Dune Memories

Unlike most people I had never heard of the novel 'Dune' before the David Lynch movie. I remember seeing the ads and Sting crying, 'I WILL KILL HIM' while wearing an outfit that could only be describe as 'European Latex Fetish Jumpsuit Chic' though. I was fascinated.



I dragged a couple of my friends to it and after it was over my guy friend thought it was a piece of crap and he had no idea what the hell he had just seen. She however gave me that look that let me know that she was thinking exactly what I was - that I had just been exposed to something that would change my life.

The next day I went to see it again and liked it ever more. I needed to find the book this movie was based on. I had to know everything about it.

This was back in the 80s when the concept of 'googling' someone meant something entirely different than it does today. A GOOGLE was a math term for a number so large that is was expressed as a one followed by a hundred zeros and not the name for the search engine of first choice that it became associated with.

You couldn't just pick you way through a thousand pictures, articles, reviews, trivia sites, or blogs about the movie and book. You were alone, usually, in your admiration for something that no one that you knew shared.

I read the book in a week while working at an outdoor skating rink's rental shack. I am sure that the kids were returning the skates and other hockey equipment but what the hell did I know?

That shack was where I finally learned that as cool as I found the movie, the book was a more rich and rewarding experience that I would ever find from a novel before or since. I had the images of the characters and places in my head already from the movie. That made the book really come alive in my imagination.

When I realized that the 'sound weapons' were an invention for the film I was even more impressed with what Frank Herbert had created. Fremen don't need goofy weapons to make them warriors. Fremen already ARE weapons and perfect in their creation.

I was lucky to know someone who was passionate about the book and story and when I found the DUNE ENCYCLOPEDIA is a used bookstore, she countered with THE MAKING OF DUNE paperback edition. We talked of the story often.


When the movie came out on video ("What's that daddy?") another associate who worked at a video rental place just 'happened' to let me know that a copy of the movie had mysteriously came up lost in inventory and he hoped I wouldn't share that knowledge with anyone.

In those days a video movie cost almost 100 dollars a piece to buy upon release. They were priced that high so that people would keep RENTING and not have any illusions that they could own their favorite movies and build up a collection of them to watch anytime THEY wanted.

'WE' will control how you entertain yourself was the mantra of the day. Within a few years this business model failed and prices came down significantly to where they are now but back then they really gave you the screwgie if you wanted your own copy of say, 'Star War' to put under your pillow at night.

Having my own copy of the movie before the usual 12 month period waiting period when the movie came on Pay-TV and you could tape a copy of it with your VCR was rare and special.

I tried to share the movie with as many people in my circle that I could but it got few takers. No one wants or needs things explained to them while watching a movie. No one likes the tape to be paused so that Calvin can do a class on why those guys in the fish tanks looked like they did or why those desert guys had blue eyes.

The 'spice jokes' I did not find funny. The connection they tried to make between 'Dune' and 'The Spice Girls' irritated me to no end.

Today things are much different. In just this past month I have found kindred spirits who love everything about the story of young Paul Atriedes, who travels with his family to the most valuable planet in the entire Universe and while there, finds godhood. They get it. I love that they get it. They are my people.

Long live the fighters!