Let me begin this review by saying that you do not need to watch any of the older films to view this movie. If you did see the originals, then you know what you are getting into. If you haven’t seen the classics, then you need to know that this is a crazy, insane, and to be a bit redundant on my part, wild movie. I actually forgot to eat my popcorn in some of the scenes even though my jaw was dropped wide open, literally.
The first thing I noticed was the director didn’t really use shaky cams. You knew what was happening in every moment of the film. Every action sequence was shot so beautifully and cleanly, you can pause the movie in any moment and probably study the composition. It’s a true testament to George Miller in creating a visually incredible world, but also, expanding on something he has created over 30 years ago.
Even though I absolutely loved the action scenes of this movie, I won’t be writing too much about it. They look amazing, and they weren’t mindless, they were mindful. I never got the feeling that the director had these set pieces to just show off the budget. These action scenes wouldn’t be as tense and exciting though, if it weren’t for these characters I was invested in.
Although this is a Mad Max movie, Charlize Theron’s character, Furiosa, almost feels like the real main character. Max is a man of few words, and Tom Hardy does such a great job portraying a man who was hardened by his past and is a loner. To me, Furiosa is one of the best characters in the last 10 years of movies. Theron was able to show that Furiosa went through a hellish life, not through exposition, but by her actions and in the manner she spoke. I wanted to know so much more about the character, but I hope they never make a prequel. It’s a conflicting feeling I know.
As I mentioned before, the plot is pretty straightforward, but there’s so much going on. Characters will be doing things in this movie or there will be an obvious physical trait a character has, but it will never be explained. I love how this movie doesn’t treat the audience dumb, but instead allows us to speculate on the backstory for ourselves. These small little subtleties create a lot of discussion, and I think that’s such a fun thing that most movies these days don’t do. A lot of movies try to explain everything to you, and the only thing you can say about those movies are stuff like, “that was fun,” or, “that was weird.”
In the end, Mad Max: Fury Road will go down as one of the greatest action movies you have seen in the 2010s. Buy / Rent / Skip? This is definitely going to be a DAY ONE BUY on blu ray for me. I can’t wait to get into all the behind the scenes.
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