Mad Max: Fury Road Review

A couple of weeks ago a group of my guy friends got together with the express purpose of watching an over the top action movie. We ended up watching Mad Max: Fury Road (2015) which was in theaters in the spring earlier this year. I have never seen a Mad Max movie before and only had marginal interest in seeing them ever. Fury Road was insane, over the top, and completely amazing! Not only that, but it's possibly the cleanest R-rated move I've ever seen.

Years after the collapse of civilization, the tyrannical Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-Byrne) enslaves apocalypse survivors inside the desert fortress, the Citadel. When the warrior Imperator Furiosa (Charlize Theron) leads the dictator's five wives in a daring escape, she forges an alliance with a loner and former captive of Immortan Joe, Max Rockatansky (Tom Hardy), and one of Joe's religious zealot "War Boys," Nux (Nicholas Hoult) . Fortified in the massive armored truck, the War Rig, they try to outrun the ruthless warlord and his henchmen in a deadly high-speed chase through the Wasteland.

There are three Mad Max movies out there already, all of which star a young Mel Gibson. Originally, Gibson was intended to reprise the titular role. Fury Road's director, George Miller, ended up recasting the role because of controversies surrounding Gibson and because he really wanted Max to remain at a younger age. Tom Hardy took on the role and he was great. Granted, I don't know how his portrayal of the character compares to Mel Gibson's; I haven't seen the old Mad Max movies. Hardy was fantastic in The Dark Knight Rises and Inception, and he is still a dramatic force to be reckoned with here. Fury Road harkens back to the original films, usually in the form of Max's hallucinating about people he was unable to save. It is also a complete story on its own that doesn't rely on the assumption that you've seen the previous movies that were originally released over a quarter of a century ago. That's good, because a lot of people have been born in the last 30 years and not all movie attendees have seen the Mad Max movie. This introduces the world setting and character to a new audience. Fury Road wasn't an attempt to rekindle interest in the original films, but I certainly want to see them now!

This is a Mad Max movie; it features the titular character and the iconic post-apocalyptic world setting he inhabits. But oddly, Max himself isn't what the story revolves around. I'd argue that even though Max is the first character we're introduced to, Furiosa is the main character. It's her story, it's her adventure, it's her quest. Max is picked up and kind of tags along in the interest of their mutual survival and as a means of Furiosa achieving her quest to free Immortan Joe's wives from abuse and to find a safe place to call home. Max is mostly present only because he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Fury Road doesn't hint at a sequel, though there is probably enough material to make a couple. If that were to be done, I could see Furiosa eventually taking the helm of the stories set in the Mad Max universe because she is so remarkably interesting and such a highly compelling character. Max was great and all, but I'd be up for seeing more of Furiosa.

Surely you have seen Indiana Jones. Remember that crazy car chase where Indy falls down the front of a moving car, slides underneath said car to the back, climbs into the back and takes out the driver? It's a fantastic scene and highly enjoyable. Mad Max: Fury Road is basically two hours of that kind of scene. There is tons of over the top crazy action and it is relentless! Scene after scene of high stakes action, with just barely enough downtime to catch your breath before the next one starts. The stunts are nothing shy of incredible. People are constantly jumping from vehicle to vehicle, firing guns, things are exploding, enemies are defeated, allies are wounded or lost, vehicles spew fire and smoke as they accelerate, storms encroach upon the chaos, and it is absolutely fun! There's even some guy strapped to the top of a vehicle who inexplicably plays an electric guitar that also inexplicably shoots flames. Why? Who cares!? It's awesome! The stunts were unlike anything I'd ever seen before, and 90% of the special effects and stunts were practical; no CGI used for most of the whole movie. Due to the intensity of the stunts used in the movie, 150 stunt performers were used which included Cirque du Soleil performers and Olympic athletes. There are insane vehicles and cars used in the movie which defy reason, all of which were fully functional, again no CGI here.  This truly is a cinema spectacle to behold.

