Warner Bros has announced that the forthcoming sci-fi/action remake of Dune will be pushed back by three weeks, from 1 October to 22 October.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, the studio wanted to distance the highly anticipated feature from the forthcoming James Bond instalment No Time to Die, opening on 8 October in the US (UK release date is 30 September).
The first in a planned franchise, Dune features a starry cast including Timothée Chalamet, Oscar Isaac, Rebecca Ferguson, Zendaya, Josh Brolin and Javier Bardem.
It was originally scheduled to be released in December 2020, before being pushed back until October 2021 as a result of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.
Late last year, the studio revealed that all of next year’s blockbuster releases, including Dune, would arrive on streaming service HBO Max as well as theatres in the US.
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Director Denis Villeneuve condemned Warner Bros’ decision at the time, writing in Variety, “It is all about the survival of a telecom mammoth, one that is currently bearing an astronomical debt of more than $150 billion.
“Therefore, even though Dune is about cinema and audiences, AT&T is about its own survival on Wall Street. With HBO Max’s launch a failure thus far, AT&T decided to sacrifice Warner Bros’ entire 2021 slate in a desperate attempt to grab the audience’s attention.”
