The Dune Movie That Never Was

Avant-garde filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky tried in the mid-’70s to make a movie version of Frank Herbert’s Dune starring Salvador Dali and Orson Welles, with concept art by HR Giger and Jean Giraud, and special effects by Dan O’Bannon who went on to write Alien.

Wow.

Just.

Wow.

Jodorowsky’s goal was to “fabricate” on film the effects of LSD, and I’m not sure he couldn’t have done just that.

I’m a big fan of Giger’s work, having been allowed to see Alien on the big screen at far too young and impressionable an age, but this Dune would have been a million time better or a million time worse — or maybe both. The whole thing fell apart because, really, what studio would have touched it with a ten-foot maker hook?

For sure it would have made David Lynch’s 1984 version look like a Shirley Temple feature.

Full story, video interviews, and tons more concept art at The Verge.