Product: Mad Max (1979)
Rating: 4.0
Awesome Post-Apocalyptic Setting!
At this point Mad Max is simply a post apocalyptic classic film. While some people may not enjoy the movie through and through, I don't think that statement is very much contested. Don't get me wrong, it's a fairly old film from today's perspective and its filming style shows that. I think in perspective this movie was pretty on point for what people were thinking about at that time. I mean when you think about it, the Cold War was still going strong and each country was trying to out power the other in terms of military might. So the greatest concern at that time was a nuclear war and "Mad Max's" setting takes place shortly after such a catastrophic event.It's pretty interesting to watch because it gives a pretty interesting "what if" scenario if technology and development stopped in the late 1970's. So you never had the internet boom and the age of the computer in the 90's. It's kind of cool when you try to picture this scenario. The places it's most apparently are in the hospital and the kinds of cars they are using. Despite this downfall it seems like everyone has custom vehicles and most are designed with a sports car in mind. In the hospital scenes it reminds me of the film version of "Johnny Got His Gun" because the hospital areas just seemed too archaic by today's standards.In Mad Max the world is still trying to hold on to the small vestiges of society that it can. Lawlessness is at a whole new level and it seems that the court systems run amok similar to our current ones. Basically the main premise for the film is that Mel Gibson plays a cop named Max who is effectively terrorized by a biker gang indirectly at first, but then very directly as the movie moves on. The gang has this bizarre spiritually violent ethos, where the main member Nightrider was a key messenger of this philosophy... or at least that's how I'm interpreting his role. The police sort of have a hand in this man's death so another member of the gang, Toecutter, comes after them. Nightrider's death is what sparks the turmoil and brings the gang into town to wreak their havoc.It's really kind of a tragic tale when you think of it as a whole, but that's kind of the point. Max is a tragic character that gets pushed to the absolute extreme on every end. However, I think during this film they didn't truly know what direction they wanted to bring Mel's character and I feel that direction was finally found in "The Road Warrior." However, "Mad Max" is still fairly essential in order to get into Max's background and why he is so angry. There is a slight discontinuity between the two films though, because at the end of this one he still has contact with some semblance of civilization and in "Road Warrior" it's all wastelands.While "Mad Max" can seem a bit dry at times because it's mostly cars racing around on highways, it does set the stage for a very influential film (I feel at least) in the future. While authors were setting the stage for post apocalyptic worlds, "Mad Max" set the stage for a lawless and harsh reality, unlike "1984" where the war pushed society to much stricter controls. I think this is the type of movie people should at least see once, at the very least for nostalgic purposes, because it does not have nearly the same re-watch value as the sequel.