A Road of Redemption

Rating: 9/10 (15 May 2015)

I really want to go back and watch Road Warrior now that I've seen Fury Road. The first Mad Max was a fantastic revenge story that also gave us some of the best low budget action we have ever had. Road Warrior to me fell short of the first and just didn't give me that visceral experience. But I'm definitely willing to give it another shot after seeing the insane Fury Road. Now, you don't necessarily have to see any of the first 3 to understand the world of Mad Max, but you will have a better appreciation for what exactly is going on in this post apocalyptic world. It's cleared up by Tom Hardy in the first few minutes of the movie, which shows flashbacks, or recreations rather, from the events of the first two films. Bottom line is to go see this movie in theaters. It's the best pure action film of the year and of quite some time.
We begin at the Citadel, when presumably the world and it's chaos is controlled by King Immortan Joe. He has 5 wives who were individually selected for breeding and carrying on his blood, who are held hostage at his place. Furiosa, played by Charlize Theron, isn't thrilled and decides to steal all of his wives and bring them to her homeland, the Green Place. While in pursuit, she crosses paths with the once captured Mad Max, and they agree begrudgingly to help each other for their own greater good. What follows is an insane action film that barely takes time to breathe. 90% of the film is supposedly practical effects, which is absolutely mind-blowing. I love Avengers, but half of the film is green screen, and you can pretty much tell when it is. But here, watching the film, I couldn't really tell you what parts were real and what wasn't. And at 70 years old, George Miller did an unbelievable job, especially considering some of the development problems the film had. There are people jumping from vehicle to vehicle, riding their motorcycles on top of huge trucks, hanging onto the bottom of high speed car chases, and almost all of it was real. It gives you an extra layer of excitement while watching the film that you just don't get with CGI fest films.
With that being said, the action never becomes overpowering or distracting. It doesn't necessarily exhaust you, it just thrills you. Especially with Junkie XL's brilliant score playing in the background. Sure, I definitely would have liked to have seen more development from the characters, especially our main villain. Besides having several wives and controlling the water supply, we don't know much about him. Mad Max just gets stuck in the chaos, it's not even really his film. It's really Furiosa's film and wow is she an awesome bada** character or what? Side note: I would love to see some sort of team up between Furiosa and Rita Vrataski from Edge of Tomorrow (AKA Full Metal Bitc*). Charlize Theron strips down her glamorous Hollywood look for the role and gives a terrific performance. I found a lot of her back-story to be really touching and even heartbreaking. As much as it's a story of redemption for her, it's a redemption film for the Mad Max franchise, which will hopefully continue. This can easily be a new set of films with Hardy and the supporting roles, which it's worth mentioning how great and unrecognizable Nicholas Hoult was in the film. This film has so many great action scenes, with characters you root for and even some deeper themes about surviving madness and how you control chaos. Even though I loved the trailers, I was deeply surprised by Mad Max: Fury Road, and I hope to see more of these films.
+Furiosa is an awesome character
+Hardy is as good if not better than Gibson
+Insane action, how did they do it?
+Sets up a new set of films, but honors the ones before
+Unrecognizable Hoult
+Action doesn't get exhausting
+Junkie XL's score
-Character development
9.5/10