's going on and in Dune. I don't know the the fight and everything at the end just. Yeah, it's not going for the same thing and it can't be as campy as the one of the most campy movies of all time is this Flash Gordon. And I'm not sure. And I don't want it to be either. It's just interesting how it goes between those two things because it is like self serious and over explains itself too much.

And then in the second half, it's like, all right, let's wrap it up. Yeah, right. I mean, the back half of this movie is really the biggest problem with them, right? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, that's and that's it's essentially where they were the new movie ends is kind of where this one goes off the rails a little bit is when he goes to meet with the Fremont. And I like the fact that we're kind of just talking about swaths of this movie.

We can kind of go over notes later and everything because getting into the nitty gritty of Dune like hard sci-fi. I'm not sure it's like David David just take on it. I think it's worthwhile and comparing them a little bit. However, I was just the thing I took away a lot and I probably did last time when I read the book and watch this movie. But when I read the book, I was very fascinated by the Fremen.

They are these people that like you hear a lot about you get Duncan Idaho going out there and then you he's like enamored with them. He he's he respects them. He's he's a changed man. He's completely different. He's he's sharing the ways and you're just like and he's talking about how many of them there are. And that just gets your mind like twirling about like, man, what's going on? I really want to know.

And so you get there with this movie and it just immediately turns into instead of and I am first. It already is happening in the villainy movie. But in the second part, I'm sure it's going to be more of the case too.

Instead of in this movie where we need to show you guys the weirding way, we need to show you guys that I'm the chosen one and then I'm going to lead the way and I'm going to be the hero and we need to show you and teach you, you know, like primitive people, like the ways of like what, you know, these sound like the sound guns and all this shit. And they're like so blown away by all this shit.

No, no, no, I was just so that that's what frustrated me so much with this watch and what because it was completely backwards to one of the things I like the most in the book, which was finally coming into the frame and see short whatever it is and getting to learn their ways. Taking taking in the water of, you know, all the all the ancient water and then assimilating with them more so than having, you know, yourselves be like, look at our cool powers and we're going to show you how to do shit.

And then even like the writing, the worm and everything, I don't know, it just, he just immediately knew how to do it and they didn't show him how to do shit. And he's just like, yeah, now I got it. And I was like, man, this, this is where it's really a bummer because it took so long to get here. And now that he's here, he's like, I got it. I got it. And he's just doing all this badass shit immediately. Hero. And yeah, that's that's my whole spiel.

Yeah. So Frank Herbert is on record being like frustrated that people are enamored with Paul and excite with Paul because not here. I think because to your point, which makes false, false I don't such a richer story, which is being accomplished very well in the new dunes is that Paul is a has to earn respect. He has to ingratiate himself into such an interesting strong culture that is being almost presented as is as a better culture and system than these, you know, the psychology and

in this planet. Yeah, they know what they know what the fuck they're they're doing. Yeah. Absolutely. And he also has to fulfill these prophetic things that the Ben and just Zaryad have put into the Fremen and everything. So he's he's has there's a lot of pressure on him. He doesn't immediately just like, yeah, I got it.

Right. And yes. And it he acts as the surrogate to explain that if you are going to affect broader change, you have to learn to you have you have to learn to respect these this culture because if you don't, then no one is going to want to help you. And so it's really like on you to come from a place of the collective. Yeah, because it's all the the water is such a collective source for everybody and and everything is so

communal there. Right. Or it's like the Fremen aren't their goal as opposed to everybody else in the universe is money and power. The Fremen are just so like self contained, not looking like they're all they're doing is just protecting what they have because they have to because that is the that they are being oppressed, but it's not like they want to destroy whoever's coming in or destroy the Harkin and or a tradies so that they can then you know, usurp them and be more powerful.

It's like, no, we're just trying to protect ourselves. And there was this really funny quote from and I think it was from Frank Herbert talking about friends of his that he talked to that were from the Middle East. And you know how they were like, it's funny to us that people think that this is a sci fi story because in our reality, we have been experiencing this and it makes so much sense to see this analog and the story and well, not on screen in this. Spices oil branded.

I mean, come on, right? It's like it's such a. It's such a clear analogy on the tanium. Exit right. Oh, my. Spice is so much cooler than on a danium. And also, it's places. Yeah, like, like as a pause on space, it's a cool, cool substance that's like just vague enough to like work. But then once you get into the explanation of it, it makes a complete sense and thinking about how the guild space navigators are like able to use it to tell the future and then

travel. If you hear my cat, she cries Johnny. It's a Luna bringing me a. Oh, it's Luna. A little sweater string and she cries and screams the whole way as she brings it to me. But these grasshopper guild space navigators grasshopper guild space navigators grasshopper guilds navigators. They like so it's like, you know, light speed, but and so you don't hit a planet or anything. They know the future and so they can guide it through everything as as everything's

moving. And it's like just that's such a cool things. It's like, oh, that's a weird silly. It's just like this dust that must tell you tell the future. And it's like, do you understand the implications, though? And I look that, you know, all the bootlery and G hard and stuff is so no AI or computers and shit, except for like these mentat things and every it's it's it fits David Lynch. It does fit David Lynch is kind of ethos and like kind of his sensibilities a lot of

like and a lot of the sets. Yeah, they look pretty fucking cool. Conceptually, and his artist and his art style, all the harkening stuff for sure on industrial harkening shit. I find it's so cool that even though it you can at a very like base like surface level, you could be like spice is oil, but when you learn more about spice, it isn't oil. It's so

much. It's so much more interesting than that where it's like this is so valuable because it is required for space travel, but not because it goes into a ship and thinking even deeper than that. It's because it affects your brain to be able to allow you to think broader, think broader in the sense of time. Really? Use it. Everyone uses it and yeah, in their own different ways. Absolutely. There's so there's so many interesting things about the lore of Dune that have again

surf like midichlorians. It's very because in the midichlorians give you the force. Spice gives you the voice. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, the force. It's a lot of fun. I forget. Continue, sir. But so I just I find it's so fun that there are at a surface level, a lot of clear analogs between what's happening, like what is what exists in the real world and what exists in Dune, but it is.

