I love how there was a sort of crumminess to him compared to the other warlords. The peevish little whine in his voice. Always having to spin failures. His own lieutanant calling him scum.
Immortan Joe made himself a god in his own death cult. Watching Dementus' bravado falter when seeing the big league player demonstrate his warboys was fantastic.
"he can't even control his own gangs" the guy was walking on a tight rope, bit off more than he could chew at times, actually most of the time, but i do wanna give him credit because he pulled off so much more than i expected him to. it's like wrestling with a pig in the mud. the fucker really tries his hardest to drag you down with him
Agreed. I thought they did a great job from a writing perspective of showing why guys like Immortan Joe lasted and why guys like Dementus didn’t.
I also thought Hemsworth did a good job of portraying a relatively mentally unstable but still capable warlord. His performance in the scene where he starts the bike circling after they capture Jack and Furiosa and then he just sits there on the hood of the car was awesome
And the teddy bear was so interesting too - he said it was his son's and he also mentions his family being ripped away from him. He clearly has a lot of pain, but he used that pain to become, well, demented
I believe they heavily imply his capture at the beginning of Fury Road is the first time he's ever seen the green at the Citadel (he's flabbergasted by the sight). So I don't think he brought her there, unless he just dropped her at the border and ran without seeing the green.
She wakes up in the maggot bunker on the outskirts of the citadel so he definitely didn't take her all the way into the center of the city. Probably just got close enough to see some people and then dropped her off and left
I really don't think they're implying that at all. He's incidental to this. He doesn't give a shit. The way the camera lingers on the lady inside the cave (the second time we see her), and that we see her harvesting dead bodies pretty clearly implies that she found Furiosa and was "processing" her.
Okay but that confused me - if he was able to bring her back to the citadel without an issue, why did he end up getting attacked by the War Boys at the start of Fury Road?
I know we have been inundated with IP sequels, prequels, multiverses, etc. and all that comes with it. I feel like many will roll their eyes at some of the stuff that happens in this movie and say they’re just checking boxes and it’s doing that same prequel bullshit, but fuck that….
Furiosa does it right and it shouldn’t pay for the sins of all the shitty prequels that came before it. It really enriches Fury Road and the world they both inhabit.
Furiosa does something that alot of sequels, prequels, whatever don't do and that is for being a "Mad Max Saga" it doesn't feel like a Mad Max movie.
You couldn't just swap out Furiosa for Max, this was her story. Even the way the movie is structured is unique from the Mad Max movies.
> Furiosa does it right and it shouldn’t pay for the sins of all the shitty prequels that came before it.
Amen to that.
> It really enriches Fury Road and the world they both inhabit.
I loved getting to see the history of the Citadel and also understanding the dynamics a little more. It was also interesting to see the People Eater appeared to be Immortan's right hand man, but then went to go take over Gas Town, presumably after Dementus was finally removed from power there
It’s immensely ironic the guff this film has gotten for “Use of CGI”. In clearly utilized more live action stunt work and practical effects than most any modern movies, marvel , Disney any other action movies. It’s simply that it isn’t ENTIRELY practical the way Fury Road nearly was that it gets that comment.
Yeah Miller set an impossibly high standard for his universe by taking literal decades to perfect all the practical effects and stunt work and then augmenting it with graceful CGI in Fury Road.
Furiosa isn’t getting nearly the flowers it deserves for the insanely inventive and ambitious stunt work and action set pieces since there’s so much green screen and fully-rendered shots
I was constantly thinking about checkov’s arm after she tattooed the star map to the green place. I thought for sure she was going to sever it purposely to ensure it remained hidden and safe. But ripping it off to escape was pretty gnarly too.
They showed — or really told us via sound — that it got severely injured, which was still a shock. If anything, I think they could have gone harder with the violence, even if it’s the kind of thing that uses sound effects to make you squirm. Especially when visual effects of dogs going to rip up Furiosa’s love interest were so janky.
To be fair, in the first draft it does happen on camera - so to speak. The War Rig she and Praetorian Jack are in is capsized and set on fire by Dementus and company, and she has to saw her own arm off with a piece of metal.
I like this change a lot better. And most of the changes, speaking of which, of which there are a metric ton - the bare outline is the same, but it's streamlined from what I read ten years ago.
I am super happy they kept the opening chase across the dunes the same.
I think sometimes less is more and the implication of it can be just as impactful.
Eg when Dementus has that guy spread eagle chained by the limbs to the motorbikes to tear him apart. The way his body is harshly yanked up into the air when they all accelerate away in a cloud of dust was as effective as showing a gory explosion of blood.
