Jodorowsky's Dune

A long time ago, before Star Wars, director Alejandro Jodorowsky had intended to make a big budget adaptation of Frank Herbert’s “Dune,” even though he had never read the novel. Having made the completely bug nuts El Topo and The Holy Mountain, Jodorowsky seemed an odd choice to helm such a project, and that proved to be the truth in the end. The film never got made because studios were too afraid to back his big budget vision, even though they were impressed by the fact Jodorowsky had a assembled an impressive creative team, including Dan O’Bannon and H.R. Giger, who would both work on Alien. This documentary prominently features the Jodorowsky and his fascinating account of the film that never was. He references a huge book of storyboards throughout his interviews, and regales with tales about such stars as Mick Jagger, Dali and Orson Welles having committed to the project. He even reminisces about reluctantly going to see David Lynch’s Dune and actually being happy that it was awful. Also, according to him, Pink Floyd was in line to provide music for the soundtrack. It isn’t until the closing minutes that the film reveals how influential the failed movie was on future cinema, including imagery stolen straight from Jodorowsky’s Dune and used for Prometheus. Jodorowsky proclaims that somebody should make an animated movie of his vision. I couldn’t agree more.