I mean, all the climate change stuff is like very like super ahead of its time as well and like changing the ecology of a planet because you're harvesting a resource too much. I mean, I mean, give me. Hello. But so. Again, I just want major love of this like world. You know, these movies by and large is this idea of. Using little bits of like things you're familiar with, but then transforming them in a in a way that makes sense. Like I would argue that Dune is so good. The story by and large

this movie. Yeah, at times two. But it's so good. I mean, the new ones are really good at it where it is. These little, you know, certain aspects of our present society have lasted, you know, 200,000 years or whatever and like what has lasted because that's to me is like the fun of sci-fi is, you know, the recognizing like, oh, this is like kind of what evolved out of these things. I was really hoping that Gurney was going to have his musical instrument and the

new one, but he does have it. Patrick Stewart does have it in this one and he's just carrying it for a bit. I can't recall if he actually plays it maybe like before the battle. He might be. I forget. But he's like walking in before the little shield duel that they have and he's carrying. They had some name from it in the in the book, but I always thought that was that was cool. It's like, well, you got to find a way to make an instrument and it looked like I forget what those

are. Those are called or you like spin a little thing. It's like a guitar that you spin a little thing at the base and it makes a hardy-girty and it makes a little like tremolo effect. Yeah, that kind of stuff is great. And then, you know, even like the shields and everything, I like how as with the Boulayrin Jihad and the death of all computers and all that stuff, I like that a lot of this. I mean, they get to the

voice guns and all that stuff. And in the new one as well, I don't really like those, but I do like blade warfare, you know, like you got to get up close and get into that because that gets that's so real. And I like when sci-fi stuff, some stuff like is limited in interesting ways or like downgrades or defaults. And that's maybe the dystopian effect or the cyberpunk effect, a little bit of the, you know, Blade Runner can be compared to either one of these movies, which is which is

fun, you know, it's like Blade Runner. The original one came out at the same and Blade Runner sequel is, you know, a little bit of a new round of the same. But really, Scott was also considered for this movie and then you decided to do Blade Runner instead. Let's be real, that would have been better. Yeah, you're right. He would have been like, I can make it to an hour movie. Don't worry about it. Don't worry about it. Yeah,

absolutely. I mean, they go, you know, this, which I mean, but then he has how many director cuts of different movies as he

have to. So I don't know. It could have been the same drama that like unfurled after Blade Runner that happened to both movies because all the Harrison Ford and Arian should know that shit and that in that movie and the long drawn out thing to get the all like the five different cuts that he went through, the thing is he would be willing to go through that and David Lynch is like, I want to forget this ever happened.

Right. Just like with the story you played is like David Lynch, obviously is the type of person where almost immediately he starts to shut down like on a physiological level when he just doesn't like what he's doing. And you can just tell that I'm, you know, I watched an interview with him that talked about the production of this and he said, even from before

filming. Yeah. When they were going through the script of it, he was already like letting the studio selling out as he says selling out as he said, yeah, like make because he didn't have final cuts. This is big issue. Right. And then it kind of makes him seem like such a little stinker where he's like, well, since I don't have final cut, then I'm going to just,

you know, okay, fine. If you want to do it that way, let's do it that way just to like almost like it's almost like he sabotage this to prove like the studio meddling was all terrible ideas. I don't know. Yeah, I wouldn't go that far, but I would definitely say that he's a sensitive artist that is very hurt by the process of this. When in the past, he was kind of

giving. He was given final cut and he was given a lot of leeway by the people who backed him in both a racer head took fucking forever and he like took up some some barn in the studio that Mel Brooks or no, this is this is Mel Brooks was an elephant man, but a racer had like he took forever to make that movie and he just locked himself in this, you know, in the set and

just spent forever making that one. And then Mel Brooks saw that and kind of gave him final cut on elephant man because he liked him so much and then didn't attach his name to elephant man because he didn't want that to distract from the success. I mean, what a fucking guy. What a fucking guy. Mel Brooks, you mean? Absolutely. Yeah. What a fucking guy. Because you have to assume that in the movies that Mel Brooks had made prior to that, like studios, I'm sure told him like this is

too much. You can't do this because his movies have moments in a not moments like whole scenes that are so just like surreal self-indulgent. Oh, sure. You know, like they're really funny, sure, but it's not like they the plot along necessarily, but he's just such a funny guy where he's lies. Kind of takes the vaccine in a good amount of it, you know, and absolutely.

Yeah. Twin Peaks begins as, you know, the murderer of a girl and turns into what it is and it becomes so much more about what you perceive as extraneous things and being the things that almost matter and then the journey and all that stuff. And I love, I love his, but his whole deal. I love it. And I love watching interviews with him, you know, reading his books and really digging deep and on him. I watched Mahalan Drive again recently

and love Blue Velvet. But yeah, he totally seems like somebody that, yeah, if you work with him, you just have to give up any sort of, unless he asks you and he wants your professional opinion or whatever, but I would imagine that it has to be very specific what he wants and that could also change in a moment as well. And then I also hear he's just lovely to work with if you're an actor. If you're an actor, like he's the best because he really takes all the time to get,

to have fun with that. And he's worked with people that, you know, like when he does work with somebody, he kind of tends to work with them again and again. He's worked with a lot of very cool and interesting people like David Bowie and Billy Zane and when they show up and Twin Peas. Stinginess is such a good thing. Those little cameos. Full casting. The sting thing is pretty mind blowing to little tidbit on that of like synchronicity had just been recorded and had like

not even come out yet when they were making this movie. And then synchrony, I think synchrony like comes out and then everyone's like, Oh my God, we fucking love staying in the police and that he's going to be in this movie. Oh shit. And then I've seen interviews with Dave Lynch. He's like, he's not the, he's not the main star of the movie. He's not the main character. People are going into this movie being really

sad that he's not in it very much. Right. Absolutely. And it's, it's fun now to know that there's a lot of him. If you know what I mean, there's a lot of him, even if you don't, you know, you don't see, you don't see very much. You do see a lot of him. Austin Butler is, I think, great casting. And I think, yeah, yeah, Shalamane and Zendaya. The whole casting of the new movie is perfect. And I think it as it's, as itself as a movie is a 10 out of 10

perfect movie for me. And I cannot wait for part two because I think it's just going to be the best thing. I'm excited. I hate to be, you know, I, I don't hype things up. Try not to hype things up too much too often, but I just think it's, it's so good. I've seen it, I think like three or four times and seen it four times. Yeah. Just a fucking ready for the IMAX

experience and a couple of days I'm seeing it. And I think we'll probably report back on the next episode about, you know, kind of how it compares to this and be like, you know what, actually, the David Lynch one is much better. He totally should put that on this. Unfortunately, he did the same thing. He did the same thing. It was two and a half hours of bullshit and sound guns. Sound guns. Oh, God, I hated sound guns. That's one of my notes is like,

I had at hour and 30 things have gotten really aimless. Yeah. And then my next note was the voice gun is kind of lame. Yeah. That whole scene is like, now yell at it. But you're gone. And I just hated that there is he was like condescending and all is you're like, I got to teach these guys. But then even some, even some of that stuff was kind of, he's like, I am going to take 100 of

your strongest men and I will teach him my ways. And then those 100 men will teach all of the rest of them was real Ponzi scheme, if you will. It's like, I will. If you act now, you can learn the weird way. Take this pamphlet and a little, a little water of life or I mean, that's what bon me eyes because the issue with this latter portion of the movie is that they have

what's in the books. They like are very stringent on what they want to put in because I think they were stressed out about being faithful to the book to like way too much. But they maintain those scenes like the big ones, like of Jessica taking the water and writing the worm and the big, you know, the big battle and they're like, those things are there. The connective tissue

is not villain who knows how to make something burn. I mean, to bring that up again, just like let it burn and let like that build up really, really come in to play and make the action just come across so palatable. But with this one, it's like, I've got to do this. I've got to do this now is like all he does. And no one tells him there's no, there's nothing that pushes him along.

