Denis Villeneuve’s windswept epic is engrossing enough to maintain an audience with an intermission and a running time twice its length.

When the anticipation is feverish, it sets up movies to disappoint and fail. This long-awaited movie smashes those expectations.

Dune is a triumph of mediocrity. What it does, it does well enough, but was it worth doing? It's a cookie-cutter movie, a restatement of every trope that now impoverishes cinema.

Ultimately, much of what is presented in this first half is perplexing because it’s unclear what changes to the story are being made. It is possible that as a whole, Dune will read far better, but we can’t know until the second half arrives.