Review: Mad Max: Fury Road
The best action film of this millennium. Full stop. The long-awaited fourth installment of the Mad Max franchise, Fury Road is a shot of amped-up adrenaline from mastermind George Miller. Mastermind may be a hubristic term for a seventy-year-old Australian with 15 credits under his belt, but it seems an understatement for this underrated auteur whose vision of a post-apocalyptic road warrior is as indelible now as it was thirty-five years ago when Mad Max first seared the screens.
Miller's reimagining is lean in narrative, extravagant in action, purposeful in intent, and laserlike in focus. That it also happens to be a feminist subversion of the genre is icing on a very multi-layered cake. Miller wastes no time plunging the audience into the action. Our Mad Max (Tom Hardy), still plagued with guilt over being unable to save his family, is captured by a gang of War Boys and imprisoned in the Citadel. The Citadel is ruled by Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-Byrne, Toecutter in the original Mad Max), a brutal despot with an untamed lion's mane, heavily painted face, a toothsome mask connected to a breathing apparatus, and translucent armour over his boil-marked flesh. He controls the water and, by extension, the starved population who live in fear of Joe and his blindly devoted War Boys, violent punk soldiers with shaved heads, torsos painted white, and an appetite for destruction.
Mad Max: Fury Road is not about how our hero untangles himself from an inescapable situation, but rather how he comes to cross paths with the film's true protagonist, Imperator Furiosa (Charlize Theron). Tasked with filling up the fuel reserves at Gastown, the raccoon-eyed, one-armed warrior absconds with Immortan Joe's prize breeders, five beautiful young women (Zoë Kravitz, Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, Riley Keough, Abbey Lee, and Courtney Eaton) held captive and forced to bear his children. When Immortan Joe learns of her betrayal, he amasses his soldiers and goes after Furiosa.
One of his soldiers, Nux (Nicholas Hoult), eager to impress his leader, insists on going despite his low levels. No matter, Max will serve as his own personal blood bank. Thus Max is strapped to the front of Nux's vehicle; a human grille ornament, his face encased in a muzzle, and a metal chain keeping him attached to Nux. How he manages to survive the brutal, nail-biting, pulse-pounding chase that ensues is breathtaking to watch. Yet survive Max does, entering into an uneasy alliance with Furiosa as they attempt to escape the various war parties hot on their heels.
The action sequences are beyond the extremes of imagination. It's a detonation of anarchy, all these supercharged vehicles that crash and collide into one another, war boys hanging off the sides like streamers, wailing like banshees, and unleashing everything at their disposal. Just when you think the mayhem has peaked, Miller deploys cars that look like overgrown porcupines with spikes shredding through metal and flesh, motorcyclists leaping through the air to drop grenades, war boys on poles to lower them onto and into Furiosa's rig, and did I mention the awe-inspiring sandstorm that engulfs all who come in its way? Unhinged and unbound, it is as if the film is in the midst of some relentless, almost libidinal feeding frenzy. Oh what a lovely day indeed.
Theron and Hardy deliver raw, nuanced, and soulful portrayals. She is as formidable a figure as any of her male counterparts, and the grudging but gradual respect Furiosa and Max develop for one another is one of the film's best components. In fact, for all the film's nihilism and savagery, Miller weaves in a tenderness that doesn't feel mawkish or manipulative.
The true stars of the film, however, are the stuntmen who engage in some of the most jaw-dropping and outrageously choreographed chaos ever put on film. Miller stays true to the DIY spirit of the first three films, with the CGI kept at a minimum. That genuine danger only enhances this highly visceral, endlessly exhilarating, and flat out brilliant masterpiece.
Mad Max: Fury Road
Directed by: George Miller
Written by: George Miller, Brendan McCarthy, Nico Lathouris
Starring: Tom Hardy, Charlize Theron, Nicholas Hoult, Zoë Kravitz, Rosie Huntington-Whitely, Hugh Keays-Byrne, Riley Keough, Abbey Lee, Courtney Eaton, Nathan Jones, Megan Gale
