Sunday 25 December 2016

ARRIVAL and BLADE RUNNER director in talks to helm new DUNE movie

Denis Villeneuve, the director of Arrival and the forthcoming Bladerunner 2049, is in talks with Legendary Pictures to direct their new movie version of Frank Herbert's Dune.



The director has cited Dune as one of his favourite SF novels of all time and is keen on leading the project. Legendary recently concluded a deal with Frank Herbert's estate for both a film and TV series based on the Dune novels.

The novel is set 20,000 years in the future, when FTL travel is reliant on the spice melange, which alters consciousness. It can be found only on one planet in the known universe, Arrakis, also called Dune, the third planet of Canopus. House Atreides is ordered by the Emperor to mine the spice on Arrakis, replacing their old enemies, House Harkonnen. However, the Harkonnens plan to return to Arrakis and launch a sneak attack. Unbeknown to the Harkonnens, the eldest son of the Atreides, Paul, has forged an alliance with the native Fremen, resulting in a prolonged conflict on which the fate of the galaxy may rest.

There are six canonical Dune novels written by Frank Herbert: Dune (1965), Dune Messiah (1969), Children of Dune (1976), God-Emperor of Dune (1981), Heretics of Dune (1984) and Chapterhouse: Dune (1986), as well as a large number of mostly-reviled, fan-fiction prequels and sequels written by Herbert's son, Brian, in collaboration with Kevin J. Anderson.

The original Dune has been adapted for the screen twice, as a 1984 movie helmed by David Lynch and a 2000 mini-series on the Sci-Fi Channel directed by John Harrison. In 2003 the Sci-Fi Channel filmed a mini-series based on Dune Messiah and Children of Dune, named after the latter.

4 comments:

Silicon said...

ANOTHER Dune movie?! Not sure what I feel about that ... love Dune but I think it may have been adapted for the big screen enough times already.

Adam Whitehead said...

It's only been filmed for the big screen once. The 2000 project was a relatively low-key TV mini-series.

G.C. said...

They finally have the special effects and know-how to do it too. Dune should hopefully be much better now that we're not stuck with 1980's special effects. Though there is a potential that they could ruin the dialogue and story progression.

I'm looking forward to it. The director seems to know what he's doing.

Jens said...

Adam, you mention "both a film and TV series". Are these independent from each other or tie-ins of some sort?