Still love the movie. The book creates such a concrete world that I easily suspended disbelief. But I noticed this time through the book that it gave very little in the way of description. What the movie did for dune was give it such a visually rich and consistent world that I again suspended disbelief. I do see his point in two major cases. - Todd Hoff

The harkonnens in the movie are cartoon figures. In the book they are full fledge evil propelled by rationality. The movie treats them as bafoons. I know this is just a movie thing, but it made the movie less than it could have been. - Todd Hoff

Second, were the weirding weapons. They only exist as a notion in the book, but they take a major role in the movie. Again, I get it, but the fighting could have been more interesting without magic weapons. - Todd Hoff

Like lotr, dune leaves much unsaid, so spicing up the movie visually makes sense. But I think the movie would have been better without the two mentioned changes. I still love the movie though. The whispers voicing the unconscious thoughts really reveal how calculating a time it was, that without computers we might be even more violent. - Todd Hoff

Nice summary. But I'm with the professor. Dune was just over done for me. - MoTO Boychick Devil

In what way? - Todd Hoff

That "Dino De Laurentiis, Let's Overdo Everything" manner. Like you, because I'd read the book, I had context. But overall, I felt the movie was a thrown together mess. For instance, the opening moments when the Antreides are betrayed, the battle scenes seemed to go on forever. Just explosion after explosion going nowhere. As much as I loved the book, the movie never interested me. I thought the set design was unattractive. MacLachlan just kind of wandered around the screen. And like you said, I could not take the Harkonnens seriously as villains and assassins. - MoTO Boychick Devil

Maybe since I had just watched the last hobbit movie the battle scenes did not seem excessive :) - Todd Hoff

good point. I haven't rushed to see that one yet. I'm still amazed/pissed that they turned the shortest book in the Middle Earth canon into three features. But I'll probably go, because I'm a Tolkien fanboy. - MoTO Boychick Devil

I think, for me, the movie is mostly saved by the casting for most of the roles, which I really enjoyed. I read the book after, which also seems to help - I didn't have expectations going in that it needed to match. I'm skipping the last Hobbit movie - they're telling a story I'm not interested in, and setting aside the things I loved most about the source material. Even with the changes to Dune, I didn't feel like it did that. - Jennifer Dittrich

For some reason, I can't stop at Hobbit 2 (Electric Boogaloo). I *have* to see Smaug get shot down. After that I may walk out, because IIRC form the book, the battle afterwards was pretty much an afterthought with most of the action offstage. - MoTO Boychick Devil