The dinner scene has been mentioned a few times now. Can you break that down for us non-book readers?
there is a dinner that Leto has once he arrives on arrakis- he invites all the movers and shakers for the city of arrakeen the city which everyone lives thats built up around the fact that the outworlders are there and spice is transported off-world. now this dinner is for these people to figure out who Leto is - Is he going to squeeze the planet for spice like the Harkonnen did? Does he give a damn about the natives? Is he going to change to be more like Arrakis? or try to change Arrakis to be more like him? Who's in? Who's out? you begin not just to understand how different Leto is but also how different even PAUL is from his father AND you also see the distrust that could exist even among family .
since coming to arrakis there is a population who have left the fremen and traditional desert life - and live in the city they may hold some of the traditions of the fremen but they are essentially dependent on how the city functions - they have lost their knowledge of the abilities to actually live in the desert let alone the DEEP desert. There is fukked up poverty in Arrakeen. why? the one thing that hasnt changed is peoples dependence on water- everything revolves around water and in the city there is a whole economy and economic ecology that is built up around water since this population of people have lost the ability to live the Fremen-way over the centuries and millennia that spice has been mined on Arrakis since out worlders have been there.
for example in the book - when people arrive at the dinner , the guests use these towels to wash their hands and flick water on the floor or toss the towels to the side - and instantly there is someone there to dab up the water or snatch up the towel - they wipe the condensation thats on the side of the cold glass of drinks so that its not damp - some servant literally sucks the moisture from a towel. they pour the used water from the basins and that they squeeze out of the used towels into containers which is then used to be "sold" on the streets. this is all part of the process of the "water custom" and there are people that make their living off of the outworlders excesses in using water- there is a man Bewt something that is the most successful "water seller" at making his living off of reselling the "used" water - this guy did business with the Harkonnens ( but was never controlled by them) and he shows his displeasure at the Duke, when Leto advises Bewt to diversify his business, as he plans to make water a less scarce commodity when both he and Paul are horrified at the level of poverty and savage usery that occurs around the people getting enough water. The Harkonnens used the lack of peoples ability to get water as a means of control and just cruel entertainment.
as mentioned earlier about mistrust of family - there is a whole subplot of a spy in the House Atreides ( which there is - its Yueh ) and Jessica and Thufir are trying to figure out who the Harkonnen agent is, having both ruled out who it really wasnt, and are using their commentary about Duncan (which neither truly believe is the agent) to probe each other, because that's the person each individual thinks is the most likely candidate for betrayal. Thufit doesnt trust Jessica at all ( because she is BG - there was an exchange with Jessica and Hawat where she shows him how powerful she is by controlling him when she learns he suspected her as the traitor.) and jessica know Thufir doesnt like her but she is all caught up in her BG way - shes suspects everyone except for .... Yueh. He is so wracked with grief not just about his wifes capture and torture at the hands of the Harkonnens but also the guilt about his betrayal. What everyone thinks is he is depressed about his wife being "killed". there is a particular exchange between Jessica and Yueh where he is about to confess his betrayal to her but she mistakes his emotional turmoil for the grief about his lost wife.
So the dinner sets the stage where everyone has their own agenda and can't be trusted, Almost all of this is allusion is to show you the Byzantine nature of Imperial politics at all levels in question... and to help show why Paul can both play the game, and flatly refuses to.
There is a maxim in film making "show it dont tell it " its to stop the mechanism of "exposition" - exposition is where characters show or explain some fact they want you as the observer to consider - Villnueve has said he doesnt like a lot of dialogue- and if he could make a movie with little to none he would. BUt for something like Dune there is a LOT of internal dialogue with the characters especially in this scene - and the actual exchange between characters is vague and open ended - again to show the lack of trust and ulterior motivations of all people. Someone who is very skilled as a writer could pull it off i think - like a David Mamet - but like i said - the director doesnt like a lot of deep dialogue and more than likely thats because the audiences for movies and TV are used to very simple narrative.... there cant be a lot of allegory or metaphor in speech/dialogue.
this is also one of the reasons the Baron just kind of comes off as one dimensional - someone like him ALWAYS has dual, triple even quadruple meaning to what he says...which makes him so powerful and also so fukkin evil.
