Synopsis:

Experience Denis Villeneuve’s DUNE saga like never before with DUNE: The Complete Saga. This fan edit merges DUNE (2021) and DUNE: Part Two (2024) into a cohesive, streamlined three-hour epic. Designed for fans of Villeneuve's vision, this cut offers a faster-paced, singular cinematic experience that maintains the integrity of the story while eliminating slower moments and extraneous content.

Intentions:

This is not intended to replace the original films but rather to provide a fresh perspective for those seeking a more condensed journey through Villeneuve’s adaptation of Frank Herbert’s sci-fi masterpiece.

Change List:

This project involved a meticulous blend of the two films, requiring extensive trimming and restructuring. Almost every scene was tightened to quicken the pace while preserving the essential story beats. Scenes and dialogue that didn’t advance the narrative or slowed the pacing were removed. However, critical moments like the Water of Life sequence and Paul’s speech to the Fremen remain untouched. Additionally, this edit incorporates an IMAX-inspired aspect ratio shift for immersive, VFX-heavy and atmospheric sequences. About 100 minutes of the 180 minute runtime features a cropped and upscaled “lie-max” format, which enhances the visual grandeur of these scenes by “opening the matte” to 1.85:1 aspect ratio. Topaz AI was used to upscale the footage and restore the resolution lost during cropping, resulting in visuals that look even better than the quality of the original discs during these scenes. A unique challenge arose due to differences in HDR metadata between the two films. To ensure visual consistency, the HDR metadata was recalibrated to achieve a harmonious middle ground between the grading of both scans. Select scenes were also recolored to match the original coloring of each disc. CHANGE LOG: -Opening Warner Brother Logos have been replaced with my logos -Removed "Dreams are messages from the deep" -Paul and Jessica breakfast scene is shortened -Herald of the Change ceremony is shortened -Paul asking Duncan to leave early with him scene is shortened, Paul no longer tells Duncan about his vision of Duncan's death -Paul and Leto scene over family graveyard has been cut from here and moved to later on -Cut straight from Paul asking Duncan to leave early to Paul and Gurney training scene, which is massively shortened: Gurney no longer lectures Paul on the Harkonnen's brutality -Removed the scene of Rabban complaining to the Baron about the Atreides being given Arrakis. I felt that DV in these movies tried a little too hard to explain what was going on to the audience who may not understand, and this scene where the Baron says "when is a gift not a gift?" kind of spoils some of the suspense for me -Cut straight from Paul and Gurney training to Paul being woken up by Jessica for Gom Jabbar test -Paul no longer sees Dr Yueh before the Gom Jabbar test. I felt that this was DV's way of making sure the audience is introduced to Dr Yueh before his betrayal, which is again him trying to explain things too clearly. My edit is for those who have already seen the two movies but want a different experience of them, so I cut out many expository moments like this -We now see a shortened version of the scene of Paul and Leto talking over the family graveyard -Montage of Atreides packing and leaving Caladan for Arrakis has been shortened so they arrive at Arrakis faster -Paul and Jessica's flight to Arrakeen is shorter -Removed Leto and Gurney looking at the city -Removed the scene of Jessica and Mapes. I thought her screaming like that was always a bit cringey, and in my edit, the crysknife from Part One is not important. -The scene of Paul learning about the palm trees has been removed. This was a tough one for me to take out, but ultimately it had to go for my pacing. - Removed the hunter seeker scene. It just wasn’t necessary in my cut unfortunately -Removed the council scene, instead we cut straight to Paul and everyone examining the spice silos -Leto's introduction to Stilgar is shortened -Duncan showing everyone his Fremen gear has been cut -The whole sequence of them visiting the spice harvester and Paul's vision has been heavily shortened -Paul now sees his full vision during this scene instead of explaining it to Jessica later, that scene has been removed -Removed Leto chewing out Kynes for the Harkonnen sabotage -Removed Salusa Secundus scene. Also very hard for me, but it really did not add anything except for some visual spectacle, which my cut is not lacking in any way, instead, what I did was move the scene of mother Gaius coming to tell the Baron about the plan to collude with the Emperor to here, which helps the upcoming attack flow better. -Removed both scenes of Leto and Jessica before the Harkonnen's attack. It does explore their background a little, but it is definitely not needed in my cut. -Harkonnen's attack has been massively shortened -Removed scene of Kynes meeting up with Duncan after Harkonnen attack -Removed scene of Rabban telling the Baron about the attack as he's healing -Removed Paul's vision of Jamis, instead we just see them go from in the Fremen tent to out in their stillsuits at night looking for them before the Sandworm comes -Paul's fight with Jamis is severely shortened as Jamis is not super important in this cut, and Chani does not give him the knife. It just felt too forced for more how immediately infatuated Chani was with Paul, and vice versa to some extent. -Removed "Power over spice is power over all" -Removed Dune 2's opening narration from Irulan -Opening action sequence of Dune 2 has been shortened -Jessica throwing up and them disposing of the bodies via sandworm has been cut -Stilgar asking the council what to do about the strangers has been cut, instead he just tells Jessica in the next scene -Paul and Jessica eating the Fremen spiced food has been cut -Removed Jessica telling Paul that she has to take the water of life, instead we just cut to her doing it -Removed Stilgar and Chani arguing about the prophecy as Jessica takes water of life -Removed Stilgar sending Paul into the desert alone for a night -Removed Rabban and Baron scene right after Paul and Chani kiss -Removed Paul and Chani waking up together -Instead we go right from Paul and Chani kissing to Paul learning to ride the worm -The worm-riding sequence has been shortened heavily -Greatly shortened the explosion of the spice depot on Arrakeen -Feyd's birthday party is greatly shortened -Removed scene of the Baron giving Feyd Arrakis. In my cut, we do not see the Atreides man who is not drugged during Feyd's fight, so there's no need for Feyd to get mad at the Baron about trying to kill him -Removed scene of Lady Margot reporting back to Mother Gaius and Irulan -Paul and Gurney's scenes in between reuniting and visiting the atomics have been shortened for pacing -When the Harkonnens attack the Seitch, we don't see any of the inside of their ships with the Baron, we just stay with the Fremen on the ground -The next 20 minutes play out exactly as it is in the original film with Paul going to the south, taking the water of life, and giving the speech to the Fremen -From here on out, no other scenes have been removed -The Fremen battling the Sardaukar outside has been shortened -Paul's final knife fight with Feyd has been shortened -Final credits have been cut to keep the runtime under 3 hours — the full list of credits is displayed in the DVD menu screen of the ISO file version

Additional Notes:

There are several available formats: 4K, HDR, 5.1 + 2.0 audio 4K, HDR, 5.1 + 2.0 audio (Widescreen Edition) 4K, SDR, 5.1 + 2.0 audio 4K, SDR, 5.1 + 2.0 audio (Widescreen Edition) 1080p, SDR, 5.1 + 2.0 audio 1080p, SDR, 5.1 + 2.0 audio (Widescreen Edition)