Movie Review: Mad Max: Fury Road

What a lovely day indeed

John Wick, Dredd and Mad Max: Fury Road all have one thing in common, and it's that these three movies have managed to bring about a renaissance of what I like to call the 'one sequence' action flick. Going into Mad Max, I wasn't expecting to be as blown as away as I was. I was looking forward to seeing a balls to the wall crazy action flick about a bunch of crazy people fighting with frankenstein cars. Well, I basically got that, but with 100 times more insanity and I loved it.

Mad Max is the fourth film in a long running franchise created by George Millar. It follows the titular character Max (Tom Hardy) as he attempts to survive the wastelands. The world has gone mad and Max is in the middle of it all trying to fight for his life. Immediately he's taken in by a local warlord known as Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-Byrne) and used as a 'Bloodbag' by one of Immortan Joe's Warboys. Soon, Max runs into a woman named Furiosa (Charlize Theron) who betrays Immortan Joe and is attempting to bring his 'breeder' women to a safe haven, away from his iron fist. What follows is an adrenaline fuels adventure full of blood, rust, explosions and plenty of metal. 

For this scene, Tom Hardy was actually strapped to the front of a car and driven around

Fury Road has a very basic plot and is essentially a film about a car chase. But I'll be damned if that movie didn't do it well. As I've mentioned before, Mad Max is one of the films I've seen that manages to do the whole 'one sequence' action film right. It's a movie that excels in what it sets out to do and it's not afraid to take a simple concept and amp it up to 11. Each sequence is paced so well that you'll be at the edge of your seat for an entire action sequence, and once you've felt overwhelmed, the film kicks back with a slower scene to let you recover before throwing you back into the fray. Some would argue that these scenes slow the movie down too much, I argue that these scenes were necessary and a perfect fit for a film of this caliber. You need these slow moments in order to catch a breath, and to establish plot (even if the plot is thin already).

Many of these cars are perfectly driveable. Created specifically for this film.

Fury Road is so incredibly well shot and choreographed that it's hard to compare it to any other action film that's been released so far. I thoroughly enjoyed Furious 7 and Age of Ultron, but those two films pale by comparison, especially once you realize that a majority of the film was done with practical effects. Every 10 minutes there would be a shot that would wow me, it kept my attention the entire way through and never let me go. On top of that, the film boasted fight scenes that were so incredibly choreographed that everything flowed smoothly, like a well oiled machine. There's one sequence where Max is fighting Furiosa that I can recall that stuck with me. Every actor moved naturally and each punch was thrown perfectly. The final seconds of that particular fight scene had my jaw on the floor, and it essentially stayed that way all the way until the end of the film.

Scenes that demand shock and awe are commonplace in Fury Road.

On top of the incredible action and the likable characters (both villainous and heroic) Fury Road also boasts an astounding soundtrack. A soundtrack so good that playing a track during your daily commute might tempt you to just go off road and be a little crazy yourself.

The fact that George Miller also employs the use of practical effects throughout 90% of the film is one of my favorite things about Fury Road. Most other directors would have used CGI to amp up the action as much as they could, reaching unbelievable levels of  carnage and destruction, whereas in Fury Road, most scenes were REAL. Performers actually pole vaulted from car to car, some vehicles actually flipped and exploded, and actors actually fought on top of a truck or even shimmied underneath them. Pure unadulterated insanity...and I love it.

Yeah...this actually happened.

Fury Road is an interesting movie in that it's not incredibly deep, so it can be hard to spoil...but at the same time it was so amazing that I can't go into detail about many things at the risk of spoiling. In short, I'll leave you with this:
Fury Road will hook it's claws into you the moment it begins. This roller-coaster of a movie will have it's ups and it's downs, but it was all engineered perfectly so that the ride would be unforgettable. While it's general plot falls a little flat with very little explanation of certain things, this seemingly shallow depth is  deceptive as there is an ocean of lore and story to be found within this universe. If you're looking for an incredible action film that isn't afriad to pull any stops, go watch Fury Road right now!

Truly, the real star of Mad Max: Fury Road

Verdict: 5/5