Dune director Denis Villeneuve has some words for… well, words.
In a recent interview with The Times, Denis Villeneuve surveyed the state of modern cinema and came to the conclusion that films have been lacking due to television’s recent storytelling dominance, signaling the reliance on dialogue as a primary reason. “Frankly, I hate dialogue,” the filmmaker said, “Dialogue is for theatre and television. I don’t remember movies because of a good line, I remember movies because of a strong image. I’m not interested in dialogue at all.”
He continued, championing film’s exploration of form over spoon-fed content: “Pure image and sound, that is the power of cinema, but it is something not obvious when you watch movies today. Movies have been corrupted by television.” When asked if he’d be interested in helming another Dune sequel — or a new film in general — without any dialogue whatsoever, the French-Canadian director was enthused. “In a perfect world, I’d make a compelling movie that doesn’t feel like an experiment but does not have a single word in it either,” he said. “People would leave the cinema and say, ‘Wait, there was no dialogue?’ But they won’t feel the lack.”
While Villeneuve has screenwriting credits on both parts of the Dune adaptation — as well as his French-scripted early works — he’s become notable for his expansive, visually-dominant work with lauded cinematographer Roger Deakins on Sicario and Blade Runner 2049. On the other hand, Arrival, which was adapted by Eric Heisserer, revolves heavily around the uniting concepts of language and how it can foster a shared experience of humanity.
Elsewhere in his interview with The Times, Villeneuve discusses Dune’s two-part journey, and why he feels young people are becoming more interested in longer films (despite the clamoring for shorter fare): “Think of Oppenheimer. It is a three-hour, rated-R movie about nuclear physics that is mostly talking. But the public was young — that was the movie of the year by far for my kids. There is a trend. The youth love to watch long movies because if they pay, they want to see something substantial. They are craving meaningful content.”
Dune: Part Two lands in theaters on Friday, March 1st. In her review, Liz Shannon Miller agreed with Villeneuve that a final sequel would round out the story well, writing, “Fortunately, Villeneuve wants to keep going, and Part Two wasn’t greenlit until after the release of Part One, so the dream of a Dune trilogy is far from dead.”