Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2020/04/13/first-look-at-denis-villeneuve.html
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I take it that Paul Atreides isn’t supposed to be fifteen years old in this version. Though I guess Chalamet wouldn’t be the first actor in his mid-20s to play a teenager.
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Sting as a balding 30-something Feyd Rautha set the Dune Character Ages bar at “ok whatever”
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However bOINGbOING does its RSS feed tricks many of the feed readers. Often I get completely and obviously unrelated images associated with stories. For this post though, the result was pretty amusing:
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That picture has to be from the sequel “Dune Messiah”.
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Nobody was looking at Sting’s scalp, that’s why they put him in those Hawkman underoos.
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You’d think they’d give up with trying to make Dune. It’s like the bones outside of the cave of the Killer Rabbit in Monty Python. “This time for sure!”
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That Dune is being made into ONE movie, and Avatar keeps expanding into 4 or 5… shakes head.
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I dunno, I thought the SciFi Channel miniseries was at least halfway decent , and their Messiah/Children series was pretty good. After “Arrival” , I would have given Villeneuve my full faith, but I thought “Blade Runner 2049” was disappointing. After watching a bunch of Jodorowsky films, I really think his “Dune” would have been a hot mess.
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Have you seen Timothy Chalemet?
There’s legal and union restrictions on working hours and what sorts of shooting for actual teens and children that can make it impractical (or unethical) to cast actual teens. So casting young looking 20 somethings is the default. Like Tom Holland and Andrew Garfield for Spiderman. Garfield was 29 when cast, Holland 19/20. Both playing high school students. Which Holland continues to do.
So I’d say Chalemet’s casting likely guarantees a teen/young Paul.
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I, for one, am looking forward to a whiny, moody, Kwisatz Haderach (but i like some of the casting choices, depending on some of the makeup choices…); and I hope Oscar Issac is at least taller than Chalamet. 
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Are you saying that Chalamet is a bit old to be playing a teenager?
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Oh, absolutely. It would have been a glorious train wreck, but a train wreck nevertheless.
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Villeneuves must flow
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My hopes for the remake include:
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the major wimmin characters getting more time on screen–they have key roles in the book Dune and I found Lynch’s [ahem] choice of elisions annoying; e.g., ooooh lookit how bad those Harkonnens are, here’s even more lurid footage not even part of the original book but uh hey let’s cut development for Jessica’s and Chani’s characters for time
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better exposition of the Fremen culture on Arrakis
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better graphics for the dreams sequences and the melange-trippin’ sequences (lordy the graphics were so cheesy, and I understand why but still)
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sly cultural references to our wretched existence here on
Giedi PrimeEarth, kinda like how Terry Pratchett had a lot of in-jokes and oblique references -
100% complete lack of music by the band Toto
Why didn’t Villeneueve call me for my opinions before filming? Sheesh.
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For the Dune narrative and “heart”, I feel it’s very important for Paul to be a young adolescent – a boy, really – when ‘discovered’/assessed by Reverend Mother Mohiam and the Bene Gesserit. In such a critical role in DV’s film, you need a fine actor who appears ‘young enough’ and who could age with the story. That said, with Dune being presented by DV in two parts, I think a younger actor could have been found since DV’s part 1 film covers Paul while he is still a boy and (per the book) small for his age; part 2 could have possibly been covered by a suitably older actor, but if your goal, as a filmmaker, is to have the audience emotionally invested early on with Paul (and given how that role carries the story), then an experienced baby-faced 20-something actor may have been the smart way to go for Parts 1 and 2. I just hope Chalamet is up to the job. 
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They could use the soundtrack for Jodorowsky’s Dune!
Didn’t Eno do the imperial theme or something like that in Lynch’s one? Kind of makes sense that he’d want him involved, I guess Toto was the producer’s pick.
Also: Johan Johannnson was set to do the music for DV’s Blade Runner and Ridley Scott got rid of him (or so I was told) so I’m kind of hoping Scott fucked up that movie as it was quite a disappointment for me.
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They’re apparently doing 2 for Dune itself.
And they’d be high to not plan on a longer series. There’s like 4000 of those books, so if the first movie is any good there’s no reason to stop.
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Indeed. “Heart plugs.”
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On one hand, well he’s not a teenager.
But you can be 20 and still have a lot to learn, especially if you hope to lead a planet.
I love the look of that picture and I have to say I am hooked. Going to love the movie.
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