I rewatched Dune part 1, hoping to take away a better impression than I had when I saw it in theaters. Unfortunately I still don’t find much of value in it. I still need to rewatch part 2, and maybe that could still change my mind. But I’m not holding my breath.
In brief, Dune seems deeply misanthropic. The message is: the masses are irrational and easily duped by conniving populists that promise revolution. Simultaneously Horseshoe Theory and Great Man Theory. It is a diatribe against democracy and the intelligence of the underclasses.
Am I massively missing the point of this story? I have sought a Marxist analysis of these movies, and the ones I have found only ramble aimlessly the cleverness of Villeneuve for subverting the spaghetti-western hero trope and for being “self-aware” about Orientalist and colonial themes. As far as big-budget media goes, I think Andor is far more useful for leftist agitation than Dune could be.
The books do a much better job of depicting this, but if I remember correctly, part of how the Fremen survived the occupation of Arrakis by the Imperium (who have massive spaceships capable of orbital bombardment) was by being fractured, secretive, and isolationist. I don’t think their lack of revolt, which ends horribly and is actually a condemnation of the white messiah trope, is meant to show their lack of collective intelligence, it is simply a byproduct of their survival methods and the technological gap between them and the Imperium.
Also, prior to Paul, I think their ultimate goal was the terraform Arrakis to a lush green planet, which is why they store water in their sietches. They did not have any ambitions beyond Arrakis, which is what it would ultimately take for them to secure the planet ironically.