HERO’S DARK FACE IN VILLENEUVE’S DUNE: PART 1 (2021)

Abstract

Heroes, one of the most important building blocks of storytelling, have existed since ancient times and have been in variable relationships with society. These relationships, which change in every age, have paved the way for questioning and learning who the hero is and what heroism is. Since the literature on heroic narratives has a wide interdisciplinary field of study, it is possible to reduce the field of study to fictional heroic narratives. In this field, heroic narratives, which are often analysed in psychological and cultural contexts, form a coherent literature by offering similar formulas. In this field, it is a theoretical field of study that often deals with the positive aspects of the hero and ignores the dark, undesirable aspects. In this study, the protagonist in the film Dune: Part One (2021), directed and co-written by Denis Villeneuve, the protagonist of the film Paul Atreides was tried to be understood in which situations the protagonist moves to the dark side by referring to the fictional hero narrative literature. The journey of Paul Atreides, the protagonist of the film, parallel to the archetypal hero was determined and at which points he started to turn into a dark hero was examined by interpretive content analysis. Paul's story feeds on traditional heroic myths, but questions these myths. With this questioning, patterns belonging to dark heroic narratives were tried to be revealed.