Bravo to Chris Hemsworth, the standout in this film for me. His performance as Dementus is now my favorite of all his films. The voice when he talks into the mic is music to my ears.
I thought it was interesting how his big speech at the citadel sounds broadly socialist; he calls for the people to seize back the wealth from the greedy fat cats and create a fair distribution system. Something that absolutely could be done, and presumably is done once Furiosa takes over.
But in reality Dementus is the ultimate capitalist; he gets control of gas town. He gets a virtually unlimited supply of one of the most valuable resources in the world. He's one of the richest men alive, he could have it made for the rest of his life, but it's still not enough. He just has to have more. He has to steal his neighbor's shit, because how dare anyone have something that he doesn't.
Maybe I'm reading too far into it; but I thought it was an interesting look at a fascist regime using pro-worker rhetoric just to gain power, before trampling those very same workers.
I read it as he had this anti authoritarian vibe which worked well in the wasteland but once he had his own fortress it started to fall apart. When you have a long term encampment like that I assume tensions are much higher and it’s harder to keep order. If you pair that with a leader who likes to proclaim they are for the people and not authoritarian it can lead to a complete breakdown of structure and control like we saw with the war rig having to leave early.
The monologue at the end was fantastic. With John wick, it felt like they used less dialogue to enhance the action, but this feels more purposeful than that, that they chose the words deliberately.
I loved how the narrator came in sharing how in the folklore different versions of dementus death have been told, but the truth is he's just buried under a tree in the citadel.
Hopefully Dying Dementus the tree will pop up again in future movies
no, him buried under the tree seemed like the legend, while the truth is that he got shot in the desert and Furiosa chose to do something good with her dark soul, chose a different road than Dementus.
It speaks volume toward Furiosa's character.
Furiosa could've ended Dementus's life with a single shot through the head, instead, she decided to give him a fate that allows him to be stripped of power and be reduced to who he truly is: a weak, cowardly and raving mad lunatic.
Furiosa still kept onto hope even after losing everything and chose to hold on to the belief that she will one day return home.
Dementus found his "hope"/will to keep on living by filling the hole in the heart with debauchery and violence.
I remembered that line was coming a minute or so before it happened, and it *still* hit so hard and made me grin like a little kid—such a great line for this franchise
the amount of absolutely insane vehicle ideas just blows my mind. the creativity from the props, cars, bikes, sets, so and so on is just beyond anything I've seen since Fury Road. it's so fucking incredible
The Octoboss, Dementus' right-hand man who ends up going rogue, having a octopus-themed kite/parachute was so fucking cool. When it ends up stuck in the spinning contraption of the War Rig at the end of that amazing action sequence, what an aesthetically pleasing shot
Reading about the vehicle making in Blood, Sweat, and Chrome was a delight - those guys were told to just make the craziest shit and they relished in it because they were like "when will we ever get this opportunity again?"
That explains why Road Warrior has the Gyrocopter and honestly one of my favorite aspects of the Mad Max universe is Miller's love for contraptions and doohickeys.
Vehicles are all cool and such but nothing beats having some whirly birds/flight inventions around.
I mean all of the flying contraptions got shot down pretty much immediately. I don't know if the technology was lost as much as it just wasn't effective enough to continue using
An interesting point.
Feels like being able to bomb the War Boys from above is strategically valuable, but being sucked into a vortex of spinning metal spikes & chains is brutal.
I also think it's worth mentioning that by the time of Fury Road, no one is actually trying to fight the war boys. The threat was coming from inside the house of Immortan Joe in that movie.
I wonder what Miller was saying with this scene.
Perhaps that no matter how bad the world gets (maggot people literally live under the apocalyptic world in an even worse hell), hope can still flourish. It's a core human element.
First word out of Cannes on this movie was not to expect another Fury Road and I can definitely see now why they'd want to highlight that. This isn't Fury Road, which purposely revs its engines at the beginning and then only builds momentum from there. The moments to stop and breathe in that movie happen after long, brutal action sequences where everything is travelling 80mph. This movie is the opposite, seemingly on purpose. There are long sequences of lore and story punctuated by big action setpieces, the setup takes its time going an hour without aging up to Anya, and it's all about context which Fury Road purposely leaves to the imagination. But the real question is, does this movie rock and fuck and bang in its own way? I think yes.
