Jodorowsky's Dune
Sony Pictures Classics | Release Date: March 21, 2014 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
79
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 31 Critic Reviews
Positive:
29
Mixed:
2
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Tampa Bay TimesSteve PersallApr 30, 2014
Herbert's tale is twisted into a barely recognizable rush of pretentions made entertaining by Jodorowsky's glee in describing them. At age 85 he remains a madman with immense personality, a pinhole visionary insisting his Dune would be a prophecy shaping generations. Jodorowsky's Dune makes a viewer wish he'd gotten the chance. Read full review
100
Time OutJoshua RothkopfMar 18, 2014
Frank Pavich’s fun documentary captures an unbowed, exuberant Jodorowsky, who recalls his team of “spiritual warriors” with the camaraderie of a battle-scarred veteran. Read full review
91
Portland OregonianMarc MohanApr 10, 2014
Highly entertaining chronicle of a dream unfilmed. Read full review
91
The PlaylistJessica KiangJan 28, 2014
Director Pavich, his first time at bat, has crafted an unalloyed pleasure of a documentary, especially for those of us who care about "Dune," about sci-fi, and about the value and power of creative passion. Read full review
90
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzApr 10, 2014
[Jodorowsky's] a hoot, and so is Jodorowsky's Dune. But it's something more, too, a look at twisted genius and missed opportunities, a sad but intriguing combination. Read full review
90
Village VoiceAlan ScherstuhlMar 18, 2014
At least we have this gem, the rare tease of what could have been that actually proves satisfying enough on its own. Read full review
89
Austin ChronicleMarc SavlovMay 7, 2014
As a documentary on the origins and backstory of the unfilmed film, Jodorowsky’s Dune is unsurpassable. More than that, however, it also allows audiences a rare glimpse inside the furiously creative mind of Jodorowsky, who still, at 84, is a wonderfully mad genius of the moving image. Read full review
88
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe WilliamsMay 8, 2014
With a mad captain at the helm, this documentary version of Jodorowsky’s “Dune” is probably more entertaining than what Hollywood would have done to it, with a clearer message: Our lives are like sands though an hourglass, so dream the impossible dream. Read full review
88
Philadelphia InquirerTirdad DerakhshaniApr 18, 2014
"You have to be like a poet," Jodorowsky says at one point. "Your movie must be just as you think of it. . . . The movie has to be just like I dream it." What an extraordinary dream it could have been. Read full review
88
Boston GlobeTy BurrApr 3, 2014
In retrospect, it’s obvious why the film was never produced: The director was a lunatic. Read full review
88
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsMar 27, 2014
Had this ambitious head trip come to pass, it might've made Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey" look like "Go, Dog. Go!" Read full review
83
The A.V. ClubBen KenigsbergMar 19, 2014
While it’s heartbreaking that the movie never got made (son Brontis Jodorowsky, who would have played Paul Atreides, is particularly poignant imagining his alternate life as a superstar), Jodorowsky’s Dune posits that the raw materials nevertheless left an enduring mark on cinematic sci-fi, providing the basis for famous aspects of "Alien," "Star Wars," and "Contact." Read full review
80
New Orleans Times-PicayuneMike ScottMay 2, 2014
Here is a film that not only entertains, but also educates and -- thanks to Jodo's deep confidence and energetic artistic optimism -- one that also inspires. Read full review
80
Wall Street JournalJoe MorgensternMar 27, 2014
The made movie — i.e. Mr. Pavich's documentary — makes for a great seminar on creativity. Its star is Mr. Jodorowsky, outrageously handsome and dynamic at the age of 84. Read full review
80
New York Magazine (Vulture)Bilge EbiriMar 24, 2014
They’re great stories, and it’s through them that Jodorowsky’s Dune shows us how the greatest movie never made, in its own crazy little way, somehow still came to be. Read full review
80
TimeRichard CorlissMar 21, 2014
The message to take from Jodorowsky’s Dune: movies once had brains and balls, and lost them. Read full review
80
The New York TimesJeannette CatsoulisMar 20, 2014
Cheerfully partial and unapologetically deferential to its subject’s operatic self-promotion, Jodorowsky’s Dune makes you wish that he had scraped together the final $5 million needed, we are told, to realize his dream. Read full review
80
New York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierMar 20, 2014
Given the evidence compiled here by director Frank Pavich, there’s reason to believe Jodorowsky’s “Dune” was more influential for never actually existing. It wound up being inhaled, like some ethereal alien spice, by a generation of moviemakers. Read full review
80
VarietyPeter DebrugeDec 24, 2013
Pavich does an admirable job tracking down surviving parties (except for the suspicious-sounding cast), opting for a humorous rather than indignant tone to the interviews. Read full review
75
Charlotte ObserverLawrence ToppmanApr 24, 2014
Pavich gives the Chilean-born Jodorowski his full say in the documentary, partly in Spanish and partly in expressive if slightly fractured English. Read full review
75
Miami HeraldRene RodriguezApr 24, 2014
Grandly entertaining documentary. Read full review
75
McClatchy-Tribune News ServiceRoger MooreApr 1, 2014
A mesmerizing movie, a history lesson about the pre-blockbuster era in science fiction movies. Read full review
75
RogerEbert.comMatt Zoller SeitzMar 28, 2014
An account of a film that was never made despite all the love that its makers poured into it, yet somehow it's warm and inspirational: a call to arms for dreamers everywhere. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesBill StametsMar 27, 2014
[A] diverting documentary. Read full review
75
NPRIan BuckwalterMar 21, 2014
For those with any interest in cult cinema or just the bizarre behind-the-scenes stories of any film production, Jodorowsky's Dune is a fascinating document of one of the most legendary films ever not made. Read full review
75
Slant MagazineJesse CataldoMar 17, 2014
This is a fanboy movie, one more engaged with the excitement of possibility than that of reality, and whatever the noxious connotations of that form of film appreciation, this particular project does a pretty fantastic job of stirring up enthusiasm. Read full review
74
Film.comJordan HoffmanDec 24, 2013
It never quite elevates itself above something like a really well produced behind-the-scenes featurette on a high end Blu-ray. But if you’ve got that Jodorowsky T-shirt aping the Judas Priest logo, you may as well start lining up now. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterStephen DaltonDec 24, 2013
The tone veers into film-fan geekery in places, but Jodorowsky is such a natural showman and irrepressible egotist that his ancient anecdotes never become tedious. Read full review
63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Geoff PevereApr 3, 2014
At its most heightened state of geek arousal, Frank Pavich’s Jodorowsky’s Dune imagines an alternate pop-cultural universe where an unmade movie changed everything. Read full review
60
The DissolveNoel MurrayMar 19, 2014
The main problem with Jodorowsky’s Dune is that a significant amount of what makes Jodorowsky’s work special gets lost in Pavich’s fairly ordinary approach to the documentary form. Read full review
50
New York PostKyle SmithMar 19, 2014
The doc consists of interviews with the absurdly grandiose Jodorowsky (whose fans include Kanye West) plus acolytes like current director Nicolas Winding Refn and film nerds, all of whom walk us through storyboards and tell us how awesome this “greatest film never made” would have been. Read full review
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