For all you DUNE fans...

did you guys notice how her narration kept cutting out?

Yeah, I suspect a non-edited version of this will surface eventually.

But, honestly, who cares about the narration; the cool thing is the footage itself.

Although by no means a great film, DUNE featured an amazing cast, and it's always fun to see this sort of "behind the scenes" footage (sorta reminds me of the POTA Roddy McDowell home movies).

For the record, that's John Dykstra seated beside Albert Whitlock and Tony Masters....

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Pretty incredible assembly of 20th century SFX/ Art Direction talent in that there shot.
 
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Dune is an interesting film, and is actually what got me into the books. While it's weird and the theatrical version is missing a LOT (although the Smithee version has a lot of padding), it's still pretty cool.

I don't actually think it's possible to do a good film version. They're not written for translation to the screen, unlike, say, George RR Martin's stuff which, while quite dense and intricately woven, lack much of the backstory, social commentary, and appendices of Dune.

The further along you get in the books, the more philosophically oriented they get (at least up to #4) and the less action-oriented they become, which means lots of scenes of talking and not a lot of doing. Fascinating as literary fodder...but lousy for cinematic translation.

In spite of this, I love the stuff that has come out, in spite of its shortcomings.
 
I guess she was always into picture taking. I can hardly wait to see this years 'kicked out of the Oscar parties' photos.

She's a nut, but she did a great job in Dune, Bladerunner, and Stripes.

She also mentioned Aldo Ray [We're No Angels] was going to be in the film but was an alcoholic. His Bio says he had Throat Cancer.
 
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I don't actually think it's possible to do a good film version.

Well, that's what they said about The Lord of the Rings.

DUNE would certainly be a challenging adaptation, but its themes (power, religion, ecology) are timeless. My hope is that some visionary like David Fincher, Ridley Scott, Aaron Aronofsky, James Cameron, Neill Bloomkamp, Christopher Nolan, or (fill in the blank) will eventually produce a screenplay, or series of screenplays, worthy of the novel, and DUNE fans will finally have the movie they've been waiting for.

I know the odds are against it, but hope springs eternal.
 
Well, that's what they said about The Lord of the Rings.

DUNE would certainly be a challenging adaptation, but its themes (power, religion, ecology) are timeless. My hope is that some visionary like David Fincher, Ridley Scott, Aaron Aronofsky, James Cameron, Neill Bloomkamp, Christopher Nolan, or (fill in the blank) will eventually produce a screenplay, or series of screenplays, worthy of the novel, and DUNE fans will finally have the movie they've been waiting for.

I know the odds are against it, but hope springs eternal.

The first book, I think, could possibly be done as a good film -- better than what we've seen -- but it would be considerably lessened in its richness as a result. The subsequent books would, I'd argue, simply not fit within a conventional movie format, even a three hour one.

I'd argue that each book would be better suited towards a 13-hour television series, but even then, I'm not sure that the latter books would do as well. Can you imagine God Emperor of Dune: the series? It'd be like watching a lecture series.

I mean, don't get me wrong, I love those books, and I actually DO watch (and listen to) lecture series on this or that subject, but my guess is that for most audience members, the latter books would go over like a lead balloon. Ironically, the far inferior prequels written by his son would probably do just fine, given that they're more along pulp fiction lines.
 
We'll have some original DUNE production items (Atreides ship & Paintings) on display in the exhibits at this year's Wonderfest.
 
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