8.5/10

Rating: 8/10 (16 May 2015)

I will say up front that I am not the biggest fan of the Mad Max Trilogy. I didn't grow up with it and saw it way too late in the game for me to fully appreciate it. I see what it did for it's time, but I can't really say I enjoyed it that much watching it. Yet, I could not be happier to have seen Mad Max: Fury Road opening day, in all of it's glory.
It's really hard to start pin-pointing the positives of such a fluently put together film. It plays with such a fast pace you aren't giving time to catch your breath and that is what made it absolutely stunning. There are a couple, maybe three moments of character talk, but they are brief and stitch together a narrative that uses action to it's advantage: the film molds storytelling and action seamlessly and that is why every single frame works so well and had me on the edge of my seat. That is the difference between great and good action films, you don't fell you are watching action, you feel as if you are watching the story unfold, you there with the characters rooting for them and the fact that the action is the medium through which you experience it makes it all the more riveting. There is really no two ways around describing the spectacle Miller pulls off here. It is modern action at it's very, most extreme best. There are no fast cuts, there is no shaky cam it is all there for us to witness alongside the beauty of the cinematography, the mouth dropping set pieces and obviously the George Miller post-apocalyptic weirdness that is back and better than ever; if you thought the first three movies were weird just watch this and forget the other three. It also manages to pull off some surprising dramatic storyline which has many different aspects to enjoy and gives a very, very big emotional punch at the end. This is thanks to an all around great cast with two central performances that are some of the best acting of the year across the board. Tom Hardy by now doesn't even need for me to talk about him, I was a fan of his before people even knew who he was and he once again proves his talent here with some fantastic non-dialogue acting. He really proves he is simply a star and one one the greatest actor of our times. Yet, I think that the better performance and actually the best thing of the whole movie is Charlize Theron. This is Oscar-worthy work in my opinion. Every time she is on screen she owns that, this isn't just some throwaway side role, this is some stunning acting that elevated the film to another level. She sets the screen on fire from the first time she appears on frame and throughout the whole duration of the film she adds subtext to her character with very little quips that I absolutely loved!
There isn't a negative that can be pointed out. There isn't a gawping hole than detracted from the experience. The film satisfies every single thing it wants to do and does it with absolute excellence. I will even say that this film deserves both Oscar nominations for best picture and director. The reason it simply doesn't rank higher for me is the fact that as much as I wanted it, I didn't have the experience I was expecting. Now granted, my idea may very well change, but what I'm saying is that there is nothing that made me jump out of my seat or make me physically engaged. That is in no way a negative as I said, it is just what I search for with higher ranking movies and it simply (and unfortunately) did not to that for me, it didn't reach that level of absolute, mouth-on-the-floor, sweating experience. This may be due to the fact that it isn't doing anything revolutionary with the action medium. There are some very original ideas, but there isn't nothing that hasn't been seen or exceeded before. It is doing action at the very best excellence someone could ask for, but it didn't reach for anything more and it didn't give me that chilling, physically engaged experience that I crave for when watching masterpieces. Moreover, there are very little things dispersed around the film that keep it from being the masterpiece it could have been. For example, the storytelling is great, it simply lacks that edge that could have elevated everything around it.
Yet, that is really enough. I don't want to give the sensation that I still didn't have an amazing, riveting and exciting time. I look forward to checking out this one again and suggest for everybody to see this film. Go watch real action and not the fast cutting crap we are generally served.