On August 1, 1965, Frank Herbert published a novel that many would later deem the best science fiction book ever written. With Dune, Herbert created a whole new world inspiring a 1984 Lynchian retelling and now a2020 film by visionary director Denis Villeneuve. The epic tale has earned its epic movie featuring an epic cast as seen in Dune’s highly-anticipated first full trailer, out now.
The trailer gives audiences their first glance of the impressive and immersive world reimagined by Villeneuve, which is as intimate as it is vast. With Timothée Chalamet — Villeneuve called his leading man “one of the best actors of his generation” and praised his “deep intelligence” and “old soul” at a recent press conference — as the heroic Paul Atreides, Dune already feels like the buzzy award show movie we’ve all been craving in 2020.
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Dune is a coming-of-age movie that is marked by one young man’s journey to live up to his higher calling in life, despite his fear of the unknown and unpredictable. “I must not fear — fear is the mindkiller,” Paul says in the trailer, quoting one of the book’s most recognizable lines. “When the fear is gone, only I will remain.”
In his quest to save his planet, his family, and most of humanity, Paul has to learn to fight and survive. Paul can’t live up to his purpose alone, though. It takes a lot of help and brute strength in the form of characters played by Jason Momoa, Javier Bardem, Josh Brolin, and Paul’s parents, played by Oscar Isaac and Rebecca Ferguson. And then there’s Zendaya, who plays Chani, a tough and inspired companion to Paul with electric blue eyes, not to mention Sharon Duncan-Brewster, who reclaims a male character from the book and transforms them into the new and improved Liet-Kynes.
Beyond fear, destiny awaits.
See the full trailer below, fittingly soundtracked to Pink Floyd’s, “Eclipse.”