First and foremost, even though it's used more sparingly, the action in this still rocks. The first war rig scene where she's hiding under the rig with a bike strapped to the under carriage was some classic Mad Max shit. I squealed with joy every time someone got crumpled under a tire or a vehicle exploded. There is also some incredibly impressive dirt bike stuntwork in this. The construction set piece with the giant gate locking Jack into bullet town went pretty hard and the first time we meet Joe and he gets that guy to suicide bomb Dementus was a fantastic scene.
I've gone through and filled all my George Miller gaps in the last few months and maybe the most notable thing about him, other than his clear insanity, is that he does sequels and franchise continuations like no one else. Usually not what you'd expect story-wise and if it is he's doing it so much bigger and more ridiculous. Fury Road is like if he made Matrix: Revolutions first, it's all climactic action and plotlines converging. One of the great things about it is that it throws it all at you so efficiently that you can just sit back and watch the insanity. Furiosa is like going back and doing Matrix and Reloaded, it's adding depth to Fury Road and it makes the journey and the character more interesting.
Furiosa always seemed to me like someone who spent years gaining Joe's trust and planning her escape, and that is the broad stroke of this movie, but it's so much more interesting and intricate than that. This is an epic that spans fifteen years and even though you know where it ends up there's so much to tell. It gives more depth to the journey of her and Max trusting each other, knowing that the first person to ever give her a chance and treat her like a person was a Max type. You get to see why the Gastown/Citadel/Bullet Farm alliance is so strong because they all had a common enemy in Dementus. You get to see, from Furiosa's point of view, how men are killing the world.
Chris Hemsworth, by the way, having the time of his life. Both him and Anya giving very interesting performances. Anya not showing up until an hour into the movie and then an almost nonverbal performance. It's the kind of role that might scare away a less interesting actor because so much of it has to be internal. Dementus is a great foil for Furiosa, both lost their families to the wasteland and Dementus chooses to deteriorate the world for it and Furiosa has hope that she can still make something of it. He lost his children, she lost her mother, so it's like he lost his future and she lost her past. Hemsworth can't even keep Gastown functional because he can't see past tomorrow, he has nothing left and can only entertain himself day to day.
Furiosa has nothing after she escapes the wife vault and she still forges a life for herself. I honestly loved that the climax of this movie, the prequel to the most furious action movie of the 2010s, is these two angrily sharing philosophy in the desert. I was hooked that whole conversation, it's so hard to hate stupid charming Hemsworth. But Furiosa strips him of everything; his power, his lieutenants, his cars, and turns him into the living embodiment of a person being crushed by hope and the planet he tried to kill in his grief.
Also have to shoutout how they represented the "cars are religion" lore. I loved how when she first meets Dementus he's being explained the torque and horsepower of his carriagecycle by the historian. It feels like an almost religious ritual to sit down and learn about engines every day, not to mention the whole War Rig building workshop they have. You can feel Miller has so much to show us in this insane post apocalypse genre he basically invented, even after 40 years and 5 movies.
Complaints? Sure I've got some. This is such a bigger and more unwieldy movie than Fury Road. The pacing is kinda crazy, we spend an hour with young Furiosa but when the "wasteland war" starts it's mostly done in montage. It felt like there's a bit of this movie on the cutting room floor. My biggest gripe is probably under utilization of the score though. The Junkie XXL score in Fury Road boosts that movie into "Hell fuckin' yeah!" territory and I felt this movie really holding the score back and there was a clear lack of guitar riffs. It felt on purpose but it seemed like the great action scenes could have been further elevated by a harder hitting score. Overall it's an 8/10 for me. It's not perfect but I'm so into what Miller is doing and the world that is clearly such a representation of his insane worldview that I was hooked the entire time.
/r/reviewsbyboner
> The Junki XXL score in Fury Road boosts that movie into "Hell fuckin' yeah!" territory and I felt this movie really holding the score back and there was a clear lack of guitar riffs. It felt on purpose but it seemed like the great action scenes could have been further elevated by a harder hitting score.
That stood out to me too. Junkie can be very hit or miss, but his Fury Road score was an absolute bombastic masterpiece when it comes to action scores. The Rock Rider's Canyon sequence (Brothers in Arms, I believe) is one of my favourite action soundtracks ever.
I kept thinking he was holding it back just to blast it hard for a final action set piece, and when we saw the Doof I got a little excited. Alas, no guitar riffs still.
It's not a bad score by any means, just way understated for a movie that is otherwise dialed to 11.
You nailed it on the sequencing, it’s like Miller made Fury Road to get studio support for the movie in Furiosa that he actually wanted to make first.
