'Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga': Simple Theme and Thrilling Scenes

After a nine-year hiatus, the highly anticipated new installment of the "Mad Max" franchise finally made its grand debut at the Cannes Film Festival this year. The preceding installment, "Mad Max: Fury Road," also held its world premiere at Cannes back in 2015.

The film opens with an inverted map of Australia. The camera gradually descends into a lush oasis in the midst of a vast desert in an overhead shot. Two young girls are playing by the edge of the oasis when they spot a group of invaders on heavy motorcycles approaching their secret location. Keeping her guard up, one of the girls immediately runs back to their camp to warn the others and quickly sets up the first line of defense. Her name is Furiosa and the title of this new film is "Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga." Furiosa is also the main character in "Mad Max: Fury Road," which means that the latest Mad Max installment is a prequel to the 2015 film, focusing on Furiousa's backstory.

fgeIf the sets of "Waterworld" were completely reversed, it would naturally resemble the world of "Dune." Though it's uncertain whether it was directly inspired by Frank Herbert's epic 1960s sci-fi novel "Dune," the universe of "Mad Max," directed by George Miller and produced by Byron Kennedy in 1979, shares a similar desert landscape and comparable dystopian elements and is also characterized by vast, endless sand dunes. Specifically, it represents a post-apocalyptic and dystopian vision of future Australia. This setting solidifies the "Mad Max" series as the definitive representative of sci-fi films about wastelands.

In this universe, there are neither hard nor soft sci-fi elements. The entire focus is on designing and upgrading heavy vehicles, including motorcycles, modified off-road vehicles, and large machinery. In an era where gender identities and sexual orientations are becoming increasingly diverse, I'll simply refer to Miller, the engineer who custom-builds the vehicles and art scenes for this series, and its ardent fans as "mechanophiles."

I'm not a fan of the series, but in "Mad Max: Fury Road," I'm still astonished by the sight of the military bassist strapped to the front of a massive truck, furiously playing heavy metal, in "The War Boys." Heavy metal and heavy machinery are indeed a match made in heaven. Of course, I've seen similar wild scenes in real life. At some weddings in the Balkans, in addition to firing guns into the air and throwing money indiscriminately, sometimes, large bulldozers carrying Gypsy bands playing loud, celebratory brass music can be seen lumbering across the venue.

In "Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga," the truck with a bassist strapped to the front makes only a brief appearance. The spotlight shifts from the ostentatious vehicle to a massive long-haul truck driven by the supporting character Praetorian Jack, an all-terrain vehicle (ATV) with the main antagonist cum warlord of the wasteland, Dementus behind the wheel, then to a dual-engine motorcycle piloted by Furiosa in the final stage of her revenge.

These vehicles, as crucial as the movie characters themselves, become like NPCs in the massive action set pieces. For instance, in the fourth act, the dozens of motorcycles chasing Furiosa can't generate sufficient power to climb the hill and have to take a detour, while Dementus' ATV effortlessly scales to the summit, becoming the most efficient pursuer. If this series were used as inspiration for the design of a wasteland-themed amusement park, the ATV would likely become the most sought-after ride.

In fact, Las Vegas already offers large outdoor venues where tourists can drive heavy machinery and even operate excavators to demolish waste objects. Given Australia's vast, sparsely populated landscapes, creating a "Mad Max Park" isn't an impossible dream.

Spoilers Ahead:

The latest two-and-a-half-hour installment of the "Mad Max" franchise is divided into five chapters, with the standout vehicle scenes concentrated in the third and fourth. The first two chapters focus on the young Furiosa, who is captured and grows up as a displaced child with Dementus' motorcycle gang and Immortan Joe's tribe. These early chapters build her skills and set the stage for her later quest for revenge, developing the narrative energy for the ensuing plot developments.

For viewers who expect richly developed characters like those in "Joker" in genre films, "Furiosa" might disappoint them, as both the protagonists and antagonists are rather one-dimensional. The beautiful Anya Taylor-Joy's portrayal of Furiosa benefits from minimal dialogue, which helps mask any shortcomings in her performance. However, Chris Hemsworth's character, Dementus, is so lacking in depth and completely devoid of the captivating villainous charm that Immortan Joe has in "Mad Max: Fury Road," making him easily replaceable by AI models.

However, the straightforward revenge theme and linear plot development of "Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga," much like its simplistic characters, foster a mindlessly thrilling atmosphere under the cover of continuous, explosive, and meticulously crafted action scenes. This direct approach might be Miller's resolute expression of the wasteland world.