Dune was a very pretty movie–I mean if you find deserts pretty, heh. The performances were great. It was fun to see Timothy Chalamet and Oscar Isaacs playing someone entirely different after just seeing them in other movies. Other actors did compelling jobs. The costumes were cool, if slightly unexplainable. It definitely had that “this is an epic story, hold your breath and strap in” feeling.

BUT

1. I did feel like if you didn’t know a few things about the plot going in, it might have been hard to follow. The movie basically did no world building to start the viewer off–it just jumped right in. I went with someone who’s read the series and she felt this movie only got about halfway through the first book. Also she was able to explain some background stuff that I think the movie really just pretended viewers didn’t need to know. Sure, sure, keep it mysterious.
2. The sound mix was a mess–the background music was crazy loud and the dialogue was so quiet, it was incredibly difficult to hear what people were saying. I don’t know if that was specific to the theater where I saw it, or if that was just generally true of how they put it together, but the mix was off.

Also, assuming sequels are made, this is going to be one of those series that just burns through actors as they already killed off a lot of the most recognizable ones in this first installment.