Mad Max: Fury Road (George Miller)

[amberlita]

Jesus Christ, E.

[Pop Trash]

Bullshit contrarianism is equally obnoxious, and that's definitely real esp. if you hang out in quasi hipster crowds.

EDIT: I should note this statement (likely) has nothing to do with E or Wats opinion of the new Mad Max.

[Skitch]

Jesus Christ, E.

Hes in this too?!

[amberlita]

Bullshit contrarianism is equally obnoxious, and that's definitely real esp. if you hang out in quasi hipster crowds.

EDIT: I should note this statement (likely) has nothing to do with E or Wats opinion of the new Mad Max.

Oh sure. I agree they can both be obnoxious. But the only thing more obnoxious than either phenomenon is lampooning someone for having an opinion that opposes the populist one. MC has a tendency to do just that while being ignorant of the social science effect of getting jazzed up by multiple positive reviews in a thread and 110% on the tomatometer for a movie they have yet to see. The urge to conform is a powerful and subconscious one. You've all already been primed to love this.

[Watashi]

I think it's unfair to take my snide remark at E and turning it around by labeling me a conformist to the great big hype machine. I just didn't think E's criticisms were justifiable. I don't understand being let down by a movie because the trailer spoiled him. Who's fault is that? Not the film or the filmmaker.

Saying we've already been primed to love this takes away some of the thoughtful insights that critics and people here have expressed in regards to its take on gender, revolution, community, etc and reduces us to Pavlovian salivating dogs.

[amberlita]

I think it's unfair to take my snide remark at E and turning it around by labeling me a conformist to the great big hype machine. I just didn't think E's criticisms were justifiable. I don't understand being let down by a movie because the trailer spoiled him. Who's fault is that? Not the film or the filmmaker.

Saying we've already been primed to love this takes away some of the thoughtful insights that critics and people here have expressed in regards to its take on gender, revolution, community, etc and reduces us to Pavlovian salivating dogs.

Two things:

1. You're making a false analogy. This isn't classical conditioning and I don't think you are attempting to seek a reward for behavior. This is about the subtle social pressure everyone experiences to fit the norm.

Note this doesn't preclude people still loving the movie on its merits and coming to their own conclusions. I'm just wondering how you can be totally sure your opinion is 100% your own when you've been fed a baseline reality of the film's quality before you had the chance to make your own judgement.

2. You're having an overly emotional response to my YouTube video. I noted the potential influence of so many positives opinions on your own opinion. I didn't label you anything. That said, I'm unsurprised that you took such high offense. No place other than the Internet have I found the word "Conformist" thrown around like a dirty word. Film geeks are so defensive when anyone suggests there might be something influencing their opinion besides their very special totally unique great taste in movies.

[Ezee E]

I spoke to a few other things beyond the trailer. Although on that point, I will say it is the movie's fault, because they put together the trailer, but I don't want to get hung up on that.

What I am getting annoyed by is the performance of the Five Wives and their characters. As I think on the movie more, the level of acting between the Five Wives and Theron is so huge that Theron should be offended. The Five Wives are downright horrible. One has ten seconds of Stockholm syndrome that goes away with a solid slap in the face, and another quickly falls in love with Hoult for really no reason at all. Of course contractions come and go for the pregnant one. And after more than one of the wives is caught, does anybody care at all? Which one was it? Red hair, the dark skinned one, or Khaleesi?

Great sci-fi world. Wonderful sense of geography, costumes, and creatively designed vehicles. I've always given some criticism to the idea of driving various vehicles when gasoline is in such high demand, but I'll forgive it for the sake of some fun.

[Morris Schæffer]

I think it's unfair to take my snide remark at E and turning it around by labeling me a conformist to the great big hype machine. I just didn't think E's criticisms were justifiable. I don't understand being let down by a movie because the trailer spoiled him. Who's fault is that? Not the film or the filmmaker.