What there is, and we haven't mentioned too much yet, is the other thing besides the head at the beginning of Erol on a character that you don't even fucking tell the inch isn't really saying anything is the inner voice that is constantly like throughout, which could be done so well if it was done like a handful of times, like maybe like five times least. Yeah, maybe like five times like just a handful. They do it like throughout the movie. Oh, he's like,

I'm kind of hungry. I have gas. I should have Taco Bells. No, I should say like, Taco Bells. I have lower back pain. I am not doing today. I have to take a big dumpy. Oh my God, feed Ratha looks so hot right now. God, that scene with him. So raw Rafa, Rafa, Rafa, fade Rafa, I think is and then what's the other the in the new one it's played by about what is that character's name Dave Bautista plays. Oh, Robin, Robin, Harpen and Robin. Yeah, but there's that scene with Robin Rafa and

there's all the Baron Baron Baron. Yeah. And then Baron is like turned on by like his by fade Ratha. Yeah, that's the upsetting part of this point about it. Who is like, so fucking gross. I hate it. So gross. Which is the elephant man of it all. Right. Like that's in my mind where the elephant man connection comes in because there's empathy with elephant man, you know, like there's really with that character with this. It's like, yeah, maybe the makeup and all that.

But makeup. Yeah. But this. Yeah, for sure. This is just so gross and mean and like, look at all this weird. Look at it. Look at the weird shit. So God, so much weird shit. The thing that grossed me out the most, even though before you move on from that point was like the just real quick is like because you mentioned him being attracted to it to staying and I just wanted to say just like I hated how this is in that era when homo eroticism was vilified in that

way of like, oh, he's a villain. So he's going to be like kind of. Intra genus or like not like pansexual almost. Yeah, that's he's going to have that. That's a kink. That's that's weird and like and attributed to bad bad people and villains and antagonists and the weird and the way that it was mixed in with like a psychosexual homo eroticism where he pulls out the fucking heart tab of this like young. Those are the absolute. Oh, my God.

And just like. And then. But then it's like he's like horny too. And then that's just so fucking upsetting. That's I mean, yeah. And then the part where he's spinning around in circles that. But it's upsetting. And then it's it's just fucked up that like that needs to be a part of it. You know, it's just like, oh yeah, Amy is attracted to Fade Roth. Isn't that weird? Isn't this guy that adds to the weirdness, right? It's like what I feel like the movies. Yeah, that's not the problem.

That's so many other weird things about him. Like it would be a hat on a hat as you would say, Brandon, it would be a hat on a hat. I know you like to say that. I love to see that. I was just about to say that. I get to say this time. It's a clear case of ungepachka. It's like it's another hat on a hat for me was you. A mentat has wine mouth and then they also have crazy eyebrows. I just got like fucking pick one, right? I mean, they look like a horton hears a who they look like a wool who gay.

Yeah, I and so something I didn't realize, obviously, because it's such a minor thing, but like I really love the plus up that the new movie did with the Mentats where so they explain why all the Mentats have like stains on their mouth because they're like in spice. Yeah. And it's door flakes. Is that cool thing before he drinks it? Oh, yeah, he's like, yeah, I'm taking this because or whatever. And I love that in the new one, it isn't like it looks like they have just

a filthy wine mouth. It's just that little red square. Yeah, Streb looks so much cooler. And like accomplishes the same fucking thing because like. And then you can have like them be in different cultures and be represented by the culture as well, where you can have piter and the new one was the I love that actor and he's all like ball and eyebrows and pale. And then you have the other guy through fear who is just like a normal looking dude with some faded out eyes.

And like when he does his little like this little yeah, like calculation. Yeah. But then it's just yeah, it's the little strip where you can have a broad variety of different types of looking people, but then that's the signifier is is that right there? Or or or even if they're whatever culture that they may have to themselves. All the I'm glad because then there's good costumes in this movie. Like there's some some fantastic costumes in this one.

And I know that watching some little behind the scenes of the costume was only frustrated that they didn't get more time to do some stuff. And then some of their stuff wasn't featured or like last minute changes to add or remove things. But there was a lot of there's a lot of cool things. And one part that creeped me the fuck out was the I believe it was the Harkinins that were wearing them.

If it wasn't, it might have been the Guild Space Navigator guys that were wearing these like almost like black trash bags were like these big black puffy suits. Those black puffy suits originally this guy was like, yeah, so the San Diego Fire Department found this extra whole room full of body bags that weren't being used anymore. So we took those and fashion costume costumes out of them.

And I didn't tell anybody, but there were still some like like fluids and things like in the bags and obviously by cleaned them out. And everything. But he's like, I didn't tell them they were body bags until after they were like done with the scene. I'm like that fucking blew my mind if I had known that I was wearing that shit and like, oh, you wouldn't have worn it. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. But even after the fact, that's like the poltergeist thing where it's like they use the real skeletons.

It's just like, you know, you don't tell people and very dear elite. It's very 1980s cocaine style filmmaking. If you ask me, but this was shot in Mexico City. They like some of the stuff they're talking about like, hey, you just wanted black smoke. So we burn tires. They didn't care back then. So he's burned a shit ton of tires. So the black smoke is just right. Pretty tires.

You know, it's unique about this movie in comparison to the new one is and I honestly like to its credit like I enjoyed it honestly is how varied all of the costumes and looks even amongst like the Harkonnen, for example, like some people just have the middle of their head shaved and here you know, or just all of these insane choices in costuming is really fun to watch.

You know, it's a I think a plus for this movie is that there are so many goofy artistic choices that make if that fill this movie up with a lot of like I don't know. Yeah. Interest and you know, things to be like, look at that guy. Like what's that guy's deal? Everybody's just so. Yeah. Outrageous in their costuming. And he's sort of like ensemble scene where there's a lot. Yeah. There's a lot of people from different factions at the beginning, of course.

And at the end, do where there's all those, all those various people that show up to that is where the other movie kind of locks into a fun place where you can just kind of look at the fun visuals when it's like the dark battles and everything is definitely the worst part of it. Yeah, especially because there's some special effects and stuff. Yeah. And there's one isn't even really like CG at this time. Like that wasn't that wasn't a thing that you did.

So like even like the shields and stuff or like, I believe hand drawn like frame by frame that wasn't even CG is like actually just they just had to draw those things. Let's talk about the shields. That's the thing is like you can't do it. You can do anything at that time. Let's talk about it. Let's do anything at that time. What are you going to do? I don't know. There's this is the time of like lightning silly. We're like where eighties were like, we can do lightning effects.

What we got for you is lightning effects. So if you want your worm miniature who's mulling around and you know, our little miniature sand, we're lightning on top of it. Which is pretty cool. And no, there are again, all of the there's so much miniature work in this that I love. Yeah, really, really fucking dig. But OK, the worms are a little there's some cool stuff. They're so bad. It takes you out big distracting really hard to know like what's happening.

Yeah. Because once the shields go up, you can't really see the person in there. And then they're also just so blocky and large. I'm trying to think of what it what they kind of make me think of. But it's just it. Yeah, it's Minecraft. Yes. Yes. Nailed it. Yes. Yes. Roblox. Everything is very squared. Whatever reason, that doesn't make any sense why it be so blocky and like it's like pieces on each other and whatnot. It just doesn't make any.

