#1,863. Mad Max: Fury Road (2015) - Spotlight on Australia

Directed By: George Miller

Starring: Tom Hardy, Charlize Theron, Nicholas Hoult



Tag line: "Only the Mad Survive"

Trivia: Over 80% of the effects seen in the film are practical effects, stunts, make-up and sets









It took 30 years for director George Miller to get around to the next installment in his Mad Max series, and believe me, it was worth the wait! 2015’s Mad Max: Fury Road is more than a cinematic assault on the senses. It’s a goddamn blitzkrieg! This movie will leave you stunned, worn out, and thoroughly entertained.

The road warrior, aka Max (Tom Hardy), continues to roam the wastelands of Australia, doing whatever is necessary to survive. After a run-in with a group of heavily armed marauders known as the War Boys, Max is taken prisoner and forced to serve as a permanent blood donor for Nux (Nicholas Hoult), a sickly War Boy with a life-threatening illness. 

The War Boys are the faithful servants of Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-Byrne), the tyrannical leader of a desert community. In an effort to obtain more fuel for his vast army of vehicles, Immortan Joe sends one of his most trusted lieutenants, Imperator Furiosa (Charlize Theron), to Gas Town, a nearby refinery. Driving a fuel tanker, Furiosa and her War Boy escorts head into the desert...

But Furiosa eventually changes course.

As it turns out, she had no intention of going to Gas Town, and is instead on a mission of mercy to deliver Immortan Joe’s five wives, Capable (Riley Keough), Cheedo (Courtney Eaton), the Dag (Abbey Lee), Toast the Knowing (Zoe Kravitz) and the very pregnant Angharad (Rosie Huntington-Whiteley), to the safety of the “Green Place”, an idyllic oasis where Immortan Joe cannot reach them. 

The moment they realize what Furiosa is up to, Joe and his remaining War Boys climb into their vehicles and give chase, driving as fast as possible to overtake her and “rescue” the wives. Not wanting to miss out on such a glorious hunt, the weakened Nux hops into a car and, with his “blood bag” Max strapped to the hood, joins the others in their high-speed pursuit.

Tom Hardy steps nicely into the role of Max (previously portrayed by Mel Gibson), and plays the character with plenty of gusto. But what surprised me most about Mad Max: Fury Road is that Max himself was relegated to a supporting role... in his own film! For the first hour or so, Max is either in prison or chained to the front of a car doing well over 100 miles per hour. In his place, we have Charlize Theron as Furiosa, who, despite missing an arm, is every bit as tough as Max, and a lot smarter than the War Boys. 

As for the film’s heavy, Hugh Keays-Byrne (who was Toecutter in the original Mad Max) reminded me of the Humongous from The Road Warrior: like that earlier character, his Immortan Joe is an imposing figure hidden behind a mask, and has an entire army at his disposal. The rest of the supporting roles are also well-cast, especially Nicholas Hoult as the maniacal Nux. 

The film's wildest character, however, is one that never utters a word: The Doof Warrior (played by Australian singer / songwriter Iota), a War Boy who, as Immortan Joe is chasing Furiosa, stands perched on an over-sized vehicle, performing rock music as flames shoot from his guitar! The Doof Warrior steals damn near every scene, providing Joe and his troops with their own soundtrack as they speed through the desert. In a movie filled with awesome characters, the Doof Warrior is the most fascinating of them all.

As with the previous movies, George Miller and his team create a convincing post-apocalyptic world for Mad Max: Fury Road (Immortan Joe’s headquarters, with its poverty-stricken minions and man-made waterfall, is damn cool). More than anything, though, Mad Max: Fury Road is a high-octane action film, with one amazing sequence after another. As with Mad Max and its sequels, director Miller used practical effects - as opposed to CGI - for the majority of the chase scenes, giving them a realistic feel while at the same time ratcheting the tension up as high as it will go. 

It’s damned difficult to pick a single moment from Mad Max: Fury Road that's my “favorite”, but if I had to choose one, it would be the sand storm. I was so wowed by this sequence that I had to immediately watch it again. As good as the action scenes are in the series’ other entries, Mad Max: Fury Road may actually have them beat.

Hands down, Mad Max: Fury Road is one of the decade's best action films. After nearly thirty years, “Mad” Max Rockatansky hasn’t lost his edge.

Nor, for that matter, has George Miller.

