Long live the fighters!’’ With this phrase, Paul Atreides, the hero of Dune 2, encourages the fighters of the Fremen tribe from the planet Arrakis against the Harkonnens who control this desert planet, rich and the only source in the universe of the spice.

This scene was released several months ago in the second trailer of the film by Canadian director Denis Villeneuve, which was released at the beginning of this month and achieved total revenues exceeding 500 million US dollars.

The hero said it in the Fremen language, Chakobsa. This phrase is nothing but a quotation of one of the slogans chanted by the Algerian people in the early days of their country's independence in 1962.

In the 1965 science fiction novel "Dune," which Denis Villeneuve adapted for cinema, the American author Frank Herbert uses the phrase "Long live the martyrs."

It is an inaccurate expression, as the Algerians used to chant instead the phrase "Long live Algeria."

But the use of this phrase shows the influence of the liberation movements of the southern peoples and the cultures of the Middle East and North Africa in general on the author in writing his novel and on its later cinematic adaptation.

For example, the name of the people of the planet Arrakis, the Fremen (close to "free men" in English), is nothing but a translation of the word "Amazigh" (free men) which is used by the indigenous peoples of the Maghreb to refer to themselves.

The spice demanded on Arrakis symbolizes oil, which is the source of conflicts and wars in the Middle East as it is in the world of Dune.

As for the tattoos on the faces of the women of Bani Ghisrit, a group of women who enjoy great religious and political influence in the empire, they remind one of the tattoos of Amazigh women in North Africa.

The Fremen language, Chakobsa, invented by Frank Herbert, borrows several words from Arabic with slight modifications. The author added a glossary at the end of each volume of his six-volume series for the benefit of readers.

The writer used the word "Fedaykin" as a name for the Fremen fighters. It is a metaphor from the Arabic word "Fedayeen," plural of Fedai.

The Fremen believe in the "Lisan al-Ghaib" or the Mahdi who will lead them to paradise. This is a direct reference to one of the Islamic beliefs about the coming of the Mahdi who will save humanity at the end of times.

The name "Shai-Hulud" is given to the giant sandworms, among the examples taken from Frank Herbert's futuristic epic which made its way into Denis Villeneuve's film bleaching.

But some critics reproached Denis Villeneuve for "whitening" the story by removing some words used in the novel from the film.

In The New Yorker magazine, Manveer Singh, assistant professor of anthropology at the University of California at Davis, criticized artificial language creator David J. Peterson, who participated in the film, for removing many words inspired by Arabic in the Fremen language.

Peterson justifies this choice by the matter of the credibility of the language used in the film. On the social network Reddit, he wrote that "The time depth of the 'Dune' novel makes it impossible to know how much Arabic would still be known by then."

Frank Herbert used the word jihad in his novel to talk about the war Paul Atreides wages with the Fremen against the Harkonnens.

For Manveer Singh, "Herbert saw jihad as an embodiment of religious passion – a socially transformative and perhaps liberating force, but also a dangerous one."

The film avoids this word and instead uses the phrase "holy war" to distance itself from any reference to Islamic extremism and terrorism as seen by the American public in the Arab world.

The movie Dune: Part Two was released on February 29 in the Arab world. It remained screened for only one week, whether in Dubai, Doha, Beirut, or Riyadh.

According to the marketing strategy, it will be re-screened at the end of Ramadan, on April 11 upcoming, and cinemas are usually empty during this month. The audience returns for Eid al-Fitr.

Producers prefer to release their films at this time, similar to film releases during the holiday seasons in other parts of the world.

Denis Villeneuve and some members of the film crew participated in the premiere of Dune 2 in the Middle East, which was held on February 18 in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.

This choice is not by chance. The film was shot in the Liwa desert in Abu Dhabi, known for its sand dunes, a natural environment for depicting the planet Arrakis.

According to Abu Dhabi authorities, just under 20 shooting locations were used "during the winter of 2022, employing a team of 300 local staff, 250 international staff, and 500 additional workers during 27 days of filming."

A part of the film was shot in Jordan, especially in the Wadi Rum area known for its canyons or Wadi Araba.

After the wave of premieres for his film, Denis Villeneuve confirmed last week on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation waves that his film "now runs on its own. I no longer have control over how people receive it."

Since the film's release, media in Arab countries have paid attention to the cinematic artistry of the film, but it has not received significant critical reviews.

Last Wednesday, film critic Alya Talat wrote on the Al Jazeera website that the film "Dune 2" is "an epic vision of a novel that reproduces white male supremacy," and when Paul Atreides allies with the Fremen people to fight the Harkonnens who exploit the spice of the planet Arrakis for the empire, the critic sees that as "white colonialism in Africa or Asia or Latin America."

She considered that Paul Atreides not being one of the Fremen is a continuation of the idea that "the inferior peoples must submit to the white man."