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[Ed. note: This piece contains mild spoilers for Dune.]
Early within the runtime of Dune, a curious factor occurs. Duke Leto Atreides (Oscar Isaac) offhandedly muses about how a lot cash it will need to have taken for the Emperor to ship an envoy to his residence planet of Caladan. In response, his retainer Thufir Hawat (Stephen McKinley Henderson) rolls his eyes again of their sockets till solely the whites are exhibiting, and when he rolls them again down, his tattooed lips are in a position to spit out the exact financial price of the entire manufacturing.
Director Denis Villenueve’s Dune has a lot to clarify over the course of its runtime that it by no means fairly particulars what the heck simply occurred, however readers of Dune the guide may have a fairly good concept: Thufir Hawat, and David Dastmalchian’s Piter De Vries, are Mentats, the human computer systems of the world of Dune.
Why does Dune want human computer systems? Don’t they’ve common computer systems?
The lore of Dune is lengthy, and deep and bizarre. Which is to say, tens of 1000’s of years earlier than the occasions of Dune, human society was drastically altered by a seismic struggle towards synthetic intelligence referred to as the Butlerian Jihad. Within the aftermath, humanity swore to by no means create machines that might do the work of human minds ever once more. It was even codified into the galaxy’s dominant faith, “Thou shalt not make a machine within the likeness of a human thoughts.”
So, no, the world of Dune doesn’t have any computer systems — not even pocket calculators. As an alternative, advanced calculations are carried out by individuals referred to as Mentats who’re specifically educated to be, like, actually sensible.
Yep, it seems the one factor holding us from being nearly as good at math as computer systems is the appropriate coaching.
Why do Mentats have lip tattoos?
The Mentat lip stain is one among Dune’s most evocative character visuals, a visible cue all Mentats share due to — that is Dune, in any case — medicine. Mentats habitually drink “the Juice of Sapho,” a form of hyper-coffee that will increase their psychological acuity twice over or extra. Naturally, Sapho is addictive, and ultimately it has the aspect impact of staining a consumer’s lips an apparent purple.
Donald Mowat, head of hair and make-up on Dune, advised Polygon that the “wine-stained lips” of the film’s Mentats had been among the many most troublesome parts to design.
“It’s ridiculous to say,” Mowat mentioned over Zoom. “I spent per week on that. I truthfully misplaced my thoughts for a minute.”
On the advice of a member of his staff, he determined to take a look at the 1984 David Lynch adaptation for inspiration. “I attempted. I performed with the concept of blackberry, the colour of it, wine stains. And I went ‘That simply seems like a child that drank Kool Support.’”
Mentats in Lynch’s Dune additionally had these completely wild eyebrows.
Picture: Common Photos
Mowat was already engaged on designing tattoos for different courses of characters within the film, just like the Fremen and Sardaukar warriors.
“That’s what made me suppose ‘Why does this must be a stain? Why can’t or not it’s a logo within the colour of wine?’ I simply stored eager about blackberries, black currant, darkish. And that’s how that got here to be as that little piece.”
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