Dune’s Impressive Sweep, Best Actor & Actress At This Year’s Oscars

Jazz Macpherson
Marketing Coordinator

Dune Takes Home More Awards Than Any Other Film

Warner Bros.’ Dune absolutely dominated at the 94th Academy Awards, winning in several categories. The feature adaptation of Frank Herbert’s science fiction novel, is centred around the son of a noble family who is endowed with the responsibility to protect the most valuable, vital element and asset in the galaxy.  The impressive list of Oscars scored by Dune include the following:

Best Cinematography

Aussie cinematographer Greig Fraser won his first Oscar. His other credits include Zero Dark Thirty and Lion. Fraser’s win marks the 7th Australian to win the best cinematography award.

Dune was nominated alongside Nightmare Alley, The Tragedy of Macbeth, West Side Story and The Power of the Dog.

Best Visual Effects

DNEG, a leading technology-enabled visual effects (VFX) and animation studio, earned the Academy Award for their team’s work on Dune. The award marks DNEG’s seventh Oscar for ‘Best Visual Effects’. It is also the second time their teams have received an Oscar for a collaboration with Denis Villeneuve, after their Best Visual Effects Acadamy Award in 2018 for Blade Runner 2049.

Best Original Score

Legendary composer Hans Zimmer earned his second Oscar. He won his first 27 years ago for best original score in The Lion King.

Composing the music for Dune fulfilled one of Zimmer’s long-held ambitions. He read the novel by Frank Herbert when he was 18, and had often imagined how the music of Arrakis would sound.

Zimmer spent over a year experimenting with women’s voices; whispers, chants and screams, in order to create the elaborate soundscape of the film.

Best Sound

Dune’s 5 sound specialists - Green, Mark Mangini, Mac Ruth, Doug Hemphill, Ron Bartlett and Mac Ruth - have received a total of 25 Oscar nominations between them. Hemphill won a statuette for his sound editing work in 1993 for The Last of the Mohicans, and Mangini won for his work on Mad Max: Fury Road in 2016.

Other nominees for the award included No Time to Die, West Side Story, Belfast and The Power of the Dog.

Best Production Design

Patrice Vermette earned his first Oscar for best production design in Dune. The film came out ahead of its other nominees, including Nightmare Alley, The Power of the Dog, The Tragedy of Macbeth and West Side Story.

Best Film Editing

Joe Walker took out the award for best film editing in Dune, against the other nominees of Don’t Look Up, King Richard, The Power of the Dog and Tick, Tick…Boom!.

Best Actress In A Lead Role

Jessica Chastain won the Award for ‘Best Actress in a Lead Role’ in The Eyes of Tammy Faye.

Chastain was up against Olivia Colman in The Lost Daughter, Penelope Cruz in Parallel Mothers, Nicole Kidman in Being the Ricardos and Kristen Stewart in Spencer. 

The film charted the real-life story of evangelical power couple Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker, and their rise and fall. Chastain portrayed the preaching wife of Bakker, a Christian televangelist.

Best Actor In A Lead Role

Will Smith won the award for ‘Best Actor in a Lead Role’ for his performance in King Richard. 

Will Smith was up against Benedict Cumberbatch in 'The Power of Dog', Javier Bardem in 'Being the Ricardos', Andrew Garfield in 'Tick, Tick ... Boom!', and Denzel Washington in 'The Tragedy of Macbeth'. 

Smith played Richard Williams, the determined father who raised tennis champions Venus and Serena Williams. The Oscar marks his first Academy Award.