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Dune Cinematographer Had to ‘Forget a Lot of Star Wars’ When He Shot the Movie


Denis Villeneuve has become a modern legend when it comes to the sci-fi genre, and everyone is excited for his take on the classic Dune by Frank Herbert. What's interesting is, Dune cinematographer Greig Fraser had worked on Star Wars prior to this film, and he says he had to do a lot of mental gymnastics as not to repeat himself with this project.

Talking to Collider, Fraser, who had worked on Rogue One and some episodes of The Mandalorian, explained: "It was quite fun because I had to forget a lot of Star Wars when I was making Dune. It wasn't hard, though. Denis and I spoke clearly about how the film should look and should feel, and the formats and this and that, so it was not hard to swerve and change lanes. There were some similarities like the deserts. I mean listen, ultimately I'm positive George Lucas was inspired by Dune when he made Star Wars. I don't know if that's sacrilegious to talk about, but there are a lot of similarities in some areas, so you could tell he was definitely influenced by that. So I had to be careful doing both [Dune and The Mandalorian] and not to repeat myself. Also not just for the sake of the movie, but for fun. I hate to do the same thing twice."

When it comes to Star Wars borrowing from Dune, I would say that Fraser actually has it spot on. Dune takes place in a mostly desert planet, which Tatooine definitely is; the term of ‘spice' is also taken from Dune and brought into Star Wars as basically the same thing.

There's a lot of hype when it comes to the release of Dune, seeing that it's the granddaddy of modern science fiction. A lot of big sci-fi properties borrow from the novel, and for years the story was said to be unadaptable for cinema. Then again, with Villeneuve at the helm, everyone is expecting him to pull off another critical hit.

Let's just hope the movie does well commercially this time.

Catch Dune when it hits theaters Dec. 18.

Read Also: Dune Director Compares Paul Atreides to Michael Corleone of The Godfather

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