‘Dune’ confirmed to be split into two beautiful-looking movies: Photos – Mashable

The film adaptation of Frank Herbert’s 1965 sci-fi epic Dune is well under way with new photos popping up in Vanity Fair Tuesday along with a confirmation from director Denis Villeneuve that the first novel will be split into two movies.

Considering the immensity of the first Dune novel, which packs so much history, detail, and information into its 400-or-so pages, this decision makes a lot of sense. While Villeneuve has previously stated that it was his hope to make Dune into more than one movie, Warner Bros. has only now confirmed that his hopes are reality.

 “I would not agree to make this adaptation of the book with one single movie,” Villeneuve told Vanity Fair. “The world is too complex. It’s a world that takes its power in details.”

The scope of Dune is something that has made it so difficult to adapt for filmmakers, and trying to pack it all into a single movie wouldn’t give creators the space all of Dune‘s themes and messages they need to thrive.

“It’s a book that tackles politics, religion, ecology, spirituality—and with a lot of characters,” Villeneuve told Vanity Fair. “I think that’s why it’s so difficult. Honestly, it’s by far the most difficult thing I’ve done in my life.”

Dune primarily follows Paul Atreides of House Atreides, played by Timothée Chalamet, as his family arrives on the desert planet Arrakis to take over leadership from House Harkonnen and ultimately take charge of the production of spice, an addictive drug-like substance that increases users’ life expectancy and mental capabilities that is only found on Arrakis.

The planet’s people, the Fremen, comes with its own very complicated history entwined with other groups spread throughout the human-populated planets of this far-off future space.The planet itself is also complicated with its treacherous environmental conditions that require people to adhere to its whims by being extremely delicate with their moisture use and expenditure or die.

Chalamet’s description to Vanity Fair about trying to reproduce some of these conditions on Earth while filming sounds pretty daunting, especially considering the actors were wearing rubber “stillsuits” that (in the world of Dune) capture the body’s lost moisture and repurposes it into drinkable water.

“I remember going out of my room at 2 a.m., and it being probably 100 degrees,” he told Vanity Fair about filming in Abu Dhabi. “The shooting temperature was sometimes 120 degrees.”

As of now, the first Dune movie’s release date stands at Dec. 18. The second movie’s release date has yet to be hinted at.