Especially when you see the new one, it's just perfect how they do it with the blue and the red and slow blade breaks the shield and all that stuff. It explains it. But and then they have that whole other thing with like the the like pillar that drops down with like knives attached to it and everything. And he's got to roll around. I'm like, this does not work. And is unnecessary. We saw him do a little do already.

We don't need to see like he's he's a he's a he can battle like, oh, we already we just saw it. It's fine. Yeah, we got it. Yeah, absolutely. We get the little like PowerPoint of the planets and all that stuff. And before we go to him and there's like a soothing sound design to some of that stuff. But I want to. Yeah, I don't know. I want to talk about something that's really different in this, which I feel like I'm always going back to the beginning because there's so much to talk about.

But like this move. I'm running around right. I feel like we're getting near the end. This movie, unlike the new one starts off with the proposition from the spacing guild about the plan to like you actually hear the conversation about why it's more like omniscient. And you kind of know everyone's plans going in, which is very in kind to the book. Yeah, so the spacing guild head person. So let's yeah, we never even really like we talked about that.

And that's something to my memory is not as cuckoo bananas bonkers out there. Grasshoppery shit as in the book like in the book, I think they have like, you know, some, some defining features. Like I like this all the spice and take and everything I think has affected some of some of their looks and everything. But I think they're still anthropomorphic in some way or like humanoid. But they have like, I don't know, like gills or something. I'm trying to try to remember.

But David Lynch looks at it and is like, well, I want a big grasshopper and a tank and I want a bunch of people walking around that stuff up the goo. Do you know, look at those guys. Oh, yeah. I love that. Okay, I want to be that guy. Second to the goose weepers. All right, goose weepers. I want real energy on this one. Diane. Yeah. How much it the camera just fucking focuses on its mouth. And it just spit now. That was I was questioning a lot.

I was like, wow, they really committed to just like, you need to see this little mouth thing flapping not once, twice, but multiple times multiple times during the space travel montage of that was. That was the space. Yeah, it's so silly. Yeah, it's so out. But seeing outside looks really cool, you know, like all, you know, the big module and all the little ones flying out looks great. And but then once you get into the grasshopper flying through and bending space.

That lights up like a, that lights up like a like a firefly. And like, she's like a laser like out of its mouth and like. It's so but okay, even though it's all gross and what also you're kind of just like, what? I love the head and because it looks so fucking cool. Like gross, but it looked awesome. Yeah. Like, do you know how to with with Barbara Rella and everything too? It's just like, I don't know.

It was a bit cone in the barbarian, which is just Barbara Rella's visuals are just like weird and cool. Like, I remember going to a concert one time and they had Barbara Rella projected on a wall during like at like the bar section of the concert venue. And they were just like kind of there. I think there's DJ and they were playing some music and there was there was no sound of Barbara Rella, but I just kind of sat there for a while with a drink and we talked about this.

Watch bar watch Barbara Rella to some music and yeah, plays very well to some tunes. And this is kind of a similar thing where the visuals of this just kind of like is puts you in a place of like, wow, it's it's cool to look at. And the new one does it in a way where you know what's going on every still in that movie is like a fucking piece of art. Painting. Oh my God. I that's so funny that you bring that up because I remember maybe it was you that told me about it.

Then then we watched it together, but I've put on Barbara Rella on you to add house parties before. That's a great move. That's such a party movie. Yeah, it's such like, you know, I just imagine when I was hosting parties like if somebody were to just be sitting on the couch, like maybe in like a in a space where they're like, I don't necessarily know anybody, whatever, like having at least something to just sit down and like, what's this about?

Like, you know, and then you could like have a conversation about a thing that's happening in front of you. So then it would help you connect with the people at the party and Barbara Rella is such a good movie for that. You could still have some music playing, you could talk over it.

Yeah. And the plot of it like doesn't it's so simple doesn't really matter, but the visuals of it are just every which way you're like, you know, I'm just remembering like that set very clearly a set and there's like smoke on the ground and then they get into like a like not a toboggan, but like some kind of. Yeah, I can remember that. It's like a control panel thing. And yeah, what is it? What's it called when dogs are on a sled? A sled.

Yeah. Yeah. And it's just so many and like that guy has this whole furry. Yeah, that's ringing some bells. Yeah. I mean, and that fuzzy sort of sci-fi sort of viewing of the 70s and 80 late 70s into the 80s and is something that when it hits, it hits me really well.

I just watched Alien for I don't know what however many times I've seen that movie again recently and this is around the same time of that and just there's a way of making it look so fucking cool with the technology of its time, whether it's through miniatures which are in that one as well and

all the practical effects, it has a real weight to everything in the sets, especially like whatever sets that you have are really trying to tell you that we're in a different planet or we're in a spaceship or whatever it may be. And I know David Lynch was very inspired by Italian Verona's and like architecture because Dino gave him like a book and he was like and he was spent some time in Italy with the Laurenti's and you can tell and yeah and that I don't know like all the lavish gold

and the emperor area and the Iraqis and all that and then Geedy Prime all the Harkins for sure, Lynch's area of expertise. I would like to at least talk about some of that weird shit that happens there like there's the cat thing. I got nipples Greg. Can you milk me? Oh God. It's like a cat bomb, right? It's you got a milk the cat or he dies. He has a poison. That's right. Yes. Yes. Yes. And the antidote is in the milk of a cat of the cat.

Oh, that he has to so gross. Yeah. And that's something. And then another part that happens which is like the most like fever dream sort of where am I I don't know what is happening portion of the movie is when like if I can just describe Robin enters sees upside down cow rips tongue off of dead upside and cow begins chewing on it walks into room Jack Fisk

rolling a strange contraption in a box while Baron is flying around a pillar of smoke screaming and laughing like a madman and Tersie like begin seeing it's like and then the next like five minutes I'm just like oh can we can we get out of this again. It's do you have any idea what Jack Fisk is he manipulating his back piece or the smoke. Is he doing a sound that what is I don't know. I don't know because it's just all of the Harkinen stuff is just so fucking disgusting.

Like I it's hard for me to even like think of you know you could I don't know like what gross me out the most but like every time we're at the Harkinen place which I just want to point out I found it very funny to me that one of the sets for the

Harkinen looks like a like a green screen room where I just a little bit weirdly felt like somebody forgot to put the background so they're like the the the lot the green color green itself especially did look like green screen and I think at that time they were using blue.

So maybe this green was more novel concept but the the open air concept of the space did make it feel like a set but then the reasoning was just like yeah well just in case Baron gets a little excited he just likes to launch into the air and just scream to joy. But the overhang coming into that that room was really cool and that looked like that what is that like classic silent film metropolis.

It's called it looked a lot like that sort of just big cityscape sort of imposing or brutalist sort of sort of thing but I'm down to kind of wrap up at least plot stuff and kind of go into some notes because I'm sure that'll bring up maybe other any other things we forgot about. The final do I thought Robin's head on on the on the pike looked really good and was a nice thrilling bit of of like Emperor coming in and making himself known on to Baron Baron getting launched into a worms mouth.

