It finally happened

Rating: 10/10 (1 January 2016)

OK. here we go again. Reviewing a movie to which I was a bit too close.
Never have I seen a movie that so polarizes the viewer. You will either love or hate this flick.
Lets set the scene. This movie was largely dreamed up in the late 1990's,when George was producing the Babe sequel in Sydney. Working alongside him on the pleasant "Babe Pig in the City" were the other two notables that laid the foundation of Fury Road: Production Designer Colin Gibson and (while some may argue with me on this) Chief Mechanic (and partner in crime) Mark Mc Kinley.
By the early '00s the location had changed to Namibia (which put it out of my reach) and production had actually commenced over there. Then came ....9/11.
The Mad Max project was immediately mothballed. It was felt that such a film would not be critically accepted so close to such a cataclysmic loss in the US. It took another 10 years before Fury Road would finally rise to the top of the pond again.
As much as you read MM:FR as George's film it was always Gibson's baby. Colin had done so much for George in the past. He stuck it out with Miller when everyone else had long lost patience and left. MM:FR was George's way of finally letting his kids into the lolly shop.
MM:FR has Gibson and McKinley written all over it. So much so that some times I wonder if George even had anything to do with the film at all. That could be why the film polarizes viewers so easily.
MM:FR is what happens when the crew get to make the film THEY want to make while the director sleeps it off somewhere. And it stands as testimony to that and that alone. From the earliest days of Gibson's work on "Reckless Kelly" and "Priscilla, Queen of the Desert", MM:FR is the culmination of all those pub discussions that have happened since. The 'Wouldn't it be cool if we could do this..." moments.
And now they have. In Mad Max, Fury Road.
It's perhaps no coincidence that the abbreviation MM:FR is so similar to another one of Gibson's early films, MM:PR ("Mighty Morphin Power Rangers"). Viewers of one are likely to like the other. They both represent what happens in film making when you pull out all the stops, let things freewheel, and just allow everyone to go mad..
When it comes to Mad Max Fury Road my advice is to go into the cinema with the same attitude that the film makers had when they made it.
"Go hard or go home"!!
P.S. I met and first worked with Colin Gibson on the aforementioned 1995 vintage Power Rangers movie (which at the time was the film that I WANTED TO MAKE). Now Colin you finally got to make the film that YOU WANTED TO MAKE.
Well done mate.We can all retire now.
Paul M