The circle of death
Don’t get me wrong, it works. It works well. And if, at the beginning, you’re a little annoyed by the voiceover and the « village of the damned » style, that very first chase is just amazing. Breathtaking even. The craziness, the speed, the fury (Fury Road indeed). They call it a reboot, but it looks more like The Road Warrior high on CGI to me.
So yeah, there are some epic moments, and maybe that’s enough. It surely is enough to enjoy the film. But it’s not enough to make it a good film. You have the basic plot – that looks a lot like The Road warrior‘s – ie. transporting a truck from A to B, but that’s where the plot thickens: it’s just a pretext to tell us a far more complex / boring / useless story about redemption (they say the word half a dozen times…). In the first Mad Max, no matter how flawed they were, lay the idea that there will be no more law, no more right or wrong, no more state, and that’s what was great: the nothingness. No ideology. Nothing more than a disenchanted ex-cop cruising the dusty roads of a post nuclear world.
In this last film, everything is bigger. No more minimalism. Here, have this crowd, and take that frenzy, oh and don’t forget your special effects. And as Mad Max loses its core personality, here goes the main story, George Miller foresees a dictatorial future and relies on women to change it. Give me a break, just because you have women in your film doesn’t mean it’s feminism. Here, women are mothers, children, warriors but they would have died without mutic Max. Because in this film, Max is a good guy. Troubled, of course (that old thing with his wife and kid dying, I mean, get over it Max) but he is genuinely a good guy. And here is another problem. Why do you call it Mad Max if the film is about Furiosa and Max is now just a cute sidekick? In The Road Warrior, Max witnesses a rape & murder without even blinking, that’s how you do it in the wasteland.
It’s the little things that give away the mediocrity of the film. Max finally saying his name to a dying Furiosa he learned to like. A warboy looking a girl in the eyes for a second too long before doing something brave. Of course, everybody is brave and turns out to be good, this time.
Anyway, can we talk about the most important thing here? I would love to spend the night with George Miller, he must be into some weird stuff. BDSM much? It’s leather, gag-ball, strap-on, black harness everywhere. And don’t get me started on the old guy with the nipleclips and chain! I admit, I, too, would love to have Tom Hardy as a sex slave. Sure, the Hannibal Lecter / Christ the Redeemer style is pretty hot.
And honestly he should have kept his mask for the entire film because, just like in Beyond the Thunderdome, the problems start when they open their mouths. Sure, the action scenes are mesmerizing but the talking, oh my god, shut up already. It really seems like Miller is getting soft. Pouring in his franchise some Fast & Furious, some 300 and some of those Marvel blockbusters. And even if Tom Hardy has the perfect dead eye of a young Mel Gibson, he is not the road warrior anymore. He carpools.
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