Saying we've already been primed to love this takes away some of the thoughtful insights that critics and people here have expressed in regards to its take on gender, revolution, community, etc and reduces us to Pavlovian salivating dogs.

I agree, but to be fair, E's true criticisms don't begin until his 2nd paragraph. I don't think he's the sort of person who would resort to inappropriate use of a trailer to defend his position about a movie.

I think Mad Max: Fury Road goes for broke and it goes for broke in a way that I've never really seen before and that I found exhilarating. It's really sheer pandemonium, but to say that I cared immeasurably about the protagonists would be incorrect, but Miller's craft is just so insanely exciting and front and center that some of it got a little lost, like Hardy's merely decent performance as Max.

[Ezee E]

I agree, but to be fair, E's true criticisms don't begin until his 2nd paragraph. I don't think he's the sort of person who would resort to inappropriate use of a trailer to defend his position about a movie.

I think Mad Max: Fury Road goes for broke and it goes for broke in a way that I've never really seen before and that I found exhilarating. It's really sheer pandemonium, but to say that I cared immeasurably about the protagonists would be incorrect, but Miller's craft is just so insanely exciting and front and center that some of it got a little lost, like Hardy's merely decent performance as Max.

I actually liked Hardy's performance as Max. He was able to show motivations and personality all through emotions and gestures rather then force-feeding dialog. He had nothing else to say.

If there's a future to this series, I do hope that Furiosa is part of it.

[Morris Schæffer]

I actually liked Hardy's performance as Max. He was able to show motivations and personality all through emotions and gestures rather then force-feeding dialog. He had nothing else to say.

If there's a future to this series, I do hope that Furiosa is part of it.

The supposedly already penned 2nd part is called Mad Max: Furiosa.

[Ezee E]

The supposedly already penned 2nd part is called Mad Max: Furiosa.

Would love to see another go in that world though.

[Watashi]

Two things:

1. You're making a false analogy. This isn't classical conditioning and I don't think you are attempting to seek a reward for behavior. This is about the subtle social pressure everyone experiences to fit the norm.

Note this doesn't preclude people still loving the movie on its merits and coming to their own conclusions. I'm just wondering how you can be totally sure your opinion is 100% your own when you've been fed a baseline reality of the film's quality before you had the chance to make your own judgement.

2. You're having an overly emotional response to my YouTube video. I noted the potential influence of so many positives opinions on your own opinion. I didn't label you anything. That said, I'm unsurprised that you took such high offense. No place other than the Internet have I found the word "Conformist" thrown around like a dirty word. Film geeks are so defensive when anyone suggests there might be something influencing their opinion besides their very special totally unique great taste in movies.

1. I don't think anyone's opinion is 100% their own. I have a friend who refuses to see any promotional marketing for any film from trailers/images/reviews, etc. He closes his ears and eyes and starts humming when trailers are being shown in theaters. He likes going in blind but even that is an influence in itself and will eventually cloud his judgement. Again, whose fault is this? Are we all suppose to act like my friend and just enter every moment in our lives as a blank slate?

My remark to E, as deprecating as it was, was mostly in jest. I'm not offended. I'm not one of those people who leaves insulting comments on rare negative reviews. I've been on contrarian side many times before.

2. I actually didn't watch the video.

[transmogrifier]

I've been primed not to like this because I hated the original. We'll see....hopefully this week sometime.

[Sven]

I've been primed to love this film for over a decade. It's useless to separate Internet hype and genuine response at this early juncture. Right now, the film's release and response have taken on the properties of a pop culture event.

I can't get over Nux, for whom I cared a surprising deal. The Warboys are probably the key to getting this film's position on humanity. Hoult was so good at communicating that frenzied, suicidal, paint-huffing zeal while still keeping the character pinned to reason and resource. Comparing his climactic moment with where he was during the dust storm clarifies the movie's compassionate charge, as does the transfusion aspect.

