Denis Villeneuve’s “Dune: Part 2” gives us much of what its predecessor promised to us a few years ago. Yes, his previous film “Dune” felt to me like an exercise rather than an entertainment, but I still admired many of its many spectacular technical qualities nonetheless, and I came to have more expectation on that. To my delight and excitement, “Dune: Part 2” exceeds my trivial expectation besides being more intriguing and thought-provoking, and I am glad to see it on the big screen along with many other audiences in last evening.

The movie begins at the point not so long after the finale of “Dune”. After being forced to exile into the vast desert world of a planet named Arrakis due to the ruthless scheme of Baron Vladimir Harkonnen (Stellan Skarsgård) and the Emperor, Paul Atreides (Timothée Chalamet), a young space nobleman who promptly succeeded his betrayed father, and his mother Lady Jessica (Rebecca Ferguson) come to join the Fremens, the local desert people of Arrakis who have resisted against whoever trying to control Arrakis from the outside for a certain precious material existing only in Arrakis. Despite the considerable support from Stilgar (Javier Bardem), the leader of the Fremen tribe at Sietch Tabr, many other Fremen people are not particularly willing to accept these two outsiders at first, so Paul and Lady Jessica must do some work for proving their worth to their new allies.

As already shown to us in detail, Paul has shown the considerable potential of becoming a figure to emerge from whatever has been planned for many generations by Bene Gesserit, a shady and powerful organization for which Lady Jessica has served for years. Since his arrival in Arrakis, he becomes more aware of not only his emerging power and but also the destiny to be unfolded right in front of him, and that makes him more driven to his vengeance upon all of his sworn enemies out there, though he is often reluctant for what may happen because of him and his power.

Nevertheless, things keep rolling him and others toward the inevitable, and the screenplay by Villeneuve and his co-writer Jon Spaihts, which is adapted from the second half of the novel of the same name by Frank Herbert, gradually adds more complexity to its story and characters. As he comes to prove himself more and more, his mother’s smart religious strategy over the Fremen people all around Arrakis sets the ground for him step by step, and Stilgar and many other Fremen people become more eager to worship and support them than before, but he cannot help but unnerved as sensing more of the possible danger in his and his mother’s rapidly growing influence over the Fremen people. They are virtually igniting what has been accumulated so much via these desperate people’s fundamentalistic belief, and we become more aware of several uncomfortable aspects of their plan for survival and revenge.

Yes, Paul can be regarded as your average white savior hero just like T.E. Lawrence in “Lawrence of Arabia” (1962), and the movie thoughtfully shows some doubt and question on Paul’s eventual ascendancy as the prophesied messiah, or mahdi, throughout the story. During a certain big scene where Paul finally decides to go all the way in front of many others for whatever is to be fulfilled by him in the end, Hans Zimmer’s ever-overpowering score becomes quite aggressively disturbing instead of sounding merely glorious, and this ominous impression lasts on us to the end of the movie.

These and other interesting ideas and questions in the film are often enriched by the first-rate technical achievement of Villeneuve and his crew members, some of whom incidentally won Oscars for the previous films. While the production design by Patrice Vermette and Patrice Vermette and the costume by Jacqueline West are constantly awesome to say the least, the cinematography by Greig Fraser is so grand and magnificent in every shot that I will not be surprised if he garners another Oscar in the next year. Around the expected big finale, the movie surely throws lots of stuffs including those giant sandworms across the screen, but the result does not look messy or confusing at all under Villeneuve’s masterful direction, and you will not probably mind much when the movie leaves some possibility for the next film to come.

As the center of the story, Timothée Chalamet does his duty as much as required. While he sometimes looks a little deficient in case of several big crowd scenes to be galvanized by his character’s charismatic leadership, he is more convincing as a young man still not so sure about his destiny, and he is particularly effective in his character’s complicated inner conflict along the story.

Around Chalamet, a number of various performers ably fill their respective colorful spots. Zendaya is suitably feisty and spirited as a young Fremen woman with whom Paul comes to fall in love, and it is a bit shame that the movie does not delve more into her character’s mixed feelings about Paul and what he comes to represent. Rebecca Ferguson, Javier Bardem, and Josh Brolin have each own moment to shine as Paul’s main supporters, and Ferguson is especially terrific when Lady Jessica comes to show more scheming sides of hers later in the story. On the other side, Austin Butler, Dave Bautista, Christopher Walken, Florence Pugh, Léa Seydoux, and Charlotte Rampling bring more intrigue to the story, and Stellan Skarsgård has a lot of fun again with his strikingly baroque villain character.

On the whole, “Dune: Part 2” is more impressive and entertaining compared to its predecessor, and it is definitely one of the main highlights of this year. Although it looks and feels a lot more serious than what I timidly imagined when I read the first four Dune novels 24 years ago, “Dune” and “Dune: Part 2” captivated and mesmerized me for their sheer cinematic power, and I sincerely hope that whatever will come next will be good enough to reach to the high standard of these two movies at least.