Product: Mad Max (1979)
Rating: 3.0
More a first draft than a real classic
It's not altogether surprising that Mad Max got such short shrift when it came out Stateside with an unfortunate dubbing job to eliminate the `Strine accents so American International could pretend it was an American film (Mel Gibson suffered perhaps a worse indignity with his screen credit moved to last position, just before the lab credit on the trailers). Much of what people remember and love about Max is delivered in the sequel rather than this first outing. Indeed, at times it feels more like a blueprint than a proper movie and Gibson barely registers in the surprisingly little screen time he has - the villains, who all seem to be doing either premature Danny Huston impersonations or somewhat more timely German New Romantic turns make much more of an impression. Not only do huge sections of the film keep him offscreen, but he makes little impact in his underwritten role when he is on. In many ways, this is just a first low-budget draft of Max's world - civilization hasn't entirely crumbled yet and the precious juice is still flowing even if parts are getting hard to find. Still, the car stunts are good, if somewhat thin on the ground, but this is one case where the sequels are definitely better.MGM/UA's special edition offers reasonable extras, but they are limited by the non-involvement of George Miller and Mel Gibson and the unavailability of any archive footage. The making of featurette and audio commentary from crew members are the best of the bunch while the Gibson featurette tends to be too much of a puff piece. Despite being listed as the Australian trailer, the theatrical trailer and the accompanying TV spots are all from the US release. Thankfully the original Australian soundtrack to the feature is included on this disc.