Dune Remake Still Happening, Now With Pierre Morel at Helm

<em>Dune</em> Remake Still Happening, Now With Pierre Morel at Helm

The Spice must, and will, flow. The Dune movie remake was assumed to be dead in the water last October when director Peter Berg left the project to direct the Battleship movie. (Now with aliens!) But as the titular novel’s opening line says: “A beginning is the time for taking the most delicate care that the balances are correct.” And as Entertainment Weekly reports, Paramount has resurrected the project with a new director, Pierre Morel, whom they hope will bring that balance to a remake of David Lynch’s 1984 cult classic.

Morel was the director of last year’s competent action flick Taken, better known by its (totally made up) subtitle of Liam Neeson: Action Dad. Paramount is currently in search of a new screenplay writer to merge Morel’s vision, which he claims will be a very faithful adaptation of the source material, with the movie’s original script. The movie is apparently now a “high priority” for Paramount, which in industry-speak means it might actually see a release.

The flick was originally announced in late 2007, and went through a number of scripts and possible directors until Berg was selected. His original plan was for a more “muscular and adventurous” treatment of the book that would still be palatable to “fans of the Bene Gesserit and Kwisatz Haderach.” There’s some justifiable skepticism about whether a sprawling piece of literature like Dune could be distilled to a two-hour runtime. And while Patrick Stewart probably won’t be in this one, look on the bright side: Sting won’t be parading around in metal underwear either.