Report: David Lynch’s ‘Dune’ Had 7 Hours of Unused Footage

Wired’s lengthy report on the promotional tour for David Lynch’s “Dune” is well worth checking out. It includes quotes from people closely tied to Lynch’s film, with each person presenting another fascinating angle of the picture.

Lynch's "Dune" is well-known to be one of the worst flops in Hollywood history and the director’s worst movie. It's practically unwatchable. I don't think I've ever been able to sit through its entire 137 minutes. I've tried, because I’m a Lynch completist, but it’s such a incoherent mess.

Widely panned at the time, Lynch lost total creative control on the project, so much so that he asked the studio to remove his name from it entirely, sadly, his wish wasn’t granted.

The reactions in the WIRED piece are from much of the crew that worked with Lynch on the film, and they all suggest the same thing: “Dune” became a victim of editing interference, and something much more than that.

“What’s on the screen isn’t really David’s film. It’s a different edit. It’s a different version of the film, and that made me very sad”. — FREDERICK ELMES (Additional Unit Cinematographer)

“What you don’t realize is there’s like seven hours on the cutting room floor […] It was supposed to be two films, and it became one, really short and really not very comprehensible. — TERRI HARDIN (Stillsuit Fabrication, Stunt Double)

“I knew there was stuff that would have made a stronger film […] There was way more shot.” — KENNETH GEORGE GODWIN (Production Documentarian):

“The stories of what David went through are well-documented, and it wasn’t the film that he wanted. It wasn’t the film most of us expected to see when we went to the premiere. Everybody was a little like, “Oh, what happened?” — GILES MASTERS (Art Department)

“ In addition to the human side of Lynch, I admire his vision of things. The film could have been better. It’s a very complicated and difficult story to tell, and surely David’s version was better when it was uncut.” — LUIGI ROCCHETTI (Makeup Artist)

“If David had been left alone with the editor, it would have been better, had more coherence.” — KENNETH GEORGE GODWIN (Production Documentarian)

“I don’t know that I ever understood it any better than when I struggled through the book. I think that the movie was not as successful as David could have made it. He had a vision to do it in black and white. He didn’t want to do it in color. I think that it had the potential if David had been left entirely to his own devices to make it a stronger movie. There was a lot of interference in his version, but [he] was not a powerful enough director at that point in his career to say, “All right, everybody back off,” and have final cut. Even though I found Eraserhead very odd, to say the least, all his films have been very interesting. Dune is probably the least successful [of his films] because he didn’t have enough control to do what he wanted” — JANE JENKINS (Casting Director)

Lynch, who has been open about releasing a director’s cut, recently told Cahiers du Cinema that he’s still bitter about his experience making “Dune” and that he has no interest in catching Denis Villeneuve’s version:

“I will never watch it, and I don't even want you to tell me about it, ever.”

A few years ago, Lynch did look back on the botched adaptation during a Q&A video on YouTube:

“I’m proud of everything except ‘Dune,'” Lynch answered. “I’ve liked so much working on different movies. It’s not so much about pride but the enjoyment of doing, the enjoyment of the work. I’ve enjoyed working in all these different mediums. I feel really lucky to have been able to enjoy those things and to be able to live.”

Lynch referred to his 1984 “Dune” adaptation as a “gigantic sadness in [his] life” because of the lack of creative freedom he received from the studio during the film, including being given a tepid budget to work with.