#1,467. Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985) - Spotlight on Australia

Directed By: George Miller, George Ogilvie

Starring: Mel Gibson, Tina Turner, Bruce Spence




Tag line: "Two men enter. One man leaves"

Trivia: The sandstorm at the end of the film was real, and a camera plane actually did fly into it for some shots"








The third entry in the Mad Max series (after Mad Max and The Road Warrior), 1985’s Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome feels like two movies in one: the first good, and the second…

Well, not “bad”, really. Just… strange!

When his camel-train is hijacked by pilot Jedediah (Bruce Spence, who played the Gyro Captain in The Road Warrior) and his son, Jedediah Jr., (Adam Cockburn), Max (Mel Gibson) is forced to wander the desert.

Eventually, he arrives at the settlement of Bartertown, a community that specializes in commerce. While there, Max is approached by Aunty Entity (Tina Turner), the self-appointed ruler of Bartertown, who wants Max to help her eliminate “Master-Blaster”, a highly intelligent little person (“Master”, played by Angelo Rossitto) and his hulking brute of a servant (“Blaster”, portrayed by Paul Larsson), both of whom have become far too cocky.

But when Max has a change of heart, Aunty banishes him to the desert, where, after roaming for days, he is miraculously rescued by a group of children, the last survivors of a plane crash that occurred years earlier. These kids believe Max is the “savior” they have been waiting for, and want him to lead them all to the fabled “Tomorrow-Morrow Land”, aka civilization.

Seeing as he’s the only one who knows what the world outside is really like, Max refuses. But some of the kids won’t take “no” for an answer.

The opening scene of Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, where Max’s caravan is stolen, gets the movie off to a great start. I also enjoyed the early sequences set in Bartertown, a place filled with the kind of crooks and lowlifes you would expect to find in dystopian society. Tina Turner is solid as Aunty, but the most interesting character is Rossitto's Master, a little person and an engineering genius. Arrogant at first because he’s the only one who knows how to keep the town’s power flowing (he designed a system by which pig shit is converted into electricity), Master is eventually put in his place, at which point he starts becoming a much more sympathetic character.

Throw in a kick-ass fight between Max and Master’s friend Blaster, set in a caged arena known as the “Thunderdome”, and you have a first half brimming with promise.

That promise fades a bit when Max, back on the move, finds himself surrounded by dozens of kids, living on their own in a tropical oasis. Ignoring for a moment the obvious questions (like "What happened to all the adults?"), this entire sequence comes across as too “cutesy”. Along with asking Max to lead them to “Tomorrow-morrow land”, the children refer to their own oral history as the “Tell”. Now, these scenes are beautifully shot, and the paradise these kids call home makes for a nice change from all that went before, in pretty much the entire series up to that point.  But the whole thing is just so damn... bizarre!

Later, when the obligatory showdown between Max (who, while tracking some kids that went looking for “Tomorrow-Morrow land” on their own, ends up back at Bartertown) and Aunty occurs, the children are tucked neatly into the background, rarely offering Max and his pals any assistance. So, aside from being goofy, the kids, despite having survived on their own in the wild, are also useless when the chips are down. It had me wondering, especially in a Mad Max film, why they were even necessary.

This movie is worth checking out. There are great action scenes and fascinating characters. But when ranked against the series’ first two films, Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome finishes a distant third.

#985. The Road Warrior (1981) - Spotlight on Australia

Directed By: George Miller

Starring: Mel Gibson, Bruce Spence, Michael Preston, Max Phipps



Tag line: "In the future, cities will become deserts, roads will become battlefields and the hope of mankind will appear as a stranger"

Trivia: The dog used in the film was obtained from a local dog pound, and was adopted by one of the camera operators when filming completed






Set in a desolate wasteland where the only rule is kill or be killed, The Road Warrior -  the second entry in the Mad Max series - distinguishes itself from its predecessor by favoring action over character development. 

And, oh, what a thrilling ride it is!

The Road Warrior opens with our hero, Max (Mel Gibson), speeding along the highway in his interceptor, scouring the land for the only resource that matters: gasoline. 

After a run-in with a ruthless gang of marauders, Max crosses paths with the Gyro Captain (Bruce Spence), who tells him about a nearby refinery that is still churning out fuel. Unfortunately, this facility is under constant attack, besieged day and night by the very gang that Max encountered earlier. 

