MIDNIGHT REVIEWS Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga
Midnight Reviews features reviews and thought pieces written and edited by a parent, at night, after bedtime.
FURIOSA: A MAD MAX SAGA (2hr 28mins)
Directed by: George Miller
Featuring: Anya Taylor-Joy, Chris Hemsworth, Tom Burke
Synopsis: Furiosa (Alyla Browne when younger; Taylor-Joy when older) is kidnapped from the pristine Green Place and taken hostage by Dementus (Hemsworth). What follows is a story of how she became the unrelenting warrior we see later in Fury Road.
Review: Furiosa begins with a voiceover and image of someone we later find out is The History Man (George Shevstov). This bookends neatly with how we’re explicitly told at the end of the movie that there are various different ways the story ended, depending on who you ask. George Miller is telling us, as clearly as it’s possible to do without holding up a massive sign, that this is the telling of a legend.
Here, each location is treated as its own separate kingdom. We see characters offering alliances through what counts as marriage in this desperate place. Despite the mythical properties to the overarching storytelling, each location feels lived-in and each certainly has its own identity. Sometimes in creating post-apocalyptic stories, everything can end up looking the same as everything else. This is not the case here.
The fact that Charlize Theron doesn’t play the character, as great an actress as she is, is made inconsequential. If both Furiosa and Max were heavily involved in the story, it wouldn’t matter if neither Theron or Tom Hardy showed up because it would simply be the telling of the Furiosa legend from someone else’s point of view. Maybe Fury Road is a story told by a war boy, whilst Furiosa is a story told by The History Man. Who knows? And who needs to know?
The feeling is that everything could go up in flames at any moment.
Recent obsessions with particulars have created a climate of needing everything explained to the nth degree. We have the Russo brothers explaining the composition of Captain America’s shield, not in the Avengers movies of which there are literally over two dozen, but in publicity interviews. Directors that want to make a slightly different version of what came before must be linked, either by self or by others, to the explanation of alternate universes, which are themselves then described in copious detail. Miller eschews all of that and this doesn’t weaken the movie; in fact, it gives Furiosa and the preceding Mad Max movies further strength.
George Miller has taken a few elements that threaten to become box-office poison (it’s a prequel! It’s a legacy sequel, kind of! It has weird ideas!) and turned them into an advantage.
Sometimes, a movie being a prequel will weaken it because a moment or event that has to happen is something the audience is waiting on. Sometimes there will even be teases. Here, there’re so many other things going on that it doesn’t matter if we know Furiosa is going to lose her arm. And when it does happen, it informs the character we’re presented with, and the version from Fury Road, so well that it isn’t simple fan-service.
This prequel certainly adds to what came before. It has the advantage that you don’t have to see Fury Road to fully enjoy its plot, but then why would you not?
It doesn’t quite reach the heights of Fury Road, but then that film was one of, if not the greatest action movie ever made. To say Furiosa is a step down is a disservice; it would be akin to complaining that the second ice bucket in your Presidential suite is just out of arm’s reach.
Anya Taylor-Joy brings enough of Theron’s previous performance whilst imbuing her own version of Furiosa with an own-brand fire and brimstone. Theron’s Furiosa is dealing with loss, with grief, with the need for escape; Furiosa is a tale of someone being dragged through Hell and using demons to become unstoppable in the hunt for vengeance.
This relentless nature mirrors the nature of the film. Indeed, Furiosa could not really have any other title. Meanwhile, it still matches the hectic, chaotic direction from Fury Road, with even the calmest scenes being full to the brim with tension and ever-shifting circumstances.
Revel in its glory.
Dementus is a great antagonist. Great name, great motivation, great revelations. He is a great example of the easiest way to bring an undercurrent of comedy by including a character in charge who only kind of knows what they’re doing. The scene where he is bathed in red, coverall-cum-cape billowing behind him, magnificent grin on his face, tells you everything you need to know in regards to how he sees himself. The man has charisma, with shades of Johnny Depp’s Jack Sparrow threatening to overtake everything. But the man is also an idiot.
In a similar way to his role in Bad Times at the El Royale, it’s fun to see Hemsworth break away from muscle-bound super heroics. The scenes where the grip on his crew is loosening are chaotic and yet incredibly well put-together. The feeling is that everything could go up in flames at any moment.
This is the Mad Max way. Go and witness Furiosa on the big screen, forget news of ‘opening weekend blues’ and revel in its glory.
Furiosa is in cinemas now.
Matthew D. Smith likes to overshare his views on movies and TV shows whenever and wherever he can. Indulge him, and follow him on Twitter or listen to the podcast he co-hosts with Leslie Wai.
