SPOILER DISCUSSION

1.While I gushed over the introduction in the non-spoiler section, I think it’s relevant to mention just how fitting the idea of presenting cinema as an equivalent to experiencing prescient visions is. Cinema is capable of revealing the nature of fantasy by playing out situations that could never happen in “real” life, permitting dreams to intermingle with reality. Dune as a story examines that in its text (and film) proper, so Denis takes the idea to it’s literal next level and involves the viewer in the interpretative dance that Paul has to engage in with relation to his own prescient visions.

2.The Butlerian Jihad isn’t referenced in the story itself, but the production design certainly speaks to the influence of non-intelligent machinery. There’s a wonderful absence of familiar mechanical devices and whenever machines do show up, they’re stripped down such as to look completely different from other science-fiction depictions, case in point Villenevue’s own Blade Runner 2049.