Customer Reviews

The Making of Dune

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I have a interest in the David Lynch adaptation of Dune. So much so that I am still (Part-Time) interviewing and researching a book on the making of the film.

Ed Naha has written a competent and informative book in the same standard as other 'Making of...' books. In a book of this purpose, none of the problems with studios and post-production are ever to be aired. This is, and never was, to be like 'The Devil's Candy'.

We are given plenty of anecdotes concerning the making of the film and a very informative first section concerning the earlier attempts to film 'Dune'. We are also treated to description of scenes that were later discarded during the editing of the film.

For those who are still interested in more information about David Lynch's film, I would reccomend them to look at Harlan Ellison's two part essay on the film (to be found in 'Watching'), Frank Herbert's intro to 'Eye' and Paul M. Sammons article in a double issue of Cinefantisique.

Ed Naha's "Making of Dune" is a fascinating journey into the process of bringing Frank Herbert's science fiction epic onto the big screen. It's an interesting cast of characters- the eccentric David Lynch, on one of his first cinematic outings. The producer, Dino De Laurentiis (famous for his B movies,and now his Food Network diva granddaughter Giada) The lead,then-unknown Kyle McLachlan. Despite "Dune" being a critical&popular failure, McLachlan had faith in Lynch and went on to star in "Blue Velvet" and "Twin Peaks." There's Sian Philips,as a reverend mother of the Bene Gesserit,as well as the problematic Sean Young.

"Making of Dune" explains the complexity of production. Carlo Rambaldi,who designed ET,also designed the realistic model of the infant Alia. The early sandworms were so phallic that men in the production felt... inadequate. There were the problems with filming in Juarez, Mexico, negotiating with Herbert. "Making of Dune" had problems from the get-go. Amazingly,it made it onto the big screen. "Making of Dune" makes for fun reading.

I am a filmmaker, and Dune is my favorite movie, so I guess I was pretty biased towards this book from the start. But even if you're not a big Dune fan, this book talks about all of the crazy things that can go wrong in a movie, like wild dogs tearing up the set or hiring 100 Mexicans to clean up a desert so they could shoot a scene in it. A real fun book.

299 pages of the making of David Lynch's adaptation of "Dune" more on the making than on the story. Several b/w pictures including artwork, and costume design/set scenes.

Many condoms died to make this movie. Not too bad, for one of these.