Mad Max: Fury Road (George Miller)

[Henry Gale]

IMDb / Wiki

[Henry Gale]

Simply put: Holy sweet goddamn.

Just..... I guess with that difficulty with actual words I'll have to go with "astonishing", but it generally is just the most gloriously visceral, surreal, bizarre, perfectly unrelenting and simply incredibly satisfying big studio movie (and with it being one I can't believe actually exists the way it does) I can think of since, I dunno, Speed Racer?

I could say so much more, but I mainly just want you guys to see it already so you can hopefully feel as giddy about it as I do and reconvene here to spill such excitement.

Fuck is it good.

[All the stars, 11/10]

[BuffaloWilder]

Gonna be honest - expect a more prolonged review later on, hopefully for some kind of venue or outlet because I haven't done that in a while and this is kind of the movie I've been waiting for - but, I think this might be one of the best films I've seen in a very long time. It's very possible that it could be Miller's masterpiece.

[Dukefrukem]

I wasn't planning on seeing this in theaters, but the 89/1 RT ratio and the MC praise is changing all that.

[Peng]

Seeing it in 3 hours. Can't wait!

[Morris Schæffer]

3 hours to go!!

[Morris Schæffer]

I wasn't planning on seeing this in theaters, but the 89/1 RT ratio and the MC praise is changing all that.

Don't forget the 9.1 average rating old bud.

[Morris Schæffer]

Yeah, it's great. I'm just trying to wrap my head around the shortcomings, if there were any to begin with. Perhaps Tom Hardy didn't make too big of an impression. He was just there, mumbling stuff, seemed like a more physical version of his The Drop character. I'm thinking if I found it tense, but I'm leaning more towards insanely visceral and thrilling, but not that tense, just exciting as fuck and spectacularly filmed. Not as tense as The Road Warrior which had a sense of normalcy in its story. Here, it's sheer pandemonium, everyone's screaming, crazy looking and absolutely non-stop in its pursuit of the most bone-crunching, in your face action imaginable. The voice-over in the beginning was wearing out its welcome as I thought Hardy had, well, hardly any lines. Perhaps there was an even more powerful story in there had it paused just a bit more or if it had been a bit longer as it could have been longer given that it flew by in a heartbeat. The quiet moments are really beautiful and engaging also. It's just insanely relentless, possibly too although you can't claim it doesn't make good on its title. All nitpicks though, this was amazing.

[Peng]

Just got back from it too. I had tried to refrain from being possibly too hyperbolic by going on the rest of evening before thinking about it properly. But: someone says that this is going to be some kids' Aliens. Well, that and Speed are two of my most favorite actions films, and I'm pretty sure I loved this more than both of them. I had tempered my expectation down a while back when I heard that the plot is going to be minimum to allow for the film to be like one continuous chase. Sure, it sounds awesome, but also potentially too exhausting (That, and I don't share the extreme love for The Road Warrior). However, I hadn't expected what "minimum plot" there is to turn out to be really affecting, so much that I almost choked up real good during some action scenes. There's even time for a character arc or two. Excellent performances all around too, and one can't be too hyperbolic when it comes to Charlize Theron.

[Sven]

Ooo, ooo, just got tickets for tonight.

Lay it out for me: how many of you saw it in/are seeing it in 3D?

[Sven]

... and one can't be too hyperbolic when it comes to Charlize Theron.

...or can one? http://www.returnofkings.com/63036/w...feminist-road#!

[Peng]

Ha, I have heard about that, but didn't click it, because it sounds monumentally dumb, even before seeing the film.

[Henry Gale]

However, I hadn't expected what "minimum plot" there is to turn out to be really affecting, so much that I almost choked up real good during some action scenes.

Yeah, you're not alone here, and not even from moments that went for any shred of sentimentality. It's remarkable how much Miller's pure craft of orchestrating his abrasive lunacy instead of anything emotionally thoughtful illicited such strong reactions out of me. I remember the revving up of at least one major action setpiece, the building tension of all the players arriving at the scene, ready to attack (with at least one fire-guitar onsite), just managed to feel like the best sort of punch in the gut the way Miller presented it. And then it let loose.

Earlier than that though, the extraordinary culmination of the dust storm sequence was about when I knew the movie would have to suddenly do impossibly terrible things to push itself off the pedestal it had already managed to build for itself in my mind. Luckily, it often found ways to match it.

Even just the ending, it leaning into cutting to black, knowing it was finishing, allowing it all to complete and resolve for me, finally giving me a chance to feel off of its hook (as glorious as it may be) and breathe, I was just left stunned, and then in that daze I realized I had a couple of tears on my face. -- If I read someone else say that before seeing it I'd think they were joking, but it's absolutely true.

