Preamble

Well look what the cat dragged in. It’s been over a month since my last post. Aside from the day job becoming frantic and pursuing other ventures (outside of writing), I’ve just lacked motivation to write. While last year was successful for the blog and my writing in general, it caused an unhealthy precedent.

There’s nothing that makes me happier then the pursuit of writing be it for the blog or an external deadline. I spent last year wracking up a lot of external endeavors that when they dried up, I became very blue and unmotivated. There’s more to it then that, but suffice to say, sometimes to get back onto the proverbial horse, you have to start from square one and write about something that makes you passionate.

And I could not think of a better candidate then Dune. A recent visit to Arrakis via a nationwide cinema re-release inspired me to finally knuckle down and write about the film’s one great shot (in anticipation of its upcoming sequel, Dune: Part Two). What’s your favourite shot from the 2021 movie? Let me know in the comments below.

One Great Shot

Dune has many memorable shots. I discussed the painterly quality of the Bene Gesserit exiting their ship in my original review of the film. I could easily gush about the sheer imaginative strangeness of many of the wide shots that depict alien ships in orbit. And even delight in the dizzying height of an opening image in which Rabban is overseeing the Harkonnen army on the titular desert planet.

However, since first seeing the 2021 film, the one image that has stuck with me is of the bull’s head. It’s a recurring visual motif throughout the picture, alongside a statue of a bull being seemingly wrangled, and a carving on a grave of a bull heading straight for a man holding a spear. The bull’s head is a trophy that came from Paul’s grandfather hunting the creature for sport. At the same time, it’s also a metaphor for the Atreides’ male line and its penchant for being impulsive and cruel.

It’s a reminder of Paul’s male birthright and the leader he could become if he chooses to embrace his grandfather’s mindset. In fact, an early scene involving Paul and his father, Duke Leto shows that the young man carries some of his grandfather’s hasty tendencies by appealing to his penchant for bull hunting.

There’s also an inference in an initial scene that Paul uses his grandfather as a source of strength. When his mother, Lady Jessica tests the young man on his mastery of the Bene Gesserit technique of the Voice, there’s an interesting cut to a portrait of Paul’s grandfather and the aforementioned bull statue thereafter. It gives Paul his grounding to unleash his use of the Voice in a manner that encapsulates both of his parental birthrights.

There’s many shots of the bull’s head throughout Dune. However, my favourite comes from one of the last times we see it on screen. In previous scenes, it’s been akin to a watchful eye that witnesses Paul’s tests throughout the movie. But in these final moments, it becomes a defiant and silent symbol for Leto’s final line, “Here I am, here I remain.” In a sense, the totem outlives Leto. Whether or not it will continue to live on in Paul is one of the tantalising questions that the 2021 film contends with, particularly in response to a question Chani asks in the opening sequence- “Who will our next oppressors be?”