Led by a masked behemoth known as The Humongous (Kjell Nilsson), these bandits have been trying in vain to get their hands on the precious fuel, but have yet to breach the wall surrounding the plant. 

After rescuing one of their workers (who was ambushed by Humongous’ men and left for dead), Max is permitted inside the facility, which is run by a small group of desperate men and women, all of whom want to leave their "jobs" behind and start a new life. The question, of course, is how will they get past The Humongous and his collection of brigands? 

Fortunately, Max has a plan; in exchange for all the gasoline he can carry, Max agrees to help them escape by way of an abandoned truck he stumbled upon earlier, one big enough to carry all the fuel they'll need for their long journey. 

Of course, with The Humongous lurking nearby, pulling off this daring scheme is easier said than done.

The Road Warrior doesn’t spend a lot of time building up its various supporting characters, or filling us in on their back story; we never learn much about those inside the refinery, not even the Feral Boy, played by Emil Minty, who quickly befriends Max. It simply isn’t that kind of movie. 

What The Road Warrior does do (and very well, I might add) is get our hearts pounding with a collection of balls-out action scenes. Along with the opening sequence, where Max is pursued by some of The Humongous’ men, The Road Warrior wows us with a plethora of exhilarating moments, chief among them the finale, which sees Max barreling down the road in a big rig, attempting to outrun a dozen or so vehicles. 

Produced in the days before CGI, The Road Warrior relied on real cars, real crashes, and real excitement to tell its tale of a post-apocalyptic wasteland, and you will marvel at what director George Miller and his team managed to pull off.  

The ultimate thrill ride, The Road Warrior rarely slows down long enough to let you catch your breath, and I loved every pulse-pounding second of it!

#935. Mad Max (1979) - Spotlight on Australia

Directed By: George Miller

Starring: Mel Gibson, Joanne Samuel, Hugh Keays-Byrne




Tag line: "The Maximum Force of the Future"

Trivia: Because Mel Gibson wasn't well known at the time, he doesn't feature prominently in the U.S. Trailer, which instead focuses on the film's car crashes







Mad Max was the first in a trilogy, all made by the same director (George Miller) and starring the same actor (Mel Gibson). The two films that followed it: - 1981’s The Road Warrior and 1984’s Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, - were set in a world where law and order no longer existed, a barren, desolate wasteland controlled by roving marauders who would slit your throat for a gallon of gasoline.

Mad Max shows the origins of this decay, taking us back to a time when society hadn’t fully collapsed, but was headed in that direction

As the movie opens, Highway Patrolman Max Rockatansky (Gibson), an elite member of Australia’s Main Force Patrol Unit, is giving chase to the notorious Nightrider (Vincent Gil), a gang leader who has just escaped custody. During the high-speed pursuit, Nightrider is killed, and the remainder of his gang, now led by Toecutter (Hugh Keays-Byrne), decides to exact a little revenge on Max and his fellow officers.

When his partner, Goose (Steve Bisley), is burned alive in his car, Max seriously considers retiring from the Main Force Patrol. But before he can make up his mind, Toecutter and his cronies come after Max’s wife, Jessie (Joanne Samuel) and the couple’s young son (Brendan Heath).

Pushed to his breaking point, Max sets out to avenge the wrongs done to him, even if it means breaking the law he has sworn to uphold.

Mad Max is, first and foremost, an action film. The opening chase sequence, where Nightrider and his girlfriend (Lulu Pinkus) are on the run, is absolutely exhilarating, with director Miller bringing his camera as close to the speeding vehicles as possible. There are a few tremendous accidents along the way, including the complete destruction of a mobile camper, and the scene culminates with one hell of a fiery crash. Even when Mad Max switches to revenge mode, Miller maintains the fast pace he established at the outset, infusing these later scenes with just as much energy.

Along with the thrills, Mad Max also serves as an origin story for its title character, who in both The Road Warrior and Thunderdome would attain a mythic status. In the two subsequent movies, Max is a reluctant hero making his way across a post-apocalyptic landscape, a loner who keeps to himself, helping others only when he thinks there’s something in it for him.

He was much different in Mad Max; a loving father and husband, an officer of the law, and someone whose entire world was snatched away in an instant. To see the character’s evolution from honorable man to pariah was one of the most fascinating aspects of the trilogy, and while very few of the people he’d encounter after the events of this film would ever know the real Max, we understand him well enough.