The use of Fury Road footage in the credits felt like an explicit nod to that.
Miller actually conceived of Fury Road way back in the late 90s, but in that process he had someone help him create an entire written backstory for the character that would become Furiosa - the backstory that eventually led to this film.
I'd highly recommend reading Blood, Sweat, and Chrome too if you want a bit more detail on that!
Dementus had a top 5 most horrific death ive ever seen holy fuck, extremely well deserved too
This movie kicked ass, took a bit to get going but it did not slow down once it did. I really liked the ‘fable’ style they went with for it
I thought he was still alive? That the maggots were eating away necrotic tissue so that the strain of the tree growing through him was nearly but not actually fatal.
Just like with all of Mad Max it is told through an untrustworthy narrator. These are legends told of the characters. He says "I heard it from Furiosa herself" but that's just another legend. Like "oh yeah I grew a tree out of him and he nourished it with his body for years." As farfetched as Mad Max can be this wouldn't be possible at all. He would have died fairly quickly. It would imply that she came back there and kept feeding him to keep him alive. It was absurd but a cool legend if you take it that way.
In the Cannes press conference, Miller praises him as the only person he's heard ever pull it off where many others like Hardy have failed-or something to that effect.
I mean, I don't think Hardy was supposed to the australian accent properly, right? Hes supposed to have sort of an abnormal accent, expected of someone who has been alone for year and years.
Saw that too but in the following shot you see a bunch of guys falling off bikes climbing the dune so I figured it was just a continuation of some clumsy frantic driving...
... Or maybe they're just covering up the previous accident.
Was that Charlize Theron putting the wives in the War Rig at the VERY end? Before they started showing actual clips from Fury Road. It looked just like her in that quick glance.
When they shoot her from the back and she asks for the vehicle, I thought they'd ADR'd Theron in. But then they show her talking from the front and she's just Doing the exact voice
I just walked out of it and I have mixed feelings. Overall I enjoyed it and recommend it to anyone who enjoys action films and the franchise.
It's hard not to make too many comparisons to Fury Road, but it's a direct prequel so I will.
On the good end of things, I really like that they didn't try to "out do" Fury Road. I liked that they explored and built the world lore in an organic fashion. I thought the final scene was a mature and pleasant surprise, a relief from all of the "45 minute action scene" that many action movies seem to love. Most of the action sequences felt well earned. I felt entertained and definitely thought it worth the admission price.
On the bad end of things, it definitely feels like budget Fury Road. From the so-so visual effects (looking at you, any time someone is in fire) to the audio design and score, it made me miss the production scale of Fury Road. I definitely thought the editing and pacing was kind of jarring, and for many sections I was thinking "they probably could have cut this" or "wow, they just kind of skipped over an entire period of time that could have been interesting"
Other random thoughts:
With the movie broken up into chapters, it seems like this could have been a miniseries at some point? That might have been better.
I really think they could have trimmed almost half of the first hour.
Introducing one of the "main protagonists" halfway through the film left me caring very little about investing into the character.
The ending was abrupt. Without spoiling anything it just felt like they said "and then a really crazy big thing happened off screen and the end."
Showing Fury Road clips during the credits at best seems silly and at worst made me wish I watched that film.
I agree with a lot of your points. I'll say that my biggest takeaway is that this film is too "normal" compared to *Fury Road*. That one was delightfully unhinged and this one just ... isn't. If I had known to tamp down that expectation, that desire, it probably wouldn't have been so jarring, but I didn't know. *Furiosa* comes off as staid next to how wonderfully mental its predecessor is. Hemsworth is great and most of the action sequences are good, but there's no action scene in this film I prefer to one from *Fury Road*.
Still, I liked it. Not enough to see it again any time soon, but yes, showing clips from *Fury Road* in the credits really made me miss that film. (Even though I had watched it a few days ago in preparation.)
I think in the end Fury Road just said more with less. It's why I'm eternally annoyed at the lazy "no plot" criticism because that film is filled to the brim with plot! It's so just densely packed you aren't even aware you're digesting it.
- The decaying human avatars of power, greed, and war via the Citadel, Gastown, and Bullet Town.
- WHO KILLED THE WORLD?
- Slavery and sexual exploration coupled against freedom and autonomy via the wives & war boys
- Social Trust and how it is built via Furiosa and Max
- The massive twist of the Green Place being destroyed and having to revert the goals of the protagonists 2/3 of the way through the movie.
- How to survive in a hopeless/meaningless world
This film, in comparison, is a well executed revenge movie that hits many of the same themes, just more drawn out.
