Mastermind?

Rating: 10/10 (2 June 2015)

Having seen the trailers that described George Miller as a "mastermind" (he, the same director as Happy Feet), I was a little sceptical to say the least. And this film had been so long in the making, beset by so many production problems, it made you wonder what on earth was going on. Worryingly endless re-edits left fans thinking whether, at best ,they could come up with something worthy of all the hype and anticipation or at worst if the whole project was to be doomed. Don't know. And don't care. Because in the end Fury Road has turned out to be, for me at least (a big fan of the original and its first sequel, not so much Thunderdome) one of the greatest action films I have seen in 10 years. Forget any unfair comparisons with Michael Bay's formulaic churn and the like, this 'mastermind' has - and I'm not saying this lightly - completely and utterly re-written the rule book on big screen action and sheer crazy spectacle. I was aghast, thrilled and ultimately exhausted by the end of this film. Some of the set pieces, coming across like a strange mix of classic Max, a French circus, Duel and the Air Cavalry attack from Apocalypse Now, were astounding. But knowing that all were crafted without the help of CGI, something you can really 'feel' across this raw untarnished vision - left me even more bewildered with delight. True, Tom Hardy's Max isn't central to the piece in terms of dialogue and probably actual minutes on screen - I reckon Miller has, quite rightly, let the Max 'world' take centre stage. There's so much to see; new bizarrely wonderful things combined with clever evocative icons and nods to the past trilogy, that to have the-always-bloody-brilliant-Hardy dominate might have overshadowed our re-introduction (sequels? yes please now!) to this Miller universe. In any case, what Max does have to say or has to do is so flipping cool, its all a case of very well written less is more. Ultimately this is a film that deserves to be watched again and again - big screen, very loud. There's only a small band of directors who make films that I can watch again, again and again, and yes I would call the likes of Tarantino and Scorcese masterminds. I think George Miller is one of them too now.