Review: ‘Badass’ Furiosa, visual effects make ‘Mad Max Fury Road’ the year’s best action film

By Louis Grelot, GSS film critic

PARIS — Thirty years after the third installment of the series, Mad Max is back!

For those who may not be familiar with the franchise, Mad Max recounts the non-linear story of Max Rockatansky, an ex-cop, and of his confrontation with the apocalypse. The apocalypse has taken many forms throughout the history of cinema, but few remain less generic or as modern as the one depicted in the series.

In Mad Max, humanity must survive in the Wasteland, a desert (in the Sahara definition of the term) where gas and water are scarce and are seen as resources that people are willing to kill for are. In “Fury Road,” Max has been living in the Wasteland for some time, but has chosen to confine himself to a solitary life as every person he has helped or come to be attached to in the Wasteland is now dead.

Unfortunately for Max, trouble is always lurking  in the Wasteland. Early on, Max is captured by the clan of Immortan Joe, a patriarch leading the Citadel, a colony that he keeps in servitude through the control of the local water supply.

So, is Max’s destiny to free the people of the Citadel from Immortan Joe? Not exactly. Imperator Furiosa, one of Immortan Joe’s best drivers, is the one who decides to rebel against the tyrant by escaping the Citadel with five of Immortan’s favorite “possessions.” Then ensues Fury Road’s foundations, a two-hour chase between Immortan Joe’s clan and Furiosa with Max stuck in the middle against his will.

The plot will not get much more complicated than that, but it doesn’t matter. What does matter, however, is that what director George Miller has been able to accomplish with this small amount of story is the fabric for the best action film of the year — and in recent memory.

“Mad Max: Fury Road” is a unanimous visual masterpiece whose action pieces are not only varied in their content, but are also breathtaking, loaded with explosions, cars, and characters to root for. Not surprisingly, earlier this week it was honored with 10 Oscar nominations, including Best Picture and Best Director.

You might ask, “how does Fury Road differ from a Michael Bay movie, or even any other modern high budget action flick? One reason is the action scenes — outside of Christopher Nolan’s “Dark Knight” trilogy, much larger and more explosive than anything ever on screen. Also, unlike its competitors (if there are any), Fury Road’s action sequences are flawless and coherent, not leaving any time to catch your breath, but never being disorienting.

What’s left to discuss? The actors. Tom Hardy takes up Mel Gibson’s place as the titular character and shows once more that he is one of the best rising A-list actors. If his turn as Bane in the “Dark Knight Rises” deprived him of facial expression, “Fury Road” deprived Hardy of his words. With only about 45 lines of dialogue for the character after the opening narration, one could think that Hardy didn’t have enough to piece together a character as complex and tortured as Max;  but the film makes a point of making this scarcity of dialogue a characteristic of the character, and of his development throughout the film.

However,  Hardy isn’t at the center of the audience’s attention when it comes to the characters; some may actually say that he comes in close second to the other protagonist of the story: Furiosa. To make things simple and short, the character brought to life by Charlize Theron is, for lack of a better word, badass; and will more than likely join the likes of “Alien“‘s Ellen Ripley and “Terminator 2“’s Sarah Connor as an iconic action female character. Theron manages to give up on her looks to build another character broken by the Wasteland who’s also searching for redemption like Max, as Fury Road is above all the story of a chase, but also also of redemption

“Mad Max: Fury Road” may not be a film that everyone will love. Its nearly continuous action, lack of dialogue, and thin plot may make it hard to appreciate at first.

But upon seeing the film a second time, people will assuredly come to recognize “Fury Road” as an epic post-apocalyptic action film with a surprising amount of character complexity and subtlety. Without question, “Fury Road” is the new reference for what action films can and should be like in our world or modern CGI-driven films.

See a list of the 2016 Oscar nominations here. 

—Louis Grelot is a senior at the American School of Paris. Email Louis at logrelot@asparis.fr.