In this post apocalyptic diseased-riddeled world, a former cop (Tom Hardy) turned loner is captured by a sadistic gang lead by Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-Byrne), who controls one of the few remaining clean water supplies. Max gets entangled with Furiosa (Charlize Theron), Immortan Joe’s greatest warrior who turns against him in a quest to escape the barren desert and find her childhood homeland.
Mad Max: Fury Road reminds us that film is a visual medium. It’s not meant to have long diatribes where everything is over explained and bloated. A quick prologue to set up the world, and we’re off and running with Max Rockatansky, the Road Warrior.
To get a movie like this after watching the overly stuffed/CG fest that was Avengers: Age of Ultron was a refreshing glass of water, something the characters in this film wanted desperately. It had simple goals, and complex characters that showed us who they were with a simple blink of an eye. Director George Miller has delivered a masterpiece. Gut-wrenching. Tragic. Fierce. Unapologetic. Insane. This is a movie that must be seen on the big screen. I could have stayed in the theater another hour, and that’s one of the highest compliments I could ever give a film. There’s a lot to digest, but we’ll start with the man himself, Mad Max.
In seeing how Max was characterized in this film, the casting of Tom Hardy was a slam dunk. Not only does he wear a big hunk of metal around his mouth (ala Bane in The Dark Knight Rises), but so much of his acting is in the face. This character maybe speaks ten times throughout the movie, but it doesn’t matter. You get everything you need to know about Max in the first five seconds. They essentially use the same tragic back story from the other films, but in no way do you need to see them. If I hadn’t seen those movies, I’d still grasp everything about the character. We get a one second flashback, a quick monologue, and that’s it. Tom Hardy and George Miller do the rest. You feel for this guy, and he’s got a clear character arc. It’s such tight filmmaking, it makes me want to spike my popcorn. Tom Hardy is the man.
As awesome as Hardy’s performance was though, the show stealer was Charlize Theron as Furiosa. Nobody else could have played this role. Nobody. You keep hearing about not having enough strong female characters in film, well here she is. And just like Hardy, it’s all in the facial expressions. This is a fierce character who’s also emotionally wrenching. There’s a gripping fight scene in which Furiosa punches Max’s metal mask with her bare hand without even flinching. That’s the character in a nut shell. If this came out at the end of the year, Theron would get Oscar consideration.
The other actors are no slouches either. I enjoyed Nicholas Holt’s performance as Nux because his character represented how disfigured humanity has become. We see other sad characters who look unhealthy and disfigured, but it’s Nux we follow closely as a misguided henchman by no fault of his own. He also gets a love story, and this is where other filmmakers need to take note. He and Capable (Riley Keough) barely get screen time, but it’s so well done, you completely buy into their romance more then you would in most films.
The villain is also excellent. Immortan Joe is one evil son of a bitch, but the first time we see him is his backside, which is so horribly disfigured that you still feel a level of sympathy for him. Visually he looks fantastic, as he wears this terrifying mask, and what looks like a plastic war uniform that came out of a carbon freezing chamber.
One of the performances that surprised me was Rosie Huntington-Whiteley of Transformers: Dark of the Moon fame. She plays one of “the brides,” a group of women who play an integral part to the plot. She’s vulnerable, but also tough as nails. Her story is also the most heartbreaking. They do something with her character that I cannot believe they got away with, and it’s one of the reasons why this film is so unapologetic. There’s plenty of other ancillary characters you don’t get to know as much, but what little screen time they have, the film does a great job of getting you to care about them.
I’ve spent a lot of time gushing over the characters, but the real star of this film is the action. Aside from Terminator 2, I can’t think of a movie that has better pure action than this one. Yes, there’s CG, but a lot of it is practical and pure stunt work. The action is jam packed with crazy shit left and right. You got guys swinging off giant sticks, death cars rolling all over the place, flame throwing guitars, rocks and desert storms flying in all directions, machine guns, holy matza ball soup! So much of this could have been goofy, but it just works. What amazed me most is how coherent and well edited it was. There’s no bull shit shaky cam. It isn’t Quentin Tarantino blood splattered cartoon violence. It’s just pure, unbridled bad ass greatness on screen. This is how you do action!
The cinematography is also gorgeous. I raved about Noah’s visuals last year, but this beats it. There’s one moment where Immortan Joe is giving a speech on top of a mountain, and the overlooking shot is a sight to behold. The nighttime effects are also incredible with this blue pallet. Stunning work.
Okay, now onto the criticisms. The sound quality was a little shotty at times. Not so much with the action, but some of the dialogue was hard to understand, especially with Immortan Joe. I get he’s wearing a mask, but there could have been more of an effort to make him understandable. There’s also a point where Furiosa, Max, and their band of compatriots meet up with a group of elder female fighters, and while the characters are great, this slowed the movie down just a bit. Some of these scenes could have been cut.
This is just a great damn time at the movies. George Miller manages to infuse incredible characters and an emotionally gut-wrenching story into a two hour action scene. The score by Junkie XL is also top notch. Aside from everything else, this movie tells a complete story beginning to end, but if you want a sequel, it’s certainly there waiting for you. Mad Max kicks ass. The end.
Rating: 9 out of 10 (OMG)
Took my 15 old nephew to see it & he loved it too! I’ve been waiting for this movie since i was 14, bring on the sequels George!!