DUNE: PART TWO

DUNE: PART TWO tells the second half of science fiction writer Frank Herbert’s epic tale of political power, love and desert heroism, where Paul Atreides learns the ways of the Fremen the indigenous people on the desert planet of Arrakis and leads them in an epic struggle against the evil family that murdered Paul’s father and now controls the planet’s main natural resource, which extends human life and people’s mental abilities and makes space travel possible. DUNE: PART TWO is a truly epic, visually stunning cinematic classic, which tells a dynamic story about love, freedom, good and evil, political power, religion, revenge, and the consequences of wielding power and waging war on a worldwide and galactic stage, but the movie has some politically correct, direct attacks on religious “fundamentalism” that can be used to attack all religion, but especially Christians and Muslims.

The movie opens with Paul and his mother, Jessica, hiding among the indigenous people on the desert planet of Arrakis. The indigenous people, known as the Fremen, wear suits that collect and purify all the water exiting from their bodies. They’ve also learned how to walk among the desert sands in a haphazard way to avoid attracting the attention of one of the planet’s giant sandworms. The worms have a mysterious connection to the planet’s creation of its major natural resource, spice, which not only can extend people’s lives but also can extend their mental abilities. Spice is also essential to space travel, because it gives pilots and navigators a multidimensional awareness and foresight that’s essential to piloting spaceship.

In PART ONE, Paul’s father, Duke Leto, was murdered by the family of Baron Harkonnen, on secret orders from the Galactic Emperor. The Emperor wanted to draw the Duke and his warriors away from their home planet’s power structure. However, Paul and his mother, Jessica, escaped into the desert, where they met a Fremen tribe and their leader, a man named Stilgar. Paul’s mother is still plotting how to protect her son and place him into a position of galactic power, but Paul has fallen in love with a Fremen woman named Chani.

With Stilgar’s help, Paul helps lead a guerrilla campaign against the Harkonnen family and its collection of spice. Stilgar begins to believe Paul is the predicted messiah that will lead the Fremen people to freedom and control of Arrakis. However, Chani doesn’t believe in such religious ideals and wants a Freemen person to lead the way. She’s torn, however, because Paul is so sincere and genuinely respects, to the point that he truly wants to become part of her people/s culture.

Meanwhile, Paul’s physical interaction with the spice-infused desert sands has started to give him prescient views of the future. One possible future scares him, the possibility that, if he lets Fremen leaders like Stilgar turn him into a messiah, that this will lead to a terrible galactic war killing millions of people.

However, if he stops helping the Fremen wrest control of Arrakis from the Harkonnen family, how can he get justice for his father and all the friends that the Harkonnen’s slaughtered?

DUNE: PART TWO is visually stunning. This, however, doesn’t take away from the epic, dramatic story that it’s trying to tell. In one sense, PART TWO is just a love story between Paul and Chani, set against the backdrop of a planetary and galactic struggle for freedom. However, DUNE: PART TWO is also a story about good and evil, political power, religion, justice, revenge, and the consequences of wielding power and waging war on a worldwide and galactic stage.

In the end, DUNE: PART TWO serves as a warning against blindly following messianic political leaders, despite whatever good intentions they may have. As such, DUNE: PART TWO sends a really appropriate message for today’s politically divided society.

That said, the major problem with the movie is that there are a few pieces of dialogue where Stilgar and his supporter’s faith in messianic prophecies is condemned as a kind of religious “fundamentalism.” Thus, the movie may be seen as a specific attack against Christians and Muslims who strongly believe in their faith tradition’s basic doctrines and put them into practice in every area of their lives, including politics. In reality, of course, secular people, including atheists, can also apply their beliefs in every area of life, including politics, such as communists and fascists. The problem is not strong beliefs. The problem is if you take those strong beliefs and start physically harming and killing people who don’t share those beliefs, or if you use those beliefs to create a totalitarian society with a police state.