Fury Road was lauded as a pro-feminist film, though I'm not sure I agree with that entirely. Yes, it was fantastic to see a "women taking the reins" sort of movie. It features some women who choose to live without men, eventually fighting those men they chose to live away from. It highlights most men as villains complicit in the manufacturing of women designed to be breeders (none of this is depicted; only spoken about, or rather shouted about over the sound of cars and trucks racing at 90 mph). To be perfectly honest, the women (other than Furiosa) were not a big part of the movie and neither were their acting chops. The wives were a plot device that got some bits of dialogue. The wives' characters hardly had enough material to incorporate deeper issues. I still loved Furiosa, but I can't imagine women anywhere feeling empowered as feminists watching this movie. It's entertaining, absolutely, and it has a surprising amount of narrative heft, but Fury Road is basically a two-hour car chase and doesn't really tackle issues of feminism.

Fury Road might be the cleanest R-rated movies I've ever seen. It's "rated R for intense sequences of violence throughout, and for disturbing images." There is no sex scenes and little nudity (I'm sure I've seen worse in PG-13 movies). The action is very intense, but the violence is not gory nor visually explicit; anything notably gruesome takes place off camera, or in a few cases shows us just enough to get the gist of what has happened without dwelling on how grotesque it probably was. Furthermore, while this seems the perfect situation for it, I don't recall hearing a single word of profanity. There is talk of things that of a mature nature, but it's never shown. For example, the wives are basically sex slaves, treated as objects, abused, and intended for breeding purposes, but none of that is ever shown. It is more or less deserving of an R-rating, but Fury Road lies in the gray area between R and PG-13.

Mad Max: Fury Road was positively amazing. It's like a relentless two-hour assault on both the eardrums and the eyeballs. The structure is solid and even, at no point does it feel repetitive or drawn out. The supporting cast lacks refinement and depth, but Max and Furiosa are great characters that you can't help but be drawn to. The story is simple, but it's the action that is the backbone of this movie; it's simply fascinating. I'd love to see Tom Hardy continue in the Mad Max franchise, but more than that, I'd like to see Charlize Theron as Furiosa move it forward. I love good, strong, female protagonists, and Furiosa is great! All of the insane, over the top action sequences are positively incredible. This has got to earn awards for stunt work, and if none exists one should be made for the express purpose of giving it to this film. This is like action as art. I highly recommend seeing Mad Max: Fury Road. It's also worth owning if you enjoy action films at all.

Are you a fan of the old Mad Max films? What did you think of Mel Gibson being replaced by Tom Hardy? Comment below and let me know!

The Dark Knight Rises Movie Review

We finally get to see the conclusion of an epic trilogy. Christopher Nolan has delivered to us two phenomenal Batman movies that I believe redefined superhero movies for us. They were more grounded and less flashy, they had stories with deep meaning, and discussed some philosophical ideas while still keeping us at the edge of our seats. So does The Dark Knight Rises (2012) deliver what we’ve come to expect from Nolan?

Eight years have passed since Batman (Christian Bale) vanished after taking the blame for the death of D.A. Harvey Dent. Batman took the fall for Dent’s crimes, a move that he and Commissioner Gordon (Gary Oldman) both hoped was for the greater good. Criminal activity in Gotham City was crushed by the anti-crime Dent Act which was founded upon the lie of Dent’s pure reputation. That is, until a cunning cat burglar named Selina Kyle (Anne Hathaway) emerges with a mysterious agenda. Far more dangerous is the appearance of Bane (Tom Hardy), a masked terrorist whose ruthless plans for Gotham drives Bruce Wayne out of his self-imposed exile. But even if Bruce Wayne becomes The Dark Knight once again to protect the city that has branded him an enemy, Batman is no match for this powerful opponent.

Sometimes in a sequel, the movie will rush through some setting or character development on the assumption that you have seen the previous movies. That’s not an unreasonable assumption, but it makes for some pretty sloppy writing. In The Dark Knight Rises, key events from both Batman Begins and The Dark Knight are still weighing heavily on the main characters. We see Bruce Wayne draw inspiration from events that caused him to don the cape and cowl in the first place. We see Commissioner Gordon grieving the fact he is protecting the villain who attempted to kill his family. These plot points are developed enough in this movie to be significant within their context, but if you haven’t seen the previous two movies you may not appreciate their impact.

