Fury Road - We're on a Road to Nowhere.

Rating: 2/10 (6 December 2019)

Whilst there were a couple of good things about this film, I ultimately found Fury Road very disappointing, and my Suspension of Disbelief was trashed by all the unbelievable garbage this film contains. Tom Hardy wasn't bad as the new Max and Charlize Theron's Furiosa was a strong female character in the tradition of the franchise. I am a fan of both of these actors, but the screenplay was just awful; cheesy, lame dialogue, so bad it was vomit inducing: "Why are you hurting those people?" - "It's the oil stupid." - "Mankind has gone rogue, terrorising itself." The Fury Road prologue was badly written trash compared to the poetic prologue of The Road Warrior. "Do not my friends, become addicted to water, it will take hold of you and you will resent its absence." WTF? Who wrote this moronic tripe? Fury Road broke the cardinal rule of film-making - Show, Don't Tell. Fury Road showed us nothing (except car chases and stunts) and Told us Everything (very badly). Fury Road introduced some interesting concepts and then failed to explore any of them adequately, and subsequently the expositional info dumps were totally unbelievable. A good sequel should expand on the original, and show us something new along with the familiar elements. Apart from the pathetic Granny Biker Gang, Fury Road showed us exactly what we had seen before except it was ten times more over the top. Even the awful Beyond Thunderdome showed us something new.
It was way too over the top and didn't fit the gritty, more realistic tone of the earlier films. It was a comic-book version with embarrassingly bad dialogue and bad acting, (that Bullet-Farmer guy has to be the worst actor I've ever seen). In The Road Warrior it was established that projectile weapons were rare and ammunition even rarer and carefully hoarded, but in Fury Road they fire off thousands of rounds. Fuel was even rarer yet in Fury Road there are enormous amounts of fuel wasted: that idiot with the Guitar/Flamethrower was ridiculous, in the post-apocalypse wasteland fuel would be a resource strictly rationed not shot out of guitars (even though we're TOLD there's a place called "Gas Town" it still doesn't make sense to waste it like that, oil deposits do dry up). As the dude sitting in front of us rightly stated "What a load of bullcrap". EXACTLY.
The biggest WTF? moment in Fury Road was the ludicrous idea that you could carry enough extra fuel on motorbikes to travel for one hundred and sixty days, not to mention the fact that even from the east coast to the west coast of Australia, the trip would only take four or five days tops. After sixteen days riding in a straight line you'd be somewhere in the middle of the ocean. Utter trash.
With The Road Warrior George Miller struck gold and he has been repeating himself ever since, trying and failing to recapture what made the Road Warrior a worldwide hit by plagiarising himself. Fury Road rips off scenes from the first three films:
The Film Going out Of Focus as Max crawls away from the wreckage of the Interceptor: The Road Warrior. Fury Road.
A Thieving Pilot is Redeemed at The End: The Road Warrior. Beyond Thunderdome.
Max Wears a Mis-Matched Pair of Boots - Beyond Thunderdome. Fury Road.
The Wind-up Music Box - The Road Warrior. Fury Road.
Max Pulls Out A Hundred Concealed Guns: Beyond Thunderdome. Fury Road.
Someone Plays a Saxophone Solo: Mad Max. Beyond Thunderdome.
The White Painted Guy: Beyond Thunderdome. Fury Road.
The Feral Kid: The Road Warrior. Beyond Thunderdome.
Granny with a Shotgun: Mad Max. Fury Road.
Max's Shotgun Misfires: The Road Warrior. Fury Road.
People Tied To The Front Of Vehicles: The Road Warrior. Fury Road.
Max Buried In The Sand: Beyond Thunderdome. Fury Road.
The Antagonist Dies in a Head-On Collision with a Truck: Mad Max. The Road Warrior.
The Interceptor is Trashed: The Road Warrior. Fury Road.
Max Gets a Haircut and Kids Collect the Discarded Hair: Beyond Thunderdome. Fury Road.
A Massive Dust Storm: Beyond Thunderdome. Fury Road.
The Good Guys Escape Leaving Max Behind: The Road Warrior. Beyond Thunderdome.
A Character Finds Redemption Inspired By Love: The Road Warrior. Fury Road.
The Road Battle: Fury Road is just a feature length remake of The Road Warrior's climactic road battle.
After reading interviews with George Miller I have realised that he really doesn't have a clue:
"The previous three films exist in no clear chronology, because they were all conceived as different films." WTF? The first three films are in strict chronological order.
1. Mad Max: Civilisation exists, there is Government, Law and Order and infrastructure. The Interceptor is brand new. This film is Dystopian.
2. The Road Warrior: The Interceptor is dirty, dented and it's modified. There's been a nuclear holocaust. Civilisation is gone. The Interceptor is trashed and blown up.
3. Beyond Thunderdome: Max no longer has the Interceptor. He's grown a wicked mullet, has new transport and a small arsenal of weaponry. Primitive forms of trade and civilisation are emerging. We see the nuked ruins of Sydney. Water sellers are selling water contaminated with radiation.
That's clear indication of these films all being in strict chronological order, there's no other way they could fit together. Beyond Thunderdome can't be set before Road Warrior or Mad Max, Mad Max can't take place after Road Warrior or Beyond Thunderdome, Road Warrior can't be set before Mad Max. That's a fact, the logic is indisputable.
George Miller may be able to write and direct cool action sequences (though unlike the first two films, these are heavily powered by Hollywood Action Movie PhysicsTM) but he sucks at writing character and dialogue as Fury Road proved without a doubt. If you are a Mad Max fan and have not yet seen Fury Road, watch The Road Warrior instead, it's fifty times better than this mega-budget, over the top, badly written crud.