Probably the best subtle acting I’ve seen from a collective cast. It’s a testament to Villeneuve that I can sense strong directing from the performances themselves and not the lines or delivery. 

It looks great but that’s no surprise. Villeneuve’s sense of scale and Freiser at the helm I wasn’t quite sure how they’d top pt 1 besides bigger fights. I was happy with the amount of close camera shots for the actors to do their thing. They capture the spirit of each character perfectly that the dialogue doesn’t matter because the characters are at that point, real. The action scenes are both grand and intimate that it makes the runtime feel its length & I’m kinda mad it wasn’t longer bc it could’ve been. 

Any doubts about Chalamet’s turn from Paul to the Kwisatz Haderach are slain and Oscar Isaac’s Leto from part 1 is like a haunting spirit for the rest of the characters. Paul even talks and leads like him (and not the only character coming of age to mimic their elder) which is among the many parallels in the combined 2 part story. But everyone honestly carries the weight of their character’s function to the full on-screen extent imo.

Successfully works as 2 stand alones but the true test is to watch both films back to back. I’ll probably rewatch this 5 more times regardless