Dune, Arrakis, Desert Planet - Unboxing the Crysknives of the Film and Mini-series

It's 2020 and a new adaptation of Frank Herbert's classic is scheduled to come out at the end of the year.

Right now Denis Villeneuve director of "Sicario," "Arrival," and "Blade Runner 2049" takes a crack at this epic story which is expected out on December 18, 2020.

This is a great way for people who missed out so far on the Dune experience to check out the material, either on the big screen or taking a look at the older materials or even reading the books.  c

Before I get into the two previous screen adaptations I want to talk about what  Dune means to me personally.

At the time I was 15 years old, I lived on the South Coast of California.  Beautiful beaches, nice weather year-round. I had Friends, Family, a paper route, there were girls and I was getting ready for High School ---  then all of a sudden.  Well, it seems like it was all of a sudden to me...

My dad moved my family out to the California Mojave Desert.  

I was devastated.

My best friend gave me a book to help in through this terrible time.  The book was Dune.

I remember telling him that I thought it was boring and I could barely get through the first 25 pages. 

He told me to read the first 100 pages then tell him what I thought.   I did and I told him and then for the 30 years, I read that book at least once a year.  Along with that, I read Dune Messiah and Children of Dune as well.

zzOf course, I read all of Frank Herbert's books.  "God Emperor of Dune," and "Chapterhouse of Dune."  I went on to read Destination Void and that whole series. I sought out the "Encyclopedia of Dune,". "Eye," and "Heretics of Dune."

Then David Lynch directed the DeLaurentis Production of my favorite book.  While I thought that Lynch's version had some good ideas and some not very good concepts I certainly hated the pronunciations of the names in his film

I could go on

Then there was Sci-Fi's mini-series  "Frank Herbert's Dune" in 2000 and 3 years later saw "Frank Herbert's Children of Dune" with James McAvoy as Leto the second

This too had some good ideas and some not so good.  I could do a whole video on both of either of these. story renderings.
While some of the characters may change genders in the upcoming film, however, one of the "main character" and the largest is SHAI-HULUD or the great sandworms of Dune.

These leviathans of the desert had segmented rings that essentially had a life of their own,

They had rings of teeth at the eating end of their bodies

The somewhat indigenous desert people known as the Fremen.

These Fremen, akin to the bedouin of the Arabian Penninsula controlled the desert and the planet is 80 percent desert.  

Therefore they controlled the planet.  

As a Fremen, they had a consecrated knife, made from the teeth of the sandworms.

So we are going to take a look at two different knives, both made of worm teeth.

Well not really.

The funny thing about this box is that I actually bought this off of Etsy and not eBay.  The seller, James Arnold of ReelArt out of Florida does sell these on eBay as well. Each of these knives is sold separately but I figured that I would just get one from the film and one from the mini-series. Why just one of each? Why would I get two?

Etsy Reel Art 
Dune Mini-Series Crysknife: https://etsy.me/3fKv4iv
Dune 1984 Film: https://etsy.me/3eqloJN

Now, personally, I am excited that Villeneuve is directing Dune.  I was tripped out by Arrival, Sicario was all too real considering I used to live somewhat near the border. And Blade Runner 2049 pretty much was food for thought when it comes to Artificial Intelligence. You know Cylons and all.

I plan on seeing this film with an open mind.  

Now although neither of the two previous versions had everything that I was hoping for, I do understand how hard a story like Dune is to bring to the big screen.  The fact that he is planning to break the story into two films will hopefully allow him to tell a complete story, or at least he will get the chance to tell that story.

This makes me think that the studios are going to have to rethink how they track the profit of a film and how they make decisions on what films get a sequel or not.  The world is changing and HAS been changing and unfortunately, the way we used to do things may not evolve as "THEY would like

Now looking at some of the photos I can see that there are some of David Lynch's design elements peeking through in this film.  Look at the stillsuits. Very similar to the 1984 film  They just need the Jubba cloak, IMHO

I am thinking that the choice of actors is interesting. I mentioned that there is a couple of characters whose gender and ethnicity were altered.  In the case of Liet Kynes --- Sharon Duncan Brewster of Rogue 1  will be taking over for the recently passed Max Von Sydow. and Zendaya will play Chani.  

Considering how well I think that worked with Battlestar Galactica, I am hopeful.