Hammerman Ikon

Hammerman Ikon Film Guide

Mad Max: Fury Road
2015
****
Director: George Miller
Cast: Tom Hardy, Charlize Theron, Nicholas Hoult, Hugh Keays-Byrne, Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, Riley Keough, Zoë Kravitz, Abbey Lee, Courtney Eaton

In one corner of a futuristic wasteland, a ruthless tyrant Immortan Joe keeps the survivors in a stranglehold by controlling the supply of water. One of his trusted soldiers, Furiosa, betrays him and smuggles out Joe's five enslaved wives in an armoured tanker truck. They are joined by Max Rockatansky, a loner held captive by Joe's army. After the enjoyable Mad Max (1979) and its brilliant sequel (1981), I thought the series went out with a whimper in Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985). But now, 30 years later, George Miller returns to the franchise that launched his career. This is not a sequel but a reboot. Max is not only played by a different actor, but he is a completely different character. The old Max was a fragile, self-serving bastard, the new Max is a bulked-up, indestructible action hero. In the intervening years, post-apocalyptic survival stories have become a regular event at the cinemas, so while the punky vehicles and costumes were ahead of their time in the 1980s, they don't have the same impact in 2015. What's left is a brilliantly made two-hour chase scene which probably consumes the remaining fuel stocks on the planet. If you like non-stop action, you're in heaven. The pace is relentless, the set pieces are inventive and the stunts are spectacular. The film won six Academy Awards for costume design, production design, makeup and hairstyling, editing, sound editing, and sound mixing.