Ahhh, the classic post-apocolyptic thriller that sets the standard for post-apocolyptic thrillers. One tagline reads ‘In the future, cities will become deserts, roads will become battlefields and the hope of mankind will appear as a stranger’. I remember skipping school in the early 80’s to stay home and watch this one on cable, Such a great movie that has lost none of it’s appeal even after 20 plus years. This is the story of a man, once an officer of the law, who now roams the highways of post-apocolyptic Australia searching for gasoline and maybe a reason to exist. In this time, gasoline is the most valuable commodity, so much so men kill for it. Mel Gibson plays Max, in the role that made him known worldwide. During his travels, he comes across a small settlement that is actually producing petroleum. This settlement is besieged by a group of motorized, murdering, mauraders who want all the fuel. Knowing that the fuel is life, the people in the settlement defend the fuel, but their strength and ability to hold out against this powerful force is becoming less and less each day. Max strikes a deal with them for all the fuel he can carry provided he can get a truck for them so they can haul their tanker of gas out of the wasteland and find a better life in a fabled coastal land. Max fufills his end of the bargin, and leaves the settlement with his fuel, but is attacked and left for dead. Having lost his car, he decides to drive the tanker. This sets up one of the most amazing highway battles ever filmed, as the settlers have turned the tanker into a moving fortess, and the marauders will stop at nothing to stop the tanker and get the gas. This movie is what I would call a nearly pefect example of excellent casting, story, dialogue, plot, script, wardrobe, etc. to make up a near perfect movie. Everything in the movie works so well that your entire attention is focused on the screen, even after multiple viewings. This is actually the second in a trilogy, Mad Max being the first and Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome being the third, but, in my opinion, this one is the best. It’s raw, gritty, sometimes humourous and competely enthralling. On a side note, what’s up with Warner Brothers and their crummy cardboard packaging? It just seems so flimsy and cheap. And don’t look for a lot of extras with this release, just the full and widescreen versions and some production notes.
This just in…I heard George Miller and Mel Gibson are bringing Max back one more time in 2004 in Mad Max: Fury Road……
This movie, the second in the Mad Max trilogy, is easily the best of the three. Visually, it’s very distinctive. The first movie showed a society breaking down in the post apocalyptic world. By this movie, it’s broken down. The first movie showed the immediate aftermath. There were still working phones, power lines, people trying to go on with their normal lives, etc. There was even a police force, of which Max was a member, trying to maintain order. Now, society has descended into complete anarchy. Civilization’s infrastructure has broken down completely. In the first movie you saw shops, service stations, hospitals. Now you see people scavenging in a wrecked world. Max’s car is no longer a gleaming black vehicle, but a delapidated, dirty old beater, its engine still in top shape, but its interior stripped, and its body covered in dust, battered and old. Max’s leather police uniform is no longer immaculate, but torn and patched. Visually, this movie set a new standard, and like “Star Wars” and “Blade Runner”, changed the way movies in its genre were made. Even the setting works in telling the story. Where the first film featured country with trees and green grass, this movie is set in a blasted desert, further accentuating the sense of collapse.
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And this movie’s quality doesn’t end with the visuals. It has a great, exciting story, very reminiscent of the pulp adventures of old. It’s hero, a wanderer, a uniquely skilled and deadly loner, is a mythic archetype. The actors are all perfectly cast. Mel Gibson, with only a few lines of dialogue, turns in a compelling, emotional performance, showing the transformation from the happy, loving husband and father of the first film, to the wounded, burnt out shell of a man seen here. In this film, Max is a tough, fang-scarred old wolf, who has absolutely nothing to live for, but whose survival instinct, combined with his toughness and resourcefulness, just won’t let him quit.
The other characters in this movie are also unique and memorable. Bruce Spence’s gyro captain is a likeable opportunist. Mike Preston’s Papagallo is the determined, idealistic leader, in over his head, but trying his best. Vernon Wells makes a great, flamboyant villain. And Kjell Nilsson is the Humungus, whose face we never see; leader of a vicious band of trash, whose hulking physique, and savage followers seem at odds with his articulate speech, and ostensibly conciliatory manner. The story and characters elevate this movie over the host of low budget imitators that followed. But the film is not short on action either. And George Miller was a gifted director who put to film what remain the best car chase scenes ever shot, right down to this day. Action lovers will find plenty of excitement with this movie. It’s a terrible shame the third film wasn’t very good, as it killed the prospects of a long running series. This is sad because Max, wandering lone wolf that he is, is a character who, like James Bond, Sherlock Holmes, or the Conan of the old pulp magazines is eminently suitable to a series of adventures.
