Dune Reboot Director Details His Disappointment With David Lynch's Film

In the decades since its debut, Frank Herbert's Dune novel earned a passionate following as a compelling sci-fi epic, making audiences excited to see David Lynch's take on the concept back in 1984, only for that film to disappoint audiences and critics, which includes director of the upcoming Dune Denis Villeneuve detailing his initial excitement and his ultimate feeling of only being half satisfied with the film. Interestingly, the sprawling nature of the narrative makes it difficult to condense into one film, with Villeneuve having previously detailed that his upcoming take on will only cover half of the source material while also feeling like a complete adventure. The new Dune is set to hit theaters on December 18th.

"I'm a big David Lynch fan, he's the master," Villeneuve revealed to Empire. "When I saw [Lynch]'s Dune I remember being excited, but his take… there are parts that I love and other elements that I am less comfortable with. So it's like, I remember being half-satisfied. That's why I was thinking to myself, 'There's still a movie that needs to be made about that book, just a different sensibility.'"

Prior to Lynch taking on Dune, filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky attempted to bring the story to life in the mid-'70s, only for that project to fall apart due to budgetary limitations. Some of Jodorowsky's ideas made it into the 1984 film, but in the wake of the Star Wars trilogy and mandates from studios to make a sci-fi film more accessible, Lynch has been distancing himself from the project in the years since it was released due to how disappointing the project ended up being.

As far as whether Lynch would be more interested in seeing what the director of Arrival and Blade Runner 2049 might do with the material, he isn't at all excited.

"I have zero interest in Dune," Lynch confirmed to The Hollywood Reporter earlier this year. "Because it was a heartache for me. It was a failure and I didn't have final cut. I've told this story a billion times. It's not the film I wanted to make. I like certain parts of it very much — but it was a total failure for me."

When asked if he would potentially be interested in a filmmaker's take on the story that wasn't Villeneuve's, Lynch confirmed, "I said I've got zero interest."

The film's director of photography, Greig Fraser, detailed earlier this year that the new film won't merely feel like a partial story.

"It's a fully formed story in itself with places to go. It's a fully standalone epic film that people will get a lot out of when they see it," Fraser shared with Collider. "It was quite an adventure visually. It was a beautiful experience making it. The people involved with it, I was overwhelmed. Some of the actors, as well as being insanely talented actors, are just lovely, lovely people who I've become very close to since then."

Dune is slated to hit theaters on December 18th.

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