The story
Dune is a 2021 American epic space opera film co-produced and directed by Denis Villeneuve, who co-wrote the screenplay with Jon Spaihts and Eric Roth. It is the first of a two-part adaptation of the 1965 novel by Frank Herbert and the first installment in Legendary Pictures' Dune film series. The cast includes Timothée Chalamet, Rebecca Ferguson, Oscar Isaac, Josh Brolin, Stellan Skarsgård, Dave Bautista, Stephen McKinley Henderson, Zendaya, Chang Chen, Sharon Duncan-Brewster, Charlotte Rampling, Jason Momoa, and Javier Bardem. Set in the distant future, the film follows Paul Atreides as his family, the noble House Atreides, is thrust into a war for the deadly and inhospitable desert planet Arrakis.
Setting & tone
Dune is set in United States of America and works primarily in English. Tonally it sits in Science Fiction, Adventure, drawing on the conventions of each while filtering them through Denis Villeneuve's direction.
Why people search for this plot
Search interest in the plot of Dune tends to spike around questions about narrative ambiguity, the meaning of specific scenes, and how secondary characters connect to the main arc. Our editorial team tracks those queries and updates this summary as new questions emerge — see the FAQ on the main movie page.