That was something that was that happened and then there's got you got all the alia stuff. Sean Young is very underutilized. You don't see a lot of Sean Young but for her to be in both this and Blade Runner at the time is pretty fucking cool. Oh and speaking of her I'm just going to play a little of this as well before we kind of get near the end here.

She recorded I believe a little bit of behind the scenes from a dune and then what I think this is is her is like her later on kind of commenting on her experience but it's in a very like home video sort of way and it has this honky ton kind of piano ragtime piano playing while she's just kind of talking about what she experienced so we'll just hear a little little tip of this here. And then I'm going to fast forward at some point to check out.

David Lynch was Hollywood's current wonder boy in 1983 the it man. He'd made eraser head and then Elephant man which was nominated for an Academy Award. David has been quoted as saying various things about me. It's really charming. I would recommend checking out all of it because it's very candid. Very like candid about everything.

And she kind of she kind of mentions near the end because I don't we're not it's like six minutes. We're not going to watch it all but she does mention kind of near the end a little bit of what you're saying. It's like you kind of see how does she put it. Maybe I'll just get there real quick or she talks about.

Be able to make it at a certain point in the making of Dune. I think David got scared and felt like he was on a sinking ship and didn't know whether he would be able to make a great movie. And he was a little spoiled in that he'd only made great movies up till then. I think it's such a good apt like way to put it like that doesn't put any sort of shade necessarily on him. It does make it like a little bit you mentioned like the spoil.

It's definitely criticism. Yeah. Definitely. But it's also like get back in a compliment or it's like you made great movies but it's like not every movie can be you know perfect and and this is how you realized it and it's almost an inevitable part of being an artist and you just took it very hard. I'll do like one more little part here. Oh look there's Paul Smith sitting in the back with red hair. Jose Ferrar. Home movies. It's great.

Every single actor who worked on that movie loved David and would have done anything for him. He was inspiring to the actors. Everybody loved him. He had a great sense of humor. Patrick Stewart. As a bold man it cracks me up when other bold men wear their hair like that. It's all business in the front party in the back.

I just shave it off like what are you doing. Why are you growing out this. Maybe you're maybe you're a mercenary in the wastes of Arrakis and you got to make a living as a scavenger and you know you see Paul roll up and young pop young pop young pop. There's a pop in this movie. Yeah. Oh thank you. Yes. He loves his pop and he saves saves the day with with the pug in hand that pug even this time not being so far ago.

I'm getting there but also this pug still kind of has a snout. I feel like even from then they've been greeted to such a way that they just can't have no snout cannot breathe at all. This one has like a little bit left and you see some from like the 1800s or whatever look like how pugs like originally used to used to look like so you have seen them. Okay. Yeah. Cute dogs with like actual nose. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Like you die and then just bred him into just like deforms not to be able to breathe and even back then you could you could see that this one. I have a tough time breathing but at least looked a little bit more like normal normal pitch not to be mean but you know it's it's hard to see. Isn't it. It's not weird that breeding because the reason that people did that is because it's they have a hard time breathing and they can't get too far.

Well yeah it's part of it's all the dog show shit too right. So oh this one's got the flat nose. Oh you got a pure breathing and they and then they end up with you know abnormalities especially when the bloodline and everything is a little too too close. Yeah. So yeah. So weird but I'll just run through.

I took a lot of notes on I'm trying to I'll try to focus in a little bit. Oh yeah the when the narration at the beginning in the head is fading in and out and there's one point where she fades out and you're like OK we're done. Oh I forgot to tell you. I was like what are you talking. What do you mean. What are you going. It's not like I just. Oh hello there was a few walking street and just was like tell me about a rat kiss. Oh wait. Oh sorry sorry I forgot I forgot.

No you're in a goddamn movie. The fact that you're like oh I forgot it's and then goes on and whatever I'm like. That immediately was just like man I would already be kind of squirming in my seat seeing this the first time in theaters after Star Wars where you're like but you're like fuck yeah let's go and then you come into this and like hey how you doing you want to hear. OK see you later.

Oh no there's one more thing you're like oh yeah now I'm just annoyed like make your point. Absolutely it'd be like if the scroll at the beginning of Star Wars then had a little bit of space and then was like oh wait. Yeah there was like a dot dot dot and then it disappeared. I was a non spaceballs. Chome. Oh the Chome thing. That's something I forgot about the Chomes stuff. I'm sure that will come up in Dune part.

Activate. Fighter scene unnecessary. Still some HR Geiger stuff like with the still suits. The sleeper must awaken. And then there was like an actual fade out for a second that you almost feel like there's going to be a commercial break or an intermission. There was that visualization of the hand burning during the whole Gomtobar thing. That was that was kind of cool. It was like some David Lynch he like fire mutilation shit. To do the stitched eyes and ears. Those fucked up.

The creature juke. Oh yeah when he like squeezes that little creature in his juice box and and it takes a sip. And what about that prop that was something that's like you're going to squeeze down it's going to create the juice and you get that get up and you're going to throw it in the black water and it was like yeah like there's there's real yeah thought to all these like little little things you know killing the guy by pulling the heart pin.

Yeah. I'm tongue is what I have. What's that young grandma worm tongue. Yeah. Dwarf man he's he's awesome. Love love him and I watched a little interview with with him as well and he all of them have just like such nice things to say about David Lynch but also there's

a little bit of like yeah just very very clear creative dude but then there's no one else like him but getting that vision down is is is difficult and he was talking about the scene where Duke Lido has to shoot poison out of his mouth. And David was asking if there was a way that you could he's like what do you what do you think about performing surgery on actors having surgery on their face to get a hole put in their cheeks so they could put this prop through

and he was like and he was trying to push like this idea of putting like a hole. I think I believe in it was I think it was Duke Lido's cheek because it was part of like shooting the smoke out. Durgan. Yeah and that was a whole conversation that Dorf was was sharing and interview that was pretty fascinating to hear and then like even when the steam shot out in that scene I think it burned someone's burnt his face a bit so there was only that one take

and that was the take that they used these films in the 80s man like some of that shit is scary I even read in the scary in the in the book here and I'm gonna I'm gonna I know it's a nerdy long podcast well probably read a little bit of the book as well but he talked about how there was

like this pillar that dropped from the top of the set and hit the ground and and if anyone was saying there would have been fucking dead hearing stuff like that is so scary he's like yeah I heard that saw everyone saw and heard it and then just just heard one person like running away

and he's like whoever was responsible like was running away and was just trying to not get fired and yeah I guess I didn't find out because he person didn't get fired. Yeah Duncan tackling with the shield is so funny we was like you just see a big box like and then you barely see the dark go through his head and that's kind of sucks for dunk that actor Duncan like you barely even see my death man. No build up for the water of life stuff that poor cat.

