Fast-paced, action-packed beautifully atmospheric lackluster story

Rating: 6/10 (24 May 2015)

The movie is good, but I think it suffers from a couple of major problems.
One problem is that the main character is too weak. If there is anyone taking the lead, it is definitely Charlize Theron. Mad Max is completely shadowed by other characters, even secondary ones.
Another problem is the action is dull and repetitive, doing very little to carry the action forward. This is also the case in Fast and Furious, but in this case this is explicit and it is what the audience is expecting. The content of this Mad Max movie (including action that actually moves the story forward) would probably take no more than 30 min. All the rest is "just" show (though a beautiful one!).
The design and scenography are brilliant, no question about it. But I think that for example the design in Zack Snyder's 300 is more coherent and a better contribution to the overall experience. The story in 300 is clearer and simpler, and every element and action scene makes it move forward in a clear way. This is not the case here. Characters in this Mad Max are empty shells, simple stereotypes with little content, mere puppets in a grandiose artsy atmosphere, with no inner life.
Most of the action is completely reactive, with the characters in pure survival mode very rarely demonstrating anything of their inner self and their back story. I am all for not being spoon fed the back story, and against "talking heads" describing their background in lengthy dialogs. But this movie suffers from the opposite problem. Only very rarely did Mad Max suffered from flashes (quite literally) from his previous life, but it felt really completely out of touch with anything.
In the end, I didn't regret watching the movie (specially in the cinema), but it really felt a bit short. At home, I don't think I would recommend, unless you watch in a very large TV.