| 05.17.2015 – When you talk about a franchise like Mad Max for the current generation this franchise is virtually unknown. The last film “Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome” was thirty years ago that featured Tina Turner.
When Warner Bros announced that Geroge Miller the co-creator of the long storied franchise is bringing back Max Rockatansky I wasn’t that excited compared how Walt Disney have brought back Tron five years ago but as they say to see is to believe. |
It didn’t much carried weight unlike Tron Legacy. For me Legacy was something leaps and bounds when it came how the narrative and the modern visuals take after the original 1982 film.
For Mad Max Fury Road the initial expectation when they announced it the first thing that came to my mind was Mel Gibson. This was the film that propelled his career to Hollywood and brought you another Warner Bros. franchise with “The Lethal Weapon" and built his name as one of the iconic American action stars of the 1980s and 1990s. But before Fury Road what came to be had a lot of bumps on its path before it became the final product that everyone has been raving all about.
History of Mad
There where a lot of things addressed if Mel Gibson will reprise his role that made him a star as Max Rocktansky, but the news about his departure was widespread after production for the film got cancelled in 2006. When George Miller announced that the fourth film would be titled “Fury Road” in 2009 he also revealed that Tom Hardy would take the role of Max and by 2010 it was confirmed.
In the new trailer first teased we see Tom Hardy as Max Rocktansky a bit more edgy character than what Mel Gibson has portrayed in the last three films since 1979. Hardy’s version had less dialogue and more skilled which was impressive as Charlize Theron performance as Imperator Furiosa.
An Art Film Full of Chase
Fury Road continues its dark apocalyptic world introduced from the original Mad Max but with edgy colours and glamour that featured Victoria Secret model Rosie Huntington-Whitely that also includes characters like Nicholas Hoult as the white skinned war boy named Nux among others with equally outrageous names.
But what makes this film a subject critically acclaimed rave is how a film full of chase scene for 120 minutes of pure has become a visually coloured spectacle. Most people inside the cinema are either numb to show their aghast for this strange world or just plainly reserved to show it in the tail-end after the credits roll.
Every scene is a moving visual art that takes you right at the action that for those who expect too much gravitas in a usual action scene some might not absorb the information that clearly and all you have to do is let this entertain you than try to analyze it for what its trying to do.
It’s All about Furiosa
The central figure in this “new” Mad Max is not the man himself, but the woman who drives the 28-wheeler “War Rig”, which Charlize Theron has been praised for her performance in portraying the role of Imperator Furiosa.
She’s the one who is behind the wheel of this film who takes the narrative into the dessert filled harsher environments and pissed off faction groups who are trying to get their hands on the goods that’s she’s carrying in her truck that not seems to be.
Entirely Max appears to be a secondary character in this film rather the titular hero that everyone expects and it works. Because for more of the long time viewers who have seen the previous three originals, he is already considered a legend and new viewers doesn’t need to back pedal to look back at the character’s history.
His Name is Max
For someone who grew up seeing the three original films you can’t get Mel Gibson’s image away from who Max Rocktansky was. But Tom Hardy gave best his best portrayal adding his own layer of what the “Road Warrior” can accomplished without the need to say anything but act on it in his best possible way.
Overall if you look at it with expectation to be a film about dialogues and explanations you’re not going to appreciate it. George Miller redefines Fury Road as what the title meant to be a lot of action, explosion and mind boggling madness. It appears to be another Mad Max film, but entirely it’s a story about a mysterious woman named Furiosa which will be the next film after this.
Mad Max: Fury Road is NOW SHOWING in Philippine cinemas nationwide distributed by Warner Bros. Picture Studios.
RATED: B+
No comments:
Post a Comment