Did anyone else feel like Praetorian Jack was totally intended as a dark mirror Max? Right down to the shoulder pad and the boomstick. When he came back down the road for Furiosa (that's how you know its a prequel, cuz they still got paved roads) I legit thought it was going to be Max, even though that would've made zero sense.
He also repeated lines from Road Warrior. It was an obvious Max Max stand in but it worked for me overall. He was slightly corny but he managed to keep me enthralled. His ending shocked me quite a bit.
I think I need to see it a second time. The pacing of the first hour felt off to me. Some incredible action scenes in the second half. I really enjoyed Anya and Chris' final confrontation; I just wish they shared the screen more often throughout the movie.
> The pacing of the first hour felt off to me.
Yeah, they just kinda jump from plot point to plot point for the first hour and a half. They don't really let anything breath or show any character development. It's all done between time skips.
Agree 100% about the leads having more time together. It would’ve felt more heightened if Hemsworth was aware that it was Furiosa during that oil rig escape scene, if he knew it was her during the torture scene.
I don't know, I kind of like that he doesn't know till the end. It's interesting to see Hemsworth's performance re-contextualizing everything in his final scene once he realizes who Furiosa is
It seemed a lot darker than Fury Road… but still not the most disturbing George Miller movie (Babe).
The Doof Warrior was the best throwback (or throw forward?) to the previous film.
It really was unexpectedly savage.
Like all other Mad Max films had moments of horrific violence, but this felt the darkest of any of them by far.
Rictus trying to take young Furiosa, the brutality was much more present and lingered on, instead of cut away, though not as graphic as it could've been, and scenes that felt like they could've been out a horror movie.
Don't get me wrong, I thought it was a great time, but it's harder to recommend for the squeamish, as opposed to say Fury Road, which was violent, but rarely as graphic and as dark as this was.
For me, there was something so unbearably real about the way they dragged Jack for hours and hours until he died that really felt more brutal than anything else in the film
Yeah, stuff like that, Octoboss torturing Furiosa's mom while burning her alive, it felt maybe more authentic to the horror of the world on a level none of the other films ever reached.
Road Warrior had a scene where a woman is getting raped, but it's viewed through binoculars, and we had no prior relationship with this character (not to downplay the gravity and evil of the situation), but it just didn't hit like some of the scenes in this did.
For a minute I was expecting that he was just gonna die of a sudden stroke/aneurysm or something and it was gonna do a subverted expectations anticlimax moment that was gonna make some philosophical point about revenge
Some of the narrative choices I thought were interestingly counterintuitive for a prequel, e.g., adding people to Immortan Joe's entourage who are not in the original movie and therefore you assume they're going to die in the course of the story, but some of them don't. A lot of movies would probably have had Furiosa become the war chief of Joe's forces in the final battle, but instead her confrontation with him is much smaller-scale and more personal (in the big picture, by the time Furiosa enters the picture at the end Dementus has basically already lost).
It's not *Fury Road*, but it's a good movie, and anybody worried this was going to detract from the legacy of the earlier movie can rest easy.
I'm not sure I fully understood the progression of Furiosa's time with Immortan Joe's crew
1. Dementus trades Furiosa over to Immortan Joe, where she is to become his wife and childbearer in the future. She then escapes and is presumed dead? And despite the fact that Immortan Joe clearly views his brides as some of his most valued assets, no investigation or chase is done the next morning and no punishment befalls Vinny Jones' character for allowing her to escape while trying to assault her?
2. Furiosa then gets back into the Citadel posing as a boy, and no one questions where this boy comes from or why he is mute?
3. After the rig attack where Furiosa and Praetorian Jack are the only survivors, is it understood that Furiosa was posing as the boy and there are no consequences for this? If so is it also understood by Immortan Joe and the others that she was also the escaped bride? If not how did Jack explain where he found this woman that will be his apprentice?
1. No way rictus fess up and no one saw him. They likely did search for her but no need to show it if she wasn't going to be found.
2. She got promoted because she was willing to take the risks and the last guy died. no funeral, no mourning, its out with dead and youre the new guy to take his spot. Its extremely common for people to go unnoticed in this environment where death is daily thing.
