Movie Review ~ Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga

A funny thing happened on the way to the apocalypse.  What started as a modest Outback indie production in 1979’s Mad Max, featuring a young Mel Gibson evolved into a blockbuster franchise under a major studio.  George Miller’s Mad Max series has left an indelible mark on popular culture, with Max’s adventures continuing in 1981’s The Road Warrior and 1985’s Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome.  Each installment, while echoing the theme of a decaying humanity reveling in chaos, has its unique narrative set in a harsh, unforgiving landscape.  

The original trio of films, while always curious bits of Ozploitation, remained primarily out of my orbit until the release of the game-changing Mad Max: Fury Road in 2015. This was Miller’s return to his famous creation thirty years after the last film premiered, and it was a calculated risk at Warner Brothers. However, Miller (The Witches of Eastwick) was allowed to make the film he wanted, resulting in a shockingly excellent feature that nearly walked away with top honors (Picture, Director) at the Oscars the year it won six other statues. This film marked the Mad Max franchise’s significant evolution and growth, catapulting it into a new era of success and recognition.  

Fury Road’s jaw-dropping stunts and stunning visuals played a crucial role in its success (and Oscar wins), but the smash hit was truly elevated by one exceptional element: the creation of Imperator Furiosa, played by Charlize Theron. Her portrayal of the character, betraying the villain of that piece, Immortan Joe (appearing here, but played by a new actor seeing that Hugh Keays-Byrne passed away in 2020), was a game-changer. She joined forces with Max to transport precious cargo across a desolate desert, leaving an indelible mark on the franchise.  

When the hotly anticipated Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga was announced, the excitement among fans (myself included) was palpable. We were all looking forward to the buzzed-about spin-off for Theron, envisioning the clever new character having her own franchise while iconic antihero Max Rockatansky continued down his road of revenge. However, Miller’s decision to depict the origin story of Theron’s fan-favorite character in his follow-up was unexpected, leaving the Oscar-winning actress that built her from the ground-up out entirely and casting rising star Alyla Browne (Sting) and certified A-lister Anya Taylor-Joy as the younger and older Furiosa in her place.  The result is a saga in name only that delivers on its action set pieces but is otherwise a mess visually, thematically, and in its ability to engage with its audience fully.  This is what happens when you have numerous backseat drivers all going to different destinations.

Abducted as a child from a land of bounty by a villainous biker horde led by Doctor Dementus (Chris Hemsworth, Vacation), Furiosa is raised in brutal captivity amidst vicious nihilistic warriors which forge her steely resolve.  Passed in trade from Dementus to Immortan Joe (Lachy Hulme), the tyrannical overlord of the Citadel, she plots revenge for the cruel death of her mother.  Dodging advances from Joe’s grotesque sons Rictus Erectus (Nathan Jones, Ricky Stanicky) and Scrotus (Josh Helman, Jack Reacher), she spends years pretending to be a male grunt worker in Joe’s grimy parts factory until she sees an opportunity to escape.

In a scene that echoes the pulse-pounding propulsion of Fury Road, Furiosa stows away on a souped-up semi, speeding down a seemingly endless stretch of highway between the Citadel and the Bullet Farm.  When crazies sent by Dementus attack it, her plans of escape are put on hold, with staying alive moved to the top of her list.  Teaming with fearless driver Praetorian Jack (Tom Burke, Living), they endure an endless supply of fiends coming at them from all angles.  It’s when the movie finally springs to grab our attention life…75 minutes into the 158-minute film.

What’s left of the film is an intersection of vehicular carnage within the cult-like domains of Dementus and Joe and Furiosa’s thirst for revenge, which grows even more desperate as her attempts at happiness continue to be thwarted.  If Miller’s film matched its predecessor’s technical sophistication, it might be easier to shoo away the overabundance of grotesque, bodily-fixated oddballs that highlight an unfortunate foray into cringe-worthy absurdity.   The chase sequences spark life into the film’s latter half, but the editing, handled by Eliot Knapman (The Great Gatsby) and the usually reliable Margaret Sixel (who won an Oscar for Fury Road), feels choppy, misaligned, and disorienting.  

Now is probably a good time to mention the visual effects, which lack the high standards set not only by Miller’s previous work but also by your average blockbusters in theaters now.  Obvious green screens, blurry CGI (I saw this in crystal clear IMAX, so it wasn’t the theater), and jittery editing in the middle of scenes are qualities of the movie with ¼ of the budget this film was given.  Principal photography took place in Australia from June to October 2022, highlighting the film’s extensive production timeline and showing how much time there was to make this look far sharper than it does. 

While elaborate, Colin Gibson’s production design often feels like a rehash rather than a reinvention, and the aesthetic cohesion is lacking.  Oscar-winner Jenny Beavan’s (Cruella) costume design remains inventive as ever (each one is a work of art), but it cannot compensate for a narrative written by Miller and Nico Lathouris that feels both overstuffed and undercooked. Despite Tom Holkenborg’s (The 355) score pulsating with raw energy, it rarely elevates the action past its fiery embers to blaze brightly.

Taylor-Joy (The Menu) is an actress who will someday hold down a franchise, but it’s not this.  Though she capably envelopes herself inside Furiosa’s intense melancholy (a surefire reason Miller cast her), the performance falls short of attaining the requisite badassery a heroine of this stature requires.  That’s why Theron was so uniquely qualified for the elder Furiosa – she was completely convincing as a hardened soul with one goal in mind, and no backstory was required.  I hope everyone who turned out to gnaw at Bradley Cooper’s prosthetic nose in Maestro also picks at Hemsworth’s distracting fake schnoz, which always looks a shade of color and, in one memorable close-up, clearly shows the outline of rubber meeting the skin.  Chewing the scenery like a piece of tough beef jerky, it’s Hemsworth’s most free-wheeling role but his least charismatic. 

The eclectic ensemble of Miller’s favorite actors from down under features an array of monstrous trolls with nasty predilections.  Most wind up looking like a variation of how Ryan Gosling and Mikey Day appeared in a recent SNL sketch where they played Beavis and Butthead.  While some, like Angus Sampson’s (Mortal Kombat) unnerving Organic Mechanic, Charlee Fraser’s too brief appearance as Furiosa’s mother, and George Shevtsov’s (Dead Calm) heavily tattooed The History Man leave an impression, the glut of crank characters proves grating.  Bizarrely, Hemsworth’s wife, Elsa Pataky (Carmen), plays two roles, an unnecessary double-casting that adds nothing.

Though adrenalized chase sequences capture the clammy-handed, unhinged vehicular pandemonium the series has become known for, these scant, thrilling interludes in Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga are bogged down by heavy-handed exposition and soft-boiled character drama.  Worldbuilding on a fast track is fine, but if you are going to do it, make sure you don’t rev your engines and then take off at 30mph.  Instead, what should have been a thrilling expansion of the Mad Max universe feels like a pale attempt to recreate the wheel.  It makes you wish for Max (who may or may not be seen briefly at one point) to return to steer this franchise back on track.  And we will. Mad Max: The Wasteland, with Tom Hardy and set before Fury Road, is said to be in production now.