Dune director Denis Villeneuve loves Star Wars, but not so much that he’d make one of his own. Also, he’s still disappointed by Return of The Jedi.
Filmmaker Denis Villeneuve recently poured his efforts into one epic space fantasy, Dune: Part Two – but don’t expect him to direct a Star Wars movie anytime soon.
The French Canadian director of Sicario, Prisoners and too many other fabulous films to list is an unabashed Star Wars fan, as he made plain in a recent interview on The Town podcast (thanks, Variety – not that you’ll necessarily be reading this).
“I was the target audience,” Villeneuve said of seeing George Lucas’s original sci-fi fairytale in 1977. “I was 10 years old. It went to my brain like a silver bullet. I became obsessed with Star Wars.”
Three years later, the young Villeneuve rushed to his nearest cinema to see The Empire Strikes Back. Widely regarded as the high point of the whole franchise, it certainly didn’t disappoint the future filmmaker.
“I mean, The Empire Strikes Back is the movie that I anticipated the most in my life,” he said. “I saw the movie a billion times onscreen. I was traumatised by The Empire Strikes Back. I adore Star Wars.”
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It was the 1983 trilogy closer, Return Of The Jedi, that left the teenage Villeneuve thoroughly disillusioned. So much so that he briefly considered making a pilgrimage to California, just so he could tell George Lucas, to his face, how disappointed he was. We’re pretty sure this was an episode of South Park.
“The problem is that it all derailed in 1983 with Return Of The Jedi,” Villeneuve explained. “It’s a long story. I was 15 years old, and my best friend and I wanted to take a cab and go to LA and talk to George Lucas – we were so angry! Still today, the Ewoks. It turned out to be a comedy for kids.”
As well as being a disappointment, Return Of The Jedi also, Villeneuve argues, became the point where the Star Wars franchise became ‘codified’ – or too set in its ways to really do much with in terms of storytelling. As such, he says he has no interest in making a sequel or prequel, were Lucasfilm to call him up with an offer.
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Star Wars “became crystalised in its own mythology, very dogmatic, it seemed like a recipe, no more surprises,” after Return Of The Jedi, Villeneuve said. “So I’m not dreaming to do a Star Wars because it feels […] very codified.”
Given that entire villages of writers, directors and artists have poured countless hours into Star Wars movies that Lucasfilm will almost certainly never make, Villeneuve’s reticence is probably for the best. Besides, he still has work to do on Dune: Messiah, which is currently scheduled for release in 2026.
Before and afterwards, some of Hollywood’s most illustrious filmmakers have heaped praise on Dune: Part Two, which came out in March 2024. Steven Spielberg called it “one of the most brilliant science fiction films I’ve ever seen;” Christopher Nolan, fittingly, compared it to The Empire Strikes Back and more recently described it as “remarkable.”
On a filmmakers-reviewing-filmmakers note, we’d be fascinated to see Villeneuve sit down with George Lucas for a polite chat about Ewoks.