No cat daily to choose thoughts have sounded motion to cash that was one of what was it to check. And then he's like oh Moa deep my name is a weapon name or whatever he said. Yeah yeah he doesn't oh yeah he doesn't need anything from from the people he has to train them instead of vice versa yeah he just needs like the manpower of the friend and he didn't need any of your ideas he didn't need their skills or attributes or

the knowledge of the desert and and how to do these just like I just need people and manpower to do my bidding and I'm just going to yell and do big speeches. The Muaddi montage sucks I have here that there's that whole montage of him training and like going on these little missions that are supposed to kind of tell you that there's like two years have gone by and Ali it just grows really fast is why she's so big but that's where he gets back in touch with Gurney you young pop you young pop.

That part is like when you see that montage come at that place at that and that that time and how it's done it's just so rushed and you're feeling like it's not going well at this point. I loved how the Emperor got on turret duty and all those like other like yeah I was real yeah God the weeds a little bit like in that circular like all like looks like they were playing some arcade game or something like man I miss how are you doing over there oh pretty good what's your high score.

Yeah and then I thought one of the hardest things in the movie and when the most badass things was when he fucking takes out fade Rafa sting and then he just goes like. And then the ground just breaks. It's like dragon speak whatever and just the ground breaks I'm like fuck yeah like how he does it with his head he's like. Yeah sure mom.

Okay so yeah room to dream this book I was as written by David Lynch and Kristen McKenna and how it's done is like Kristen McKenna does a kind of more straight down the line biography from someone that is not David Lynch. And that is interspersed with every chapter there's like a chapter from her kind of giving like a little bit more drive by the numbers like what happened in his life at what time and like here's and then this and this.

Not completely drive but you know just more like third person sort of take on it and then there's a chapter that and then after that there's David Lynch's chapter where he talks and it's a response to that chapter. So he got you and it's very much like brings up things that just you just read in that chapter he's like oh I remember when this happened yeah let me tell you about that.

And we'll go into that so it's a really great way of reading a biography I think you get the kind of dry sort of bit and then you get the color as well kind of interspersed without. I was just going to read a little bit here from you do that I need to I need to go to the bathroom is that okay absolutely let's just take a little break here and we'll be right back. Hello we are back welcome back to the polarized by do 1984.

I'm going to share with you just some little excerpts from room to dream by David Lynch and Christine McKenna this part right here is about him meeting Dino. And let's check it out when I look back on the time when I was getting to know Dino is just as if I was mesmerized. Dino is like an Italian Mack truck and he just goes forward yet tremendous energy. You know what this needs. This needs a little brain you know prophecy.

That's what this is. That's coming a little strong let's let's tone that down a bit. This needs the brain you know prophecy. As I read this book. Room to dream. He had tremendous energy and he's a real charmer and he lives the good life surrounded by great food and great places and great ways to travel and great enthusiasm for projects.

So part of the Dino production was being in his world. Don't get me wrong. I love Dino and Rafael and Rafael and Sylvan and mangano and their daughters Veronica and Francesca and for a while I was like a part of the family. The only place Dino and I didn't get along was with movies. Dino loves film but not my kind of film. So he had a dilemma with me. He said this guy Lynch made a racer head which I hate and the elephant man which I love. He wanted the elephant man director.

I mean there's just like so much fun like anecdotal stuff like him loving mud baths and like first meeting him when he's like first introduced about possibly doing doing hello and as I sit down I see this guy sitting in the shadows out of the corner of my eye and that's Dino Conti who's one of Dino's friends. I didn't know why he was there but I got the warmest feeling from both of them and they fixed me a cappuccino that was out of this world.

The guy named Enzo was Dino's barber and Enzo's wife Conchetta did all the orders for us that day. Enzo used to cut Dino's hair and when Dino had an office in Wilshire Boulevard there was a barber shop in there and I could go and get my hair cut from Enzo. He was the best barber just unreal. He studied hair cutting in Italy. It was like a thing. That whole introduction sounded so Italian of like David sit down let's get you a cappuccino and this is my barber and this is my family.

Can I get you a small haircut and have a cappuccino. I'm just going to do a couple more. Dune is a story of a quest for enlightenment and that's part of why I did it but I also knew I was going into something that was meant to be for some reason. I didn't know what the reason was but I was in it. I brought in Christivore and Eric Bergren to work on the script with me because we'd worked together and I really liked them.

And they were big fans of the book. Chris, Eric, Dino, son Federico and I went up to Port Townsend and spent a day with Frank Herbert. Frank and his wife Beverly were really nice and we just talked. I don't even know if we talked about the book. The more I got into the book the more complicated it seemed.

And with Dino not wanting to do this or that I knew it would be hard to make sense of it. There's the shield wall then there's the shields and there's this from this culture and from that from that culture. And at the same time it's about this jihad and a bunch of other stuff. Very complicated. The day with Frank Herbert was nice though and I was taking taking a plane back to LA at the end of that day and Frederico was flying to Seattle to get a plane to Alaska.

My plane left first and we walked me all the way to the gate, which was so kind of him. Yeah, Frederico they say was so handsome that woman would almost die when they saw him on that trip to Alaska for a drink. Oh met the pilot that he would be killed with in a plane crash that July. That's something that's kind of nuts. That was just thrown in. You can see Frederico's name and the credits as well. And then I wanted to do. Yeah, just one more.

See here I hope you're enjoying the Brian you know and this is this is him getting into his ambient stuff. I love it. Oh yeah there's he addresses the get the surgery thing what Brad Dora said is true I did want Jurgen Prach now to get surgery for a scene in the film I told Jurgen I wanted to operate but I don't think he even considered it. But you know I feel my cheek and there's not much flesh there. So putting a little hole in a cheek doesn't seem that extreme. Oh stop.

And then he goes on to describe how someone burns their face with his it's like come on. You just contradicted yourself. It's like oh yeah by the way you like burned his face from the steam. Yeah. And then after we finished shooting and I'd been there for a year and a half we went to LA to edit the film. And I had three or four different places in Westwood during the six months that we were editing.

I don't know why I kept moving. I never hated being down in Mexico but I got real crazy when we came back to LA. Because by that time we got to the editing room the writing was on the wall. It was horrible just horrible. It was like a nightmare that was being done to the film to make this two hour and 17 minute running time that was required. Things were truncated and whispered voiceovers were added because everybody thought audiences wouldn't understand what was going on.

Some of the voiceovers shouldn't be there and there are important scenes that just aren't there. Horrible. But here's the thing. For Dino it's money. This is a business and if it's any longer than two hours and 17 minutes the theater is losing extra screening. That's the logic. You've got to hit that number and it doesn't matter if it kills the movie. I love Dino. Dino the person was fantastic and he treated me like a son and I love the whole family and love being with them.

But he thinks a certain way and it's different from the way I think. It's like if you work real hard in a painting and then somebody comes and cuts it up and throws a bunch of it away. It's not your painting anymore and Dune wasn't my movie. Yeah. He's just like so hurt by it and he's so sad and like there's a lot about what he was going through with his family. Mary which is I believe the sister of Jack Fisk.

Mary Fisk. He was married to at that time. Jack Fisk is the guy that's in Twin Peaks and he's the guy doing that twisting that little device. And in the Baron crazy Baron scene. But they had moved to Virginia. He was flying to there and back like from Mexico City to see. I believe he had two kids at the time.

