Other worlds: New attempt at Dune movie collapses

New Dune adaption dead. The latest attempt to film Frank Herbert’s Dune has officially thrown in the towel as Paramount’s rights lapsed. The novel has been filmed twice before – By David Lynch in 1984 and the Sci-Fi Channel in 2000. Neither version could quite capture the classic sci-fi novel… Is it simply not a book that translates well to screen, or has the right team just not attempted it yet? I’m sure we’ll see it adapted again either way.

That said, I must admit I am quite fond of Sci-Fi’s 2003 attempt at the second and third books in the series, Children of Dune. And it only has a little to do with James McAvoy spending half the thing running around with no shirt on.

The Hunger Games. They have their Katniss, but what about the rest of the cast? Television Without Pity, of all places, has a nice set of suggestions for casting everyone else. With the exception of Christopher Lee (he’s played that role a million times over) I wholeheartedly applaud their selections. Major props for a non-sexy Haymitch!

Chronicles of Narnia. Walden is skipping right over The Silver Chair to make prequel The Magician’s Nephew the next film in the series. Yay for having an actual reason to bring back their best character Tilda Swinton this time.

Inheritance Cycle. Knopf has released the cover for the final book in Christopher Paolini’s Star Wars meets Pern in Middle-earth series. It’s always nice to see John Jude Palencar getting work, I guess.

Lists. Topless Robot’s has 14 great but lesser-known sci-fi novels for lil’ nerds. I find it quite distressing that Paula Danzinger’s This Place Has No Atmosphere is considered a lesser known sci-fi novel. Danzinger is a YA goddess, people. RESPECT.

6 Replies to “Other worlds: New attempt at Dune movie collapses”

  1. I read This Place Has No Atmosphere! All I remember about it is wondering whether the “sonic showers” would work, though.

  2. The Dune film had the cast and director, but the tv series got the length. If you could have done the film as mini-series instead, it would have been amazing.

  3. I actually like Alex Newman’s Paul better than Kyle MacLachlan’s. They both had similar issues, though: I could buy MacLachlan as young Paul but not Muad’dib Paul, and Newman as Muad’dib but not the kid. Which is probably part of the reason I liked Children so much.

  4. Why would they skip The Silver Chair? It’s the best of the series and everyone knows it, and it’s probably easier to market than The Magician’s Nephew.

  5. @ Thom: I always liked The Horse and its boy best, but I agree with you on the marketability of The Magician’s Nephew. Plus I don’t see how they can pull off the whole creation sequence. That is I can’t imagine Liam Neeson singing Narnia into existence. ;)
    @ Dune: Liked Children of Dune, never got David Lynch’s film. Way too 2001 for my taste. More over, if you have a planet full of giant worms and a rebel alliance you should be able to make an exciting movie without going all “David Lynch” on the story. ;-)

  6. I’ve heard speculation that this will be the last Narnia film, and going out with a prequel (and Tilda Swinton) makes for nice symmetry. The Silver Chair would probably translate just fine to film, but The Last Battle is problematic to say the least. Honestly, I’m surprised they’re even making a fourth one at all.

    You know, I’ll say one thing for Lynch’s Dune – as an adaption, it’s surprisingly faithful. It just… Doesn’t work. Perhaps the combination of Lynch’s Lynchness and straight-out sci-fi is a bit much.

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