We have been here for a quarter of a year, and without a doubt the movie of this 2024, so far, is ‘Dune 2’. The desert epic by Javier Bardem, Timothée Chalamet and Zendaya has devastated the box office as if it were a giant sand worm and its filmmaker has won praise from the public and critics, who They have come to classify ‘Dune 2’ as the best science fiction film of the 21st century and one of the best in history, when in reality it is not even Denis Villeneuve’s best film.
It is undeniable that ‘Dune 2’ is a visual marvel that must be seen on the largest possible screen, with a photograph that transports us to the arid dunes of Arrakis alongside the Lisan al-Gaib of the Fremen, Paul Atreides. The battles are more epic than ever, the faith is stronger and the sandworms are bigger in an overly ambitious delivery. And yet, fails in a very important thing compared to another science fiction and adventure film like ‘Godzilla and Kong: The New Empire’.
Warner Bros.
We already warned in our review of ‘Godzilla and Kong: The New Empire’: the director “Adam Wingard does not intend to surpass in beauty the magnetic shots of Denis Villeneuve, nor to revolutionize science fiction cinema like Christopher Nolan. […] In times when genre cinema aspires to the label of ‘elevated’ and to be equated with high culture, ‘Godzilla and Kong: The New Empire’ proudly claims the origins of its species, born to entertain.”
And the second installment of the adaptation of Frank Herbert’s literary classic He tries so hard to transcend that, at times, he forgets the most important thing. ‘Dune 2’ is not perfect for a reason: the mistake of Timothée Chalamet and Zendaya’s film that makes it not round is its incoherent lack of rhythm and, as our review of ‘Dune 2’ pointed out: “It is precisely this condition of discontinuous narration which makes ‘Dune: Part Two’ a more irregular title than lovers of theaters full of fans could wish for.” The shapes eat into the background, and his artistic proposal wins by exhaustion and not by conviction.
Warner Bros.
This doesn’t happen in ‘Godzilla and Kong: The New Empire’, and it’s basically because he doesn’t care about it. Here there are no pretensions of reaching a critical consensus, but the objective is simply to entertain.. We are talking about wild fights of giant kaijus, in a continuous fight of monstrous wrestling to the death and without rules. Pure and simple entertainment without formal ties, without pedantry and without shame. Both films play in different leagues, but one achieves its mission better than the other.
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Fran Chico He is an expert in cinema and series, specialized in cultural dissemination and film criticism. He is a recognized critic in Rotten Tomatoes and in Filmaffinity. Although his favorite genre is horror, he tells you the same thing about Marvel’s new MCU blockbuster as he does about an auteur film to claim from the festival circuit. There is no series from Netflix, HBO Max, Amazon Prime Video or Disney+ that escapes your radar, delving into the catalog of each platform to recommend and analyze its best content.
Fran has been writing in Fotogramas for more than a year, but his beginnings date back almost two decades ago in film forums and blogs such as Planeta Claqueta or Moviementaries. He was founder and part of the board of directors of the digital publication of film criticism and analysis Mutations Magazine and a member of the Association of Cinematographic Informants of Spain (AICE), the organization that awards the Feroz Awards, as well as a voter for the Golden Blogos for independent cinema. After completing the Master of Film Criticism at the Madrid Film School (ECAM) taught by Cayman Film Notebookshas collaborated and/or covered as a specialized press for more than 10 years film festivals such as San Sebastián, Sitges and Filmadrid, interviewing along the way relevant directors, actors and actresses from the national industry such as Penélope Cruz, Carlos Saura , Ana de Armas, José Luis Cuerda or José Sacristán and internationals such as James Wan, Edgar Wright or Dario Argento.
His knowledge and experience have led him to be film videoblogger from Fnac Spain and director and host of the podcast Zinephage Holocaustwith more than 150 programs broadcast and available in which cinema and humor are mixed from a unique and original point of view.