'Too big to fail'

Rating: 6/10 (17 May 2015)

Written and directed by George Miller, this is his fourth Mad Max film to date. His portfolio is notably diverse and also includes the horror/comedy The witches of Eastwick and the Oscar winning animation gem Happy Feet. To date, Mad Max is also Miller's most audacious and vivid attempt to truly impress and dazzle the audience, in a much less cuter way then Happy Feet. Unfortunately this is the one and only note that Miller succeeds in.
Mad Max is beautiful, stylish and vivid. The premise of the storyline of Mad Max movies in it's nature has always been fascinating, a dystopian future dominated by motorcycle gangs, violent heroes, villains and survival. As such this also might be the biggest thing that's wrong with Mad Max, it's too ambitious, there is too much happening and thus too much time is spent on showing and depicting the scenery, the characters, leaving little room for actual dialogues and an interesting storytelling. The movie is essentially one, big, 2-hour long, chaotic chase - no wonder Max is a man of few words.
The vast majority of the scenes are very fast paced and short, switching from one angle to another in split seconds, making it hard to concentrate or capture the full creativity of the scenery. There are however a few scenes with very unusual camera angles which greatly add to the dynamic of the movie. The premise of a huge long chase also makes it hard to focus on someone for a long time. The colors are amazing, vivid and contrasting, which is very enjoyable to the eye, the same way the works of Frank Miller are. The golden-yellow desert, matched with dark biker hybrid cars, motorcycles and insane gang-members is definitely pleasing and fun, but only for about thirty minutes. After the initial 'wow' moment passes and one adjusts to the scenery, Hardy's brutality and Theron's new hairstyle, one should quickly realize that Mad Max has nothing more to offer.
The storyline and the dialogues are too dull to compensate for the amazing special effects, background and characters. I was personally disappointed, expecting more of a 'Sin City' then a '300'.