POSITIVES:
1) The performances are almost all great. Timothee Chalamet really carries the film with the amount of screen time he has and I really thought he was sensational in portraying Paul's turn to the darkness, as were the vast majority of the supporting cast 2) The size and scale of this film are truly remarkable. You should see this film on the biggest screen you can with the best sound system you can. Denis deserves a lot of credit for holding the reins here and delivering a film that is not only grand in scale but also grand in terms of its themes and messages. Whether it's the huge epic battle sequences we see, or the intense hand to hand combat scenes with Feyd, the film was gripping in all its action scenes 3) Hans Zimmer truly brings his A game and the score for this film will be hard to beat when the Oscars come back around next year. He is an epic composer and this is a truly epic musical achievement 4) For a film only just under three hours long, I thought it flew over. I checked my watch once just in passing and couldn't believe that 2 hours had passed already, which is a great sign because usually I say that films should be shorter
NEGATIVES:
1) I mentioned that I thought the performances were "almost all" great. The one exception to that for me was Dave Bautista. I really like him as an actor and usually think he performs great, but here I just felt that the performance was very one dimensional. I'm pretty sure he yells every single line of dialogue he has and it just got irritating after a while 2) The first hour of the film was a bit of a slog for me, because it focuses almost exclusively on just meandering around with the Fremen. In fact, I found the Fremen sections of the film to be by far the weakest part. Whenever the Harkonnens or the Bene Gesserit were on screen I was loving it, but the scenes exploring Fremen culture and their religious beliefs were just a bit unnecessary for me because there are soooo many of them. Lady Jessica becomes Reverend Mother almost instantly and all the stuff about Stillgar being convinced Paul is their saviour even when he says he's not was almost comical at times and has already been made the focus of several memes online.
1) The performances are almost all great. Timothee Chalamet really carries the film with the amount of screen time he has and I really thought he was sensational in portraying Paul's turn to the darkness, as were the vast majority of the supporting cast 2) The size and scale of this film are truly remarkable. You should see this film on the biggest screen you can with the best sound system you can. Denis deserves a lot of credit for holding the reins here and delivering a film that is not only grand in scale but also grand in terms of its themes and messages. Whether it's the huge epic battle sequences we see, or the intense hand to hand combat scenes with Feyd, the film was gripping in all its action scenes 3) Hans Zimmer truly brings his A game and the score for this film will be hard to beat when the Oscars come back around next year. He is an epic composer and this is a truly epic musical achievement 4) For a film only just under three hours long, I thought it flew over. I checked my watch once just in passing and couldn't believe that 2 hours had passed already, which is a great sign because usually I say that films should be shorter
NEGATIVES:
1) I mentioned that I thought the performances were "almost all" great. The one exception to that for me was Dave Bautista. I really like him as an actor and usually think he performs great, but here I just felt that the performance was very one dimensional. I'm pretty sure he yells every single line of dialogue he has and it just got irritating after a while 2) The first hour of the film was a bit of a slog for me, because it focuses almost exclusively on just meandering around with the Fremen. In fact, I found the Fremen sections of the film to be by far the weakest part. Whenever the Harkonnens or the Bene Gesserit were on screen I was loving it, but the scenes exploring Fremen culture and their religious beliefs were just a bit unnecessary for me because there are soooo many of them. Lady Jessica becomes Reverend Mother almost instantly and all the stuff about Stillgar being convinced Paul is their saviour even when he says he's not was almost comical at times and has already been made the focus of several memes online.