[Watashi]

I want a spin-off film of the dude whose sole purpose is just to play a flamethrower guitar on top of a speeding percussion death car. Does he have family? As a child, did he dream of being flamethrowing guitarist? What does he do in his off time?

These are questions that need answers.

[Sven]

Aw, Nux.

[Sven]

These male rights proponents are gonna go nuclear if they ever bother to watch the movie. The conversation should veer away from those jokers now that the film's actually released, and talk instead of how the movie is entirely about gender, its symbology and its impact on societies, etc. It's about power dynamics in relationships, explicitly, just as much as it is about debris, and nobody seems to be focusing on this.

[Russ]

These male rights proponents are gonna go nuclear if they ever bother to watch the movie. The conversation should veer away from those jokers now that the film's actually released, and talk instead of how the movie is entirely about gender, its symbology and its impact on societies, etc. It's about power dynamics in relationships, explicitly, just as much as it is about debris, and nobody seems to be focusing on this.

So...


stuff blowed up real good?

[Morris Schæffer]

I've been reading some very minor complaints about hardy's performance and they certainly echo mine. And today I had a big moment, which came out of nowhere, where I really really wish it was Gibson back behind the wheel. Might it have been too physical for him? Perhaps, but he sure looks fit enough and he might still have been a bigger draw than Hardy. I care about continuity and again, I wonder why it couldn't have been Gibson.

[dreamdead]

Saw this yesterday in Belfast, Northern Ireland. It was absolutely wonderful, full of awe and dread at such a scale that it becomes tragic without overshooting its agenda.

There's only two brief flaws: when Furousa learns of what has happened to the Green Place, the music swells a little too heavily, even if that same bombast works within the action sequences. And the Hoult character is accepted a little too quickly by the women, even as the redhead basically vouches for his valor since she wasn't killed by his hand.

That's it in the way of complaints on my end. At 45 minutes in, I realized that we'd traversed basically everything in the trailers and was so psyched that we had no idea where the film would go from here. Anyone who loves intelligent action films should expect to walk out of this film absolutely thrilled.

[Morris Schæffer]

Saw this yesterday in Belfast, Northern Ireland. It was absolutely wonderful, full of awe and dread at such a scale that it becomes tragic without overshooting its agenda.

There's only two brief flaws: when Furousa learns of what has happened to the Green Place, the music swells a little too heavily, even if that same bombast works within the action sequences. And the Hoult character is accepted a little too quickly by the women, even as the redhead basically vouches for his valor since she wasn't killed by his hand.

That's it in the way of complaints on my end. At 45 minutes in, I realized that we'd traversed basically everything in the trailers and was so psyched that we had no idea where the film would go from here. Anyone who loves intelligent action films should expect to walk out of this film absolutely thrilled.

One official trailer showed a lot more from after 45 minutes, but edited so well that it wasn't a problem.

[Pop Trash]

I don't even know what to say. I can't believe George Miller -in all of his 70-year-old glory- pulled this off.

[Ezee E]

Hmm.... I guess I wasn't as thrilled as you all were. There's certainly some good things going on, but I never really got a sense of awe that was bigger than what I saw in the trailers. The trailers took it all from me.

Hardy and the girls are all pretty simplistic, with Theron probably being the standout of the bunch. Everything else around them is so crazy and over the top that you just know that there's no chance they'll have any significant impact. Motivations are changed at the flip of a coin, and everyone becomes trusting almost instantly in a setting where you shouldn't trust a single person.

Love the world they're in, but never got the knockout punch I was expecting.

[Watashi]

Jesus Christ, E.

[Melville]

This was the greatest action spectacle I've ever seen. Insanely ambitious, relentless, gonzo, epic, grotesque, and ferocious. And in its incredibly streamlined narrative it still manages to carry off its themes of heroism, gender, revolution, and community.

[Melville]

These male rights proponents are gonna go nuclear if they ever bother to watch the movie.

It's interesting that despite everything that men's right's guy preemptively hated about the movie, Max's arc does essentially incorporate what that guy had "desperately been waiting for": "one man with principles, standing against many with none." But rather than following the countless other movies that do exactly that, this movie builds that trope into its other themes. Just as the women are reduced to chattel and machinery and must reclaim their humanity, Max starts out feral, dehumanized, and has to reclaim his humanity in his role as the wandering outsider helping the community. And rather than standing against the "many men with no principles", he's standing against the power structure of the few that systematically subjugate and dehumanize the many.