Speaking to E's criticism of the Wives' believability, I feel the film posits the wives as experienced and socially adept, who have undoubtedly had interactions with the Warboys and their ilk and are not the type to readily see them as immovable enemies. Nux is just an impressionable boy, not an arch threat. There was no "love" there, really - just mutual comfort in dire straits. Stockholm Syndrome lady was a shorthand gesture, for sure, and probably mostly used in order to fake out the audience during the climax when she pleads to Rictus to save her. High psychology wasn't the MO with that one.

[Peng]

Going from Man of Steel's trailers to the actual film will forever prime me with some level of skepticism regarding heavily hyped films, Fury Road included. It thankfully obliterated all that by the first car chase though.

[Winston*]

Well, I enjoyed it.

[Winston*]

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.

Yeah, it took me by surprise how heavy Miller went in, in this respect. I mean the film has literally has Max purify himself in breast milk.

[Thirdmango]

Goodness golly did I love this movie. Also I didn't read any reviews or see any previews before this. Went in blind besides seeing the other mad max movies.

[Skitch]

I've been primed not to like this because I hated the original. We'll see....hopefully this week sometime.

You are an enigma to me lol

[Sven]

I've been on the warpath about CG sandstorms for a while now, but this one was excellently executed. Keeping it mostly to the lighting effects and car rigs was a good idea, and the external rendering of the fire and clouds and disintegrating cars was all nicely done, photoreal but still expressionistic. Grand.

[Weems]

Yowsers. Though this had frequently amazing technical staging and consistently distinguished visuals (Miller's technical brio is undeniable and worthy of study), they were in the service of far too unimaginative a script and scenario. I found this massively overrated, as the storytelling is so constricted to being a simplistic back-and-forth chase sequence that courts repetitiveness and isn't even enlivened by good dialogue; my attention was never really dragged into this movie by Miller's construction. I think of Aliens or Terminator 2, and find this woefully inadequate in comparison conceptually. Even The Raid, which has a simple enough premise, felt moment-to-moment more stunningly stitched together and absorbing than this. This felt roughly equal to something like Prometheus.

[Morris Schæffer]

Yowsers. Though this had frequently amazing technical staging and consistently distinguished visuals (Miller's technical brio is undeniable and worthy of study), they were in the service of far too unimaginative a script and scenario. I found this massively overrated, as the storytelling is so constricted to being a simplistic back-and-forth chase sequence that courts repetitiveness and isn't even enlivened by good dialogue; my attention was never really dragged into this movie by Miller's construction. I think of Aliens or Terminator 2, and find this woefully inadequate in comparison conceptually. Even The Raid, which has a simple enough premise, felt moment-to-moment more stunningly stitched together and absorbing than this. This felt roughly equal to something like Prometheus.

The Raid was shorter by 30 minutes, but possibly more repetitive than Mad Max Fury Road for me because it's fight and shoot. Fury Road had more going in that regard thanks to its premise, but also the relative depth of its story. But yeah, Fury Road is still quite a few notches below Aliens and T2 for me as well.

[Dukefrukem]

This was the most amazing thing to grace my spectacles.

Simply a masterpiece.

[Dukefrukem]

The attention to detail was what really topped off most of the scenes for me. Bullet casings around the costumes, the steering wheels, the masks, the makeup, the prosthetics, the vehicles themselves and the set designs were all necessary to create this universe/state of this planet we are meant to feel. The CGI stuff was blended perfectly with the practical stuff.

And my god the action was relentless. There was barely any time to breathe a sigh of relief. Just frantically paced which may be the movie's only issue.

EDIT: Nicholas Hoult steals the show in some scenes. I barely recognized him.

[D_Davis]

I have a friend who refuses to see any promotional marketing for any film from trailers/images/reviews, etc. He closes his ears and eyes and starts humming when trailers are being shown in theaters. He likes going in blind but even that is an influence in itself and will eventually cloud his judgement.

These are among the top 5 most annoying people on the planet.

It's like they're constantly trying to prove to other people, while also making a silly, overly dramatic gesture and show of their fandom, that they are the most super of fans, that even a subtitle might spoil their precious fandom.