Dune

David Lynch's attempt to film Frank Herbert's epic science fiction novel about the battle for control of the desert planet Dune—the only source of a “spice” (drug) called melange, the most valuable substance in the universe—was assailed upon its 1984 release for failing to cram everything into a two-hour-plus feature. While it's true that the movie lacks some of the novel's dramatic gravity, there's no denying that Dune is a trippy cinematic experience. Lynch successfully portrays the complex political conflicts driving a web of conspiracies while also providing a mythic resonance to the odyssey of once-and-future messiah Paul Atreides (played stiffly by then-unknown Kyle MacLachlan), along with monstrous sandworms, hideous navigator creatures, and a visually spectacular milieu of vastly different cultures in the sprawling interstellar empire. The soft-rock score by Toto occasionally approaches self-parody, and the excessive use of voiceover for exposition is often distracting, but the dynamic casting (including Max von Sydow, José Ferrer, Freddie Jones, Dean Stockwell, and Sting) coupled with wonderful imagery make Dune, at the very least, a mind-boggling illustrated digest of the 1965 book (and a more compelling interpretation than the 2000 TV miniseries). Dune is exactly the kind of film that shows off the high-definition clarity of Blu-ray, sporting here a gorgeous transfer of the original theatrical version (Lynch disowned an extended version, clumsily edited without his involvement). Blu-ray extras include four production featurettes, and deleted scenes (with an intro by producer Raffaella De Laurentiis). Recommended. (S. Axmaker)