And like one very young one and then like one that was like come on like because she actually has quotes in the book too of just like I'm yeah yeah like of going through that experience of him not being around too much at that period. But a lot of just you can tell with all the interviews everyone just really is he's a magnetic personality. Everyone obviously is your his daughter so you want to be around him.

But that dynamic of the family going to LA and seeing that kind of like dynamic of you know Mary's kind of like oh these girls just throwing themselves at him and everything and it's hard to you know build a home and do all these things while having children when he's going through this. What a time in his life he's going through and something that he'll never do again and one of his sounds like the most traumatic experiences in his career.

Let alone me maybe his life or something too because he sounds so so hurt and torn up by the whole experience. And I think it's worthwhile to yeah to hear a director and just there have such a tough time with their experience while it still creates something that's pretty you know I'm ostrac when I see see it and everything to have the person who made it be like I didn't even watch it because I couldn't even bear to see how they edited it and how they put all this

inner voice shit in that wasn't necessary. It must yeah hurt a lot and why would you ever want to return to those feelings to make a TV or anything. So those are his feelings. Thank you for indulging me in that. Can we hear a little. If you don't mind if you're not annoyed in my voice yeah can I read some reviews now as well. Yeah let's do it.

Hell yeah. All right if you're not sick of me reading things. Let's hear some reviews from critics who gave it a 37% on the old rotten tomatoes are Ben a jeserite of reviews tells us what's going to be good and bad in the future. Sometimes you get those reviews before the movie comes out and they're like who are these guild space navigators of rotten tomatoes who tell me that Captain Marvel isn't going to be good. Last of a season two will not be good. What do you mean.

Let's start with Harper Barnes from the St. Louis Post dispatch. This is on Rotten Tomatoes people this is a top critic. The special effects are mediocre the miniatures look like miniatures the sets look like sets the matte paintings look like matte paintings and even the much dreaded sandworms are about as scary as Missouri neck crawlers. And mind you this is a review from. This year. I do not know when he originally wrote this review. Oh, I saw this review and it said this year but it's.

They all say this year but it's like when they get uploaded so that is the tricky thing we've mentioned sometimes in the past as well or it's like these older movies you're not really sure sometimes when they were written. It's always fun to come. Oh here we go here's a Pauline Kale. You know when that's from. That's from the time that when the movie came out because it's Pauline fucking Kale from the New Yorker.

This movie is heavy on exposition and the story isn't dramatized it's merely acted out in a series of scenes that are like illustrations. And that says from 2024 which we know not to be true. But legendary film critic Jean Siskel here's another one. One out of four they hated this movie when they said they like said it was like the worst movie the year.

Oh God. Dune simply tries to overwhelm us with technological trickery and a constantly thunderous soundtrack even on the level pure spectacle Dune is disappointing. Disappointed. Disappointed. Peter Bradshaw Guardian this is a film that doesn't dramatically harness the vast forces it's gesturing at but trundles determinedly along the very little variation of tone or pace. Hmm. Pace is rough I agree. Let's hear some audience feelings five stars.

Of the kind of the five stars because they gave it a 65% on Ron Tomatoes. There's a lot of positive love for it on other sites as well. Let's hear a review from Mark and Dark Star. Sounds like a sci-fi name. Mm hmm. I think Dark Star was a Game of Thrones guy. Easy book. My five stars on my favorite one of I assume one of my favorite sci-fi books of all time I read the book in fourth grade when I was what about 10 years old being a very advanced reader. No, you tell us.

He's like well yeah you know if I wasn't 10 years I was a very advanced reader. Being a very advanced reader I could comprehend the elaborate background of the story which may turn some people off who are looking just for the action. And though it was really important to understand the story because much of the background info had to be cut were not included in the movie. It led to what I remember as a poorly watched and reviewed movie that was characterized as confusing.

I on the other hand thought it was incredible. I love the performances of the characters especially Kyle McLaughlin, Patrick Stewart aka Captain Picard of Star Trek fame overly and Sting who I actually met in LA at a private birthday party for him after a concert of his. Wow, dark star. Wow, name dropper. I felt this 1984 movie went along pretty well with the book versus the latest mini series that I still enjoyed.

I enjoy all the versions of this movie 1984 original 2000 mini series and current version but I would recommend anyone interested should see the 1984 version as it explains a lot more or even better read the book. Read the book. I don't know if you saw if there's like a Dune mini series or I know there's a children of Dune mini series I've kind of always meant to check out that has like a young McAvoy is Duke Leo II. Oh wow.

Okay. And some other like bigger names too but he starts to get his warm powers at the end of it and I'm like oh I kind of want to see what that looks like. From five star another five star from Jack Harrison Quintana. I'm rewatching the existing Dune movies and anticipation of Denis Villeneuve's part two. So this is a recent review. Every time I watch the 84 Lynch version the more I love it. I know there are pacing issues but I still think this is my favorite adaptation across the board.

Wow. From Jagger five stars. Any random frame from this film is cooler than anything in Villeneuve's take. God forbid an adaptation of a 900 page book mangled by producers into a two hour 15 film has charmingly muddled exposition throughout you people are out of your minds. Wow. Like yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. From Hill. Five stars. The Spice Diver fan edit overcomes the poor editing aspects that diminish the 1984 Lynch film.

Spice Diver is a fan edit that combines the TV version that Dino put out that David Lynch had nothing to do with. That's like I have some extra stuff and they they've created some fan edit that includes some of that stuff. Just so you guys know and I guess some of these fans are here really love it. The result is a splendid is splendid with a clear tight story lovely lynching sound design strong set pieces and a star stud character cast flash Gordon for grownups and being so lucid and lyrical.

I try to think why this is so much better than than the unsufferably bland Denis Villeneuve offering but could not remember anything about it except needing to go for a piss and struggling to follow which of the characters is which sounds like you have a lot of it. It's nice though to hear that perspective because I think. Yeah like people that don't really don't like the Villeneuve one. Yeah. Yeah. And in particular find it to be slow and boring. You know. Definitely like it.

Yeah. I'm just too realistic and I. I hear that like when you like the Batman movies and everything it's like maybe we don't want to realistic fucking Christopher Nolan guy in a suit saving people maybe we do want silly Tim Burton like wacky stuff just like more comic bookie and not as yeah not as self serious but to each their own. But I mean we love the new dude so the realism is welcomed. Yeah I'm trying to figure out how how they feel but that's yeah it's all.

Stuff that I I love so I mean the Villeneuve shit is resoundingly everyone's on it and loving it. Maybe not maybe not everyone I don't know maybe he's not some of these people but he is like the top director of of this moment in time I feel like and he's just pumping out a yeah master piece after my master piece in my opinion. I'm glad you brought up the Batman.

But it's like yeah it is like a I don't know it's a modern modern take and maybe people like something from different different time does it does different things so there's going to be people that we've learned in this podcast that there's fans of everything and there's people that are going to defend it to the death. Yeah. I just recently watched Batman the Tim Burton one again. It is so silly and in the way that this is silly.

