Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga – action fireworks with flaws

Let me start off by saying that this review contains no spoilers. You only read information that’s known from the trailers that have already been released

I can only remember a few cinema visits where I’ve left the theatre as ecstatic as after Mad Max: Fury Road. George Miller’s vision of a grim dystopia where breakneck stunts met roaring V8 engines was truly exhilarating, and unrivalled since its release in 2015.

Even then, it was clear that director George Miller had found a woman in Furiosa whom he could build an entire franchise on. Near mute, but capable of anything, actress Charlize Theron, shaved head and all, made her way through the apocalyptic wastelands of Australia – and into the hearts of the audience.

Nine years later, after a number of production difficulties and a completely new cast, the promised spin-off is finally being released in cinemas. But where Miller focused primarily on visuals in Fury Road, he wants to tell a story in Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga. A story that goes deeper. A story that shows us the woman behind the warrior.

Furiosa’s story. Will the film meet our expectations?

The plot of Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga

Nobody knows exactly what drove humanity into the abyss. Maybe it was an illness. Global warming. Or a war for resources, followed by big bombs and a nuclear winter from which Australia’s Wastelands emerged.

Somewhere in there exists the Green Place, also known as, the Place of Abundance. It’s inhabited by a small group that lives in peace and harmony. But then a child is kidnapped by the rising warlord Dementus (Chris Hemsworth) and his forces. The secret of the Place of Abundance threatens to be exposed.

The child? Furiosa. When her mother’s captured and brutally murdered during a rescue attempt, the young girl embarks on a dark path that ends with a single goal: revenge. Revenge on Dementus. Even if he initially takes Furiosa into his own ranks as an adopted daughter. Dementus has big plans: he wants to overthrow Immortan Joe (Lachy Hulme), the most feared of all warlords.

Character study? Hardly. But…

There’s no doubt about it. Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga is a movie that only a visionary of action cinema like George Miller can create. It lasts almost two and a half hours. The crazy Australian hardly allows us to take a breather. A real hellish trip through orange deserts and steel-blue skies. Just like in Mad Max: Fury Road. It’s supposed to have «more story». Yet, Miller still relies on what he does best – action spectacle.

Never mind. Miller already avoided conventional storytelling in Fury Road. If you can even call it a story at all. It was one epic chase that happened to last exactly two hours. As if Miller had simply written down every crazy idea that had occurred to him in the 20 years since his last Mad Max film. And then only to later pack them more or less randomly into a single movie. It shouldn’t have worked at all, yet it hit like a cinematic atomic bomb.

Furiosa isn’t that much different. At least this time Miller makes an attempt to give the story at least a little structure by dividing it into five chapters. It’s still unconventional. But refreshing. Who needs a beginning, middle and end? Or a suspenseful arc that first introduces the characters and only then slowly escalates their conflicts before everything comes to a cathartic climax at the end?

Miller’s Furiosa wants to do its own thing. It takes less than three minutes for Miller, who also wrote the story, to set off the first big chase at breakneck speed. And then it doesn’t put the breaks on from then onwards. With a breathtaking editing cadence and wild tracking shots, he keeps up the pace for two and a half hours – always in Furiosa’s perspective. First played as a child by Alyla Browne. Then, from around the middle of the movie, as a young adult by Anya Taylor-Joy. A worthy replacement for Charlize Theron, by the way.

Nevertheless, what could almost have been a great character study of the iconic warrior is ultimately «just» a great action spectacle. But an incredible one!

The gaga world of George Miller

Yes, Miller still relies on opulently staged stunts with flying cars and roaring engines that happily break every cinematic convention. For example, when Immortan Joe’s infamous War Rig, a moving fortress of a tanker truck, is attacked by Dementus’ biker gang with wind machines strapped to their backs. Naturally, the moving fortress defends itself with the white-painted War Boys, that is, Immortan Joe’s fanatical followers. Witness me! they then shout, before fearlessly launching themselves at the bikers in a suicide dive, armed with explosives.

Fury Road flashbacks. You get a warm and cosy feeling in your stomach. Nostalgia perhaps?

It’s no secret that George Miller likes such extremes. This doesn’t just begin and end with the action in his Mad Max films. This also applies to his characters. Dementus, for example, played by a Chris Hemsworth in top form, leads his biker gang in a Ben-Hur-like chariot with a full, red pirate beard and wild mane. However, his car isn’t pulled by horses, but by unmanned motorcycles.

How cool is that?

His goal? To dominate the Wastelands. Dementus’ first attempt to attack Immortan Joe directly in his citadel fails. So he sets his sights on Gas Town, a fortress known for its huge oil reserves. The gasoline used to drive around in the post-apocalypse has to come from somewhere. The third major fortress in the Wastelands is the Bullet Farm – the place where ammunition comes from. Self-respecting warlords control at least one of these sites and trade with the others. Bandits live along the routes, dangerous and relentless, disrupting transactions and making their own profit from them.

Do you recognise what Miller’s doing? Worldbuilding. There wasn’t much of that in Fury Road. There is here, though. Miller’s world actually feels more real – more inhabited – than in Fury Road.

Complaints? Yes, I’m afraid.

Can Furiosa hold a candle to Fury Road with all this praise? No. Unfortunately not. As hard as Miller tries to surpass his earlier action, to structure the story better and to animate his world – for my taste, he relies far too much on computer effects. Much more than in Fury Road. But above all, it’s more visible.

It’s not as if there was no CGI in Fury Road. The opposite in fact. But it was so well hidden that most people bought Miller’s statement that his movie almost got by without CGI. To be honest, there’s not a single shot in the whole movie that hasn’t been touched up somehow with computer effects.

I don’t want to criticise the use of computer effects in general. But here, they’re used in an unusually clumsy way. And it scratches the otherwise dazzling paintwork of Miller’s action vehicle. Especially when the characters are obviously shot against a green background and later inserted into a CGI painting. What’s more, Miller polishes the whole movie with a high gloss. Even when Furiosa, Dementus and others are covered in dirt, blood and oil stains. It doesn’t look real, but artificial. A disease of the digital cinema age that already plagued the Star Wars prequels.

To make matters worse, Miller also drifts stylistically in the direction of Bourne Identity when it comes to the editing cadence. Where in Fury Road the action is mostly celebrated in long, calm and uncluttered shots – no matter how insane the pace around it is – Furiosa sometimes cuts so wildly between its shots that I almost feel sick. Especially when Miller also increases the playback speed of the film twofold at certain points. He must have copied it from director of 300, Zack Snyder. I’m not a fan.

As a result, my adrenaline level rarely reaches the heights it did in Fury Road back then.