Review: Mad Max: Fury Road
Where do we even begin with the utter madness that is Mad Max: Fury Road?
It's unbelievably bold, loud, and ludicrous, for starters. There's no room to breathe or understand anything, for the film doesn't bother stopping to do so, electing instead to sweep viewers away immediately into a montage that presents a gnarly world involving tattoos, pale bodied men, tyrannical rulers, destitute poor, and most importantly, a dizzying array of tricked-up vehicles that would put the cars in Fast & Furious to serious shame.
And these bad boys are the real stars. With dialogue cut to a minimum - even the titular Max (Tom Hardy) conveys more with grunts and gestures - viewers are clearly intended to piece the story together from the ensuing vehicular chaos that happens after a group of women, led by Imperator Furiosa (Charlize Theron) decides to run away from the aforementioned tyrannical ruler, King Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-Byrne).
If it all sounds a bit ridiculous and you're expecting some sort of backstory, there isn't. Director George Miller (aged 70, bless him) is about the here and now. As its title might suggest, Fury Road is, at its heart, about vehicles chasing other vehicles. But to sum it up so simply would be a gross injustice. Strangeness reigns all around and the action is slickly raucous.
As the tortured, flawed Max, Tom Hardy is perfect. One recalls his previous role as the villainous Bane in The Dark Knight Rises; amusingly, it is his nemesis Immortan Joe that sports a breathing mask this time. But as Furiosa, Theron is the real show stealer. Leading a bevy of immaculately beautiful women, she channels the sort of ferocious resolve hardly seen in female characters these days, much less in an action heavy, masculine film like Fury Road.
Truth be told, several signs point to a film that seems nearly impossible to succeed as a fantasy epic of sorts: an aging director whose previous three films featured pigs and penguins (Babe: Pig in the City, Happy Feet, and Happy Feet 2), and wildly outlandish characters featuring zero backstories make good examples. But Miller doesn't follow the script, and that makes Fury Road so much more enjoyable. It's blockbuster material, yet demented in every sense of the word. As a summer movie, one suspects that no other film will come close in the adrenaline stakes, so watch, watch, watch. - Thompson Wong