And it's interesting to think about the dark night Batman of it all where you know you go like or Batman begins you go like there's you know you tackle source material that is either you know kind of fantastical and it's like the dividing line is almost like. Batman begins pre and post and there's no way that we can go back after Batman begins in dark night to a. Like magical in the sense of.

Like almost borderline goofy you know and audiences were because when did the first Batman came out it came out if it's going to be goofy it's got to be like meta like Deadpool. Right. Yeah. Look at how silly we're being right now can you believe it. Hello. I'm going to fade out and come back. Oh I almost forgot one thing. Princess Erol on is the Deadpool of this time. Type here just breaking that fourth wall. We'll do one more from Brian Robinson. Five stars dude. Total five star.

I don't know why the ratings are this low but if you actually pay attention to the movie it is corny like a good old sci-fi should be. There's also a nice storyline good acting and just a good time all around it's just fun not all brooding like the new one. It's fun. Another. Yeah. A lot of people that are highlighting the the new one and these are last couple were some letterbox reviews I wanted to pull some from there for the audience to see how they're how they're feeling on there because.

Yeah you definitely get a lot of updated modern modern takes on movies like oh finally checked out dude and let's get my review. And you can also put them in. Organize them five stars if one star is whichever day you want to see it's perfect run to me. Let's get on it. That's been the polarizing review section if we want to close that up. I'm my final note would would be it's nothing new that we really discovered there beyond.

There are real defenders from the audience in a way that's like yeah almost yeah like that kind of cult status cult classic sort of status and for people who really love the sci-fi book and the story. That'll go a long way but then there's a lot of them that just go very wrong and people like reject it like like poison like fucking dark tower or some bullshit like.

And that's like a fucking however long how many books are in that like seven or whatever and they try to make one movie to wrap it all up like that's and that's offensive. I would be outright like mad at that.

This is not that they really wanted it to be like the book and there's a lot that shows through and then there's a lot of production meddling and unfortunately is highlighted throughout but there's a lot of positive things that come through that I. It's cool to see it last around through time and that there's audience members that are coming back to this movie obviously leading into the modern remake but this in my opinion like has its place and it's cool to hear a polarizing

opinion from this point in time where this one movie does really fit our podcast as well where it's people have a lot of feelings about it and the story about it has just become so clear that all the drama is easy to have a conversation and have fun getting into how it all went down kind of like how they did with

Joe Dorosky's Dune or Island of Dr. Moreau or whatever this however being real as opposed to Joe Dorosky's and also better than Dr. Moreau for sure for a lot of reasons and you can still see a young David Lynch shining through a blockbuster it's a weird anomaly that's never gonna happen again it's it's so glad we got to talk about it. You mind if I just carry on until like my my score. I've kind of started already with my my thoughts there and set set design sound design. Costumes.

There's a there's a fair amount of dialogue that's lifted right from Frank Herbert. There's earnestness with this movie where sometimes it comes across as fully intended how it's supposed to be in and played very well as good other times it could be a so bad it's good if you want to go that direction because it we've talked about this many times too

and it's like if it has an earnestness and it's trying to do something and it's committed to a vision it's going to be entertaining in its own way to and David Lynch knows how to make something visually entertaining the things that pull it back are that

I think the voice thing was driving me fucking crazy at a certain point because there'd be a time like that's kind of cool that I had another layer to this conversation that like I didn't fully it maybe wasn't fully present or something like oh that person's holding something back but then there's other times or it's just like

I want that sandwich I'm kind of hungry and it just or I would say something was very obviously already happening and for to have something so over explained in the first half every little tidbit to throwing all of that out in the final portion and not explaining

anything and just like I have to drink the water I have to fight back I have to take you the Fremen under my wing and do the really fucks this movie up and holds it back from being like really great but I still think it's a good movie I like this movie and it's fun and it's an adaptation of like a of a story that that I like and overall I yeah I have a good time watching it and then it just doesn't stick the landing so it's that's where I have a tough time but after watching it again I

got through it in a way that like was was not a dragon and I and I overall enjoyed my time so it's definitely going to be positive for me I'm going to go with I'll go 73 it's a fresh it's a fresh movie it's a movie that has a lot that I would give it credit for and it's a movie that I don't see this being my last time watching it I feel like there might be another time we're all throw this

this dude on whether it be a Barbara L situation and I just want to watch a grasshopper folding space time while I you know I'm in a party and talking to someone or something you know it's it's I think it deserves I'm glad that it exists I'm

sad that David Lynch had such a bad time and he regrets doing it but it's it's interesting anomaly in that way where it's like I the the fans kind of takes a ownership now or it's like no we like it and we take it and we enjoy it but that being said yeah this new one is like a 10 out of 10 so it's the material goes a long way for me but the artistry and the movie making side of it of the new man I'm so excited for part two me too man um what do I say

the back half of this movie brandini muadib muadib the back half of this movie really sucks for me I really did not enjoy it a lot of the special effects are really shitty and it's yeah it's really kind of unforgivable if I were to just you know I'm giving a score for this entire movie right and how what I think it deserves and how I feel about it I think it is a good bad movie but it is a bad movie and there are some really crazy things in it that were enjoyable to watch but not

I would say those are lesser than things about the movie that I didn't enjoy so yeah I would just I'm feeling a 55% is is where yeah man that's fair you know it's it's an interesting oddity I would suggest people check it out but I can understand if you if anybody who does check it out doesn't like it because there's yeah it's a lot of pacing problems I didn't like it the first time I saw it too I think I fell asleep

yeah same or like probably one of the third times I tried to watch it um yeah so I'm gonna give it a 55 excellent very fair score and this was one of those were the there's almost too much to talk about and it's hard to tailor it all in and I'm sure it's well tread territory a lot of people talking talking doing these days but I hope you guys have enjoyed your time here it's been a lot of fun and fun for me if you're curious what we're doing next time let me tell you right now

we're jumping into space time into 2001 where we're gonna get a little trippy dippy as well and it is a polarizing movie for sure it will go down in our lore as a legendary polarizing movie in my mind it is Cameron Crows vanilla sky starring Tom Cruise a critically rated 43% on Rotten Tomatoes an audience favored 72% if you have not heard of vanilla sky if you have not seen vanilla sky I'd recommend you join us for this one

I think it's gonna be an excellent episode I believe we're gonna have a very special guest it's gonna foster a lot of interesting discussion I'm excited to watch it again only seen it once and I just remember it being weird we love a weird movie love a weird movie love a weird guy like brandini here yeah like me weird guy if you like us weird guys join us next time for vanilla sky if you'd like to watch us live it's twitch.tv slash polarize pod we recorded these live

you can see our dumb faces talking talking at you can see whatever clips we might have so maybe that gives you a better idea I still think that Sean Young home video is pretty great even audio is nice to listen to if you want to send us a line at gmail.com slash polarize the pod is another place you can do it polarize the pod at gmail.com and if there's anything else brandini I think I'll just send these people on their way into the desert night I got one more thing get out of my mind

alright everyone we'll see you next time bye bye