I didn't read your whole post, mostly because I thought I was in the development dune thread, not the review thread, and as soon as I realized I stopped reading, but I did read the first paragraph and I strongly disagree. The Harkonnens are over the top *stereotypically* evil in the OG novel. That's why Lynch had to go to the point of heart plugs, they are already so bad in the books. The Baron is a notorious, incestuous pedophile & rapist. His older nephew murdered Gurney's sister and tortured him with a whip, Feyd poisons opponents with glee in front of audiences of thousands, and attempts to assassinate his own uncle. They're so notoriously evil a regular Mentat won't do they have to hire specifically "twisted mentats" from the tlielaxu to help manage their evil plans (although that's later revealed to be a fraud, mentats aren't "twisted", they're just psychos put through regular Mentat training).
The point sorta being, the audience shouldn't be aware of basically any of that at this point yet. Sure, poor Gurney rants and raves about the Harkonnen being beasts. But we're supposed to wonder if he isn't off kilter somehow, flinging baseless accusations. All we really know here, if reading the book, is that there has been a bit of palace intrigue there, with the usual backstabbings. And that lfe is hell for the Fremen, basically regardless of who is squeezing them. And that's what we know when watching the movie, too. Or, actually, a bit less. But the evil of the Harkonnen unfolds just as it should, with the Baron betraying Yueh and the Bene Gesserit. Only without being stereotypically sadistic about it. Timo Saloniemi
Are you talking about the movie or the book? I'm talking *specifically* of your characterizing the Harkonnens in the *book* as not being established as all that evil. They very clearly are, from their very first scene, with the Barons incestuous pedophilia front and center.
...which is literally the third scene of the whole book! That scene leaves very little wiggle room about the evil of the Harkonnens.
The Harkonnen being obviously "evil" is a good choice when it turns out that Paul initiates a greater evil that he can't control even though he initially seems to be presented as the hero. The novel wouldn't be as effective if Frank Herbert had made the morality and behaviour of the Harkonnen and the Atreides more ambiguous and nuanced.
Yup. The Harkonnens are so over the top evil it's a regular criticism against the book, but as @Asbo Zaprudder points out, it was purposeful for revelations later in the series.
Which is why i hope that the second movie goes into more depth about that - as i said the first movie has a scene where Paul has a vision of the Jihad and it would help kill the white saviour "accusation" for good. It would be so awesome of the movies were such a success that they would do Messiah, Children and maybe even God Emperor as one cohesive massive story but it's a big pipedream for now.
Even if those movies are commissioned, and I hope they are, I doubt I'll live to see them. In any case, I expect Villeneuve might move on to other projects after part 2.
I won't be venturing back to the cinema for another few months so I doubt I'll get to see this in it's full glory, which is a shame. I'm kind of conflicted about it anyway. I disliked the novel quite a lot, but this version looks fantastic. Will it make the difference for me ? Would seeing it on a big screen sell it any better ? Who knows.
Do yourself all a favor and if you can see it in the theater. This is a movie meant for the big screen.