Bane is an intriguing villain. I’ve seen Bane in other media; in the 1990’s Batman cartoon show, The Batman & Robin movie, and even in the recent Arkham Asylum video games Bane is depicted as being little more than an immensely muscle-bound thug. The Dark Knight Rises shows us Bane as he is in the comics; he’s highly intelligent and physically monstrous. There’s this menacing discrepancy between his voice and his physical appearance. Thanks to his mask he sounds almost like Sean Connery speaking into an Optimus Prime voice box. Hardy gained thirty pounds of muscle for this role. As if that wasn’t enough, we learn that Bane knows all of Batman’s tricks of distraction and leverage. Batman cannot face this guy and hope to win. He is a genuinely unstoppable menace and an outstanding villain!

Anne Hathaway brilliantly plays Salina Kyle, Catwoman. Unlike Bane, we don’t get to hear much of her back story. She is manipulative, smart, cunning, and sexy. She can really take care of herself; she’s just about as tough as Batman is. People try to take advantage of her or overpower her and she twists the whole thing around to her advantage, sometimes without her oppressors knowing it until later. Catwoman and Batman share a lot of similarities, which makes the dynamics between their characters really interesting!

The Dark Knight Rises is almost like a superhero movie without the superhero. Bruce Wayne’s alter ego, Batman, doesn’t show up a whole lot. When he does it's great, but this story is about Bruce Wayne having to become Batman again after his self-imposed exile. Thanks to Bane, Bruce has lost literally everything; his wealth, home, physical wellbeing, freedom, his gadgets and even his anonymity as Batman. There is nothing else that can be taken from him; he is at his lowest low.  It’s harder to become Batman again than it was the first time, but his wounded, emotional arc is deep and interesting.

The story in The Dark Knight Rises can be interpreted more politically than philosophically than the previous two movies. Bane is an anti-capitalist villain with a plan similar to the Occupy Wall Street movement to destroy Gotham City, and their only hope is an unpopular billionaire entrepreneur. I could see some viewers getting politically offended by the story, but I don’t really think that Christopher Nolan was going out of his way to make a political statement. I think Bane simply saw the flaws in the society of Gotham (namely the class discrepancy which was a plot device in the previous movies), drove a wedge into it, and let the world crumble around him.  You can infer political and philosophical concepts from any movie. People will get different meanings from the same movie based on their views. You shouldn’t write off this movie just because you see a political analogy that contradicts your own views. It’s still a good movie.

My biggest complaint is that the tone of The Dark Knight Rises was much more somber and even more depressing than the previous ones. In The Dark Knight, The Joker rigs two ferries with bombs and invites each one to blow up the other before they are blown up themselves. But the passengers on each boat refuse to kill the others, showing that even when faced with death they still choose to believe in good. In The Dark Knight Rises as soon as Bane shakes the foundation of the social stratification, the lower-class immediately seizes the upper-class with hardly any provocation. These don’t sound like the same citizens who refused to blow each other up eight years ago. The Dark Knight Rises shows us a much darker view of people, and it didn’t settle well with me. We also see Batman sink to his lowest low and stay there for most of the movie. We see Gotham essentially destroyed, and see people lose hope. Sure, we need to see a good conflict or the story wouldn’t be interesting. But so much of the movie is spent in a somber tone it almost becomes depressing.

The Dark Knight Rises was painstakingly well crafted to give us a satisfying sense of closure to the trilogy. It gets a little bit convoluted here and there, and the pacing slows down in the middle. It’s easy to get swept up in some political allegories. If you take it at its face value, The Dark Knight Rises brings the trilogy home with a bang, even if it doesn’t quite meet the exceedingly high standards of its predecessors. Catch this in theaters if you can; I may go see it again. I’ll be getting this on Blu-Ray to complete my trilogy.

There are a lot of movie Trilogies out there now; Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, The Dark Knight, Indiana Jones, and The Matrix to name a few. Which is your favorite movie trilogy? Comment below and tell me why!