THE MAKING OF DUNE
A trip to Florence, Oregon, where the United States Department of Agriculture was trying to figure out how to prevent the encroachment of sand dunes, laid the foundation for a seminal sci-fi classic that combined the hero’s journey with the social and political ramifications of colonisation.
Previous attempts have been made to adapt Dune, with a big-screen version by David Lynch (TheStraightStory) and two miniseries helmed by John Harrison (Creepshow) and Greg Yaitanes (Manhunt) coming to fruition, but this did not stop Canadian filmmaker Denis Villeneuve (BladeRunner 2049) from fulfilling his teenage ambition to bring his own vision of the world conceived by Frank Herbert to cinemas.
The city of Arrakeen is built to withstand the natural elements and threats found on Arrakis
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As her role as Chani, Zendaya wears a Fremen stillsuit which recycles body water for consumption
A lethal motion sensitive device sent to assassinate Paul Atreides (Timothée Chalamet) is known as a Hunter-Seeker
BEHIND BLUE EYES
A side effect of Melange consumption is eyes turning blue…
“We had to make sure that whatever visual we came up with for the blue eyes, it didn’t take you out of the movie,” notes Paul Lambert. “We wanted it to be subtle but you still had to see that it’s a blue-tinted eye. I now bring artists with me in preproduction and production. It allows me to do tests on set quickly for the director that help to inform the shoot. We even shot some tests of getting some onion and putting it under people’s eyes to get them to redden and tear-up a little bit, so that we could then tint that blue. When you’re out in a sandy environment, contact lenses are the last thing you want because sand is going to get into people’s eyes. What we came up with was quite straightforward but needed a steady hand to make sure it wasn’t pushed too far. We roto the overall eye, the sclera, iris and pupil, and rather than try to make a consistent blue for everybody, we worked with the natural colours of people’s eyes. It gave a natural variation between the different blue eyes.”