4 Stars

In the nine years since its release, Mad Max: Fury Road, George Miller’s return to his iconic post-apocalyptic Wasteland, has become this titan of the film world. A film plagued by a chaotic film shoot that would’ve ended the careers of many involved and should have resulted in a major failure of a film. History has since proven that’s not the case, with the film receiving near-universal acclaim, grossing nearly $400 million at the box office and went on to win six Oscars. Seek out the outstanding “Blood, Sweat & Chrome: The Wild and True Story of Mad Max: Fury Road” by author Kyle Buchanan for an in-depth look at the troubles of the film’s production. While following up Fury Road is a seemingly impossible task — who can possibly top the Doof Warrior shredding a flame-throwing guitar atop an armored car, Miller’s latest in the Mad Max universe, a prequel to that film’s breakout character played by Charlize Theron, is thankfully an entirely new beast. 

Courtesy Warner Bros

We first meet young Furiosa (played by Alyla Browne before transitioning to Anya Taylor-Joy) as a young child picking fruit in her home of the Green Place before she’s snatched away by bandits who deliver her to the theatrical warlord Dementus (Chris Hemsworth). After her mother (Charlee Fraser, Anyone But You) is brutally killed after attempting to rescue her from Dementus’ clutches, Furiosa vows revenge on the Warlord who took everything from her. Her journey takes her to the Citadel ruled by Immortan Joe (Lachy Hulme, taking over for the late, Hugh Keays-Byrne) and his army of slavish War Boys. After a tense standoff results in a trade, leaving Dementus in control as Gastown, Furiosa plots her quest for revenge, which includes her largely becoming mute, passing as a male, and seeking to gain a position of power under Immortan Joe’s rule, all in the hopes that she will someday make it back home.

If Fury Road was a nonstop adrenaline-fueled chase, Furiosa is a sprawling mythic odyssey spanning over 15 years. Some will be taken aback by Miller’s refusal to tread the same territory from Fury Road, opting for a grander, more deliberately paced narrative, one divided into five distinct chapters. In fact, Furiosa feels closest to Miller’s original Mad Max than any of the other entries. Running at 148 minutes, this epic is given room to breathe and allows its highly tactile desert Wasteland to seep its way into your subconscious. We spend much of the first hour with young Furiosa, locked in a cage ridden around by Dementus’ nomadic army, and his quest to rule everything in his path. We’re not even introduced to Anya Taylor-Joy until nearly an hour into the film.

Being a prequel, Miller precisely builds upon the mythology established in his previous four films in the franchise, but particularly in Fury Road. Witnessing the earlier days of Immortan Joe’s ruling of the Citadel, the War Boys and their haphazardous supply runs, Miller retroactively enriches Fury Road, a film that was already poetic in its narrative simplicity, in both a thematic and narrative sense. As we witness the calculated depths of survival Furiosa goes through in order to get revenge and eventually make her way home, we also get a further sense of the world around her, the inner workings, politics and how she came to be an Imperator to Immortan Joe. 

Furiosa‘s look and feel is often reminiscent of a coked-up David Lean picture, while the final chapter feels particularly rooted in Spaghetti western influences. Miller wisely doesn’t attempt to simply recreate similar sequences from Fury Road, but an entire new arsenal of set pieces that vary in terms of style and setting. The set pieces here are extravagant and while never topping the “oh my God, how are they doing that?” moments from its predecessor, they excel in how tense and methodical Miller ratchets up tension. A chase and subsequent shootout at the Bullet Farm is maybe the film’s most tense sequence which concludes in heartbreaking fashion. One sequence known as the “stowaway sequence” is gobsmacking in its execution and so deeply thrilling. This sequence features some insane vehicle designs – from motorcycles and hang gliders, with even the undercarriage of a War Rig getting its share of action. You know when someone says “use the Bobby Knocker”, that can only mean total destruction and carnage. Furiosa does also contain bits of Miller’s singularly idiosyncratic sense of humor including moments of War Boys using piss for handy tools and more than one instance of nipple violence.

 Courtesy Warner Bros

Like Tom Hardy picking up after Mel Gibson’s original Max, Anya Taylor-Joy carries her own semblance of the character while laying the foundation to come to in Charlize Theron’s portrayal in Fury Road. Theron’s Furiosa was full of melancholy that haunted her every move. Taylor-Joy’s Furiosa is more stoic and reserved, while carrying that same driven sense of motivation. Her silent rage is palpable from her deliberate physicality, moving with purpose, as if you can see her calculating her next 20 steps. Tom Burke (The Souvenir, Mank) plays Praetorian Jack, a War Rig driver who forms a bond with Furiosa, with the two eventually becoming partners. He shows Furiosa the ins-and-outs of driving a War Rig, while forging an understated, but profound emotional connection. Miller allows for these longing, albeit brief, moments of peace for the character that adds greater depth and nuance. It’s Burke’s performance that gives this post-apocalyptic epic its much-needed sense of humanity.

The film’s breakthrough performance comes from a career-best Chris Hemsworth. Riding around in a chariot composed of three motorcycles, his Dementus is perhaps Miller’s most fierce and compelling Mad Max villain to date. There’s a shot of a crazed Hemsworth driving an armored six-wheel monster truck that looks like he came straight off the set of Rob Zombie’s Dragula music video. In fact, the character’s casual sadism would make him a proper fit to join The Devil’s Rejects. This isn’t a character that is all show and empty theatrics. His theatricality masks his inner self-torment, opting to be a showman at every possible moment. He carries around the decrepit teddy bear of his deceased children as a reminder of what he’s lost, and hoping that his never-ending quest to conquer will somehow fulfill the hole that exists within him. You get the sense both Furiosa and Dementus are two sides of the same coin, two wounded souls exacting vengeance out of their own similar sense of grief. There’s almost a Batman/Joker dynamic between them, resulting in a climactic showdown that is one of the finest staged confrontations of Miller’s eclectic career.

Courtesy Warner Bros

George Miller has proven once more why he is one of cinema’s greatest mad men with Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga. A prequel that further enriches its predecessor, this is a sprawling and ambitious odyssey that is packed with some of modern cinema’s best filmmaking. It’s also Miller who dares to dream of hope amidst a sea of chaos, which rings truer now than it did nearly a decade ago.

Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga is now playing in theaters.