Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga
A movie review by Alex First
Alongside a stellar performance from Anja Taylor-Joy, the production values in the strident revenge thriller Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga are astounding.
It is a 15-year odyssey of a young girl snatched who will stop at nothing to find her way home.
In that time, the feisty 10-year-old becomes a resourceful and industrious young woman.
Furiosa (Taylor-Joy) is stolen from what is known as the Green Place of Many Mothers.
She falls into the hands of a great Biker Horde, led by the warlord Dementus (Chris Hemsworth).
Sweeping through the Wasteland, they come across the Citadel, presided over by The Immortal Joe (Lachy Hulme).
While these two tyrants fight for total domination, time and again Furiosa’s survival is on the line.
She undertakes many trials that test her resilience.
Director George Miller returns to the well he created 45 years ago with Mad Max.
He wrote the script alongside Nick Lathouris (Mad Max: Fury Road).
I gorged myself on the visual, sound, costume and make-up spectacle that are the defining characteristics of the prequel to Mad Max: Fury Road.
Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga looks and sounds magnificent.
My strong recommendation is to see this film on the biggest screen possible, with the clearest and most potent audio.
For those close to an IMAX cinema, you couldn’t do better.
I loved the stunt work and the creation of the cobbled-together vehicles (cars, bikes and trucks) that abound in the movie, crashing and bashing into each other.
The stark desert landscape, with endless sand and rocky outcrops, is a perfect setting to a world that is in chaos. Much of it was shot around Broken Hill.
Ferocious and unrelenting, Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga lays bare the brutality of the Wasteland that is front and centre in the film.
With verbiage kept to a minimum, what Furiosa offers is action aplenty over nearly two and a half hours.
That amounts to a surfeit of chases and combat, with inevitable thrills and spills.
Anja Taylor-Joy tackles the lead role with verve and gusto, and she doesn’t take a backward step.
She is mighty impressive as she carries herself with steely-eyed determination and a ferocity of spirit.
So, too, Alyla Browne as Furiosa’s younger iteration.
Chris Hemsworth is full of bluster, a blowhard in his portrayal of Furiosa’s nemesis, who doesn’t give a tinker’s cuss about anyone other than himself.
He is a cartoon-like villain and strong man.
Tom Burke makes his mark as a highly capable, tough and persistent character with a conscience, Furiosa’s running mate Praetorian Jack.
Bravo George Miller. The dystopian world view inherent in Mad Max has been spectacularly realised anew.
Rated MA, Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga scores an 8 out of 10. 148 mins