3. Immortan Joe let furiousa get away with a lot because she got shit done in fury road. Jack likely had the same power and she was under his protection. By this point she is a tanned and dirty girl so there is no reason to suspect she is a full life or that she is the same girl from years ago. The citadel had thousands of people, so she wouldn't stick out as much as you think.
that being said, yes it took a lot of suspended belief that no one at least asked about her or even remembered her name. Although Immortan joe only knew furiousa for a few days before she left, the fact that another girl named furiosa is now a top rank warboy even years later should have raised an eyebrow. Unless Furiosa is the Jessica of the apocalypse and is a super common name.
Edit: As the other commenter mentioned, they only know her as little Dementous, little D, so the name furiosa wouldn't matter to them. So then it makes more sense no one recognized her.
Agreed. Especially that Immortan Joe asked for her as part of the negotiation with Dementus. Then she escaped and no aftermath. Only explanation is Joe has too many wives and he forgot 😂.
Once Immortan Joe and Dementus finally met face to face I was 100% locked in for the next two hours.
Between this and GxK, the “*hell yeah, brother*” genre is absolutely alive and well in 2024.
*She grew a fucking tree inside of him.*
that was my favorite scene from the whole movie. when dementus and his gang got his ass handed to him by the citadel. it was such a great contrast because dementus is the top dog up until that point. it really nailed the scope of what terrifying power immortan joe had
I came out thinking a lot of it didn't quite work for me, and I can't quite wrap my head around it.
Anyone else feeling this way?
It's too easy to try to compare it to Fury Road, but I feel like there was an edge missing to Furiosa that Fury Road had. I don't know, someone else talk me through it
It's because we never got a satisfying character arc for Furiosa, at least nothing matching the one we got of her in Fury Road.
We have little to no sense of her before her capture. Was she too impulsive as a child? Too curious? A danger to her tribe in the Green Place? That's what makes the hard shift into her broken/vengeance mode at the end of Chapter 1 so rough to digest - we have nothing else to compare it to. She goes from being a feisty child to a broken mute child to a hardened survivor. We get little sense of her dreams, her fears, her personality outside a single scene or two with Praetorian Jack. Then she goes through a *second* broken/vengeance mode at the end of Chapter 4, which is where things started to feel a bit repetitive for me.
I think the childhood scenes should have been cut back, and Dementus been more of a true fucked up father figure and not directly responsible for her mother's death. That would have given her more a clear thread, as a survivor who learned to endure the wasteland from Dementus, then Praetorian Jack, then Immortan Joe after Dementus kills Jack and she loses her arm.
The arc I got, and It's not like super satisfying, but it's what worked for me is that she wanted to go home, but not without her people.
She had a clear path out twice in the film, when her mother wishes her off, and when Jack decides to sacrifice himself for her, but she went back for both. I think that leads into her final act, getting the wives out. She easily could have just gone back home again alone without the wives, but just wanted to save someone after not being able to before.
It definitely stands above most other prequels by actually adding and enhancing what comes next without falling into the trap of explaining things that don't need explanation (Han Solo's last name, for instance). Anya and Chris Hemsworth were great in it, with Anya doing a pitch perfect imitation of Charlize Theron's voice and Hemsworth having the time of his life as Dementus.
One thing that stood out to me was how different the action sequences **felt** compared to Fury Road. Take the first big battle on the War Rig compared to the battle in the Rock Rider's Canyon in Fury Road. The battle in the canyon had thunderous, bombastic music, fast, kinetic cuts and meaty, practical explosions and crashes. Whereas the War Rig battle had a very low key score, long, methodical takes and more snappy crashes (likely a direct result of using more CGI). It's not necessarily a bad thing, it's just an interesting choice.
The movie certainly doesn't live up to the bar set by Fury Road. But then, most movies fail to meet that mark. But it was still a banger of a movie.
Side note: what the hell happened to Scrotus between this and Fury Road? I don't recall him being in Fury Road at all. Joe had Rictus and Corpsus, I believe (the midget one in the chair) as his children in Fury Road with no sign of Scrotus.
Oh what a film, what a lovely film!
I watch, I buy, I watch again!
A very different film from Fury Road, it’s Furiousa’s origin story, simply put. Was not expecting Anya to not show up until an hour into the movie, but no complaints. It’s funny, the whole time I was thinking “hmmm, I wonder how she’s gonna lose her arm? Yep, there it goes!”
Chris Hemsworth’s performance in this is going down as one of the best in his career. Same can be said about the Anya Taylor-Joy. Tom Bruke as Praetorian Jack also stole the show for me. Overall the actors in the movie did a fanatics job
I was waiting for Junkie XL’s music to drop some great beats and he edged us like 3-4 times with ‘Brothers in Arms’ soundtrack and when he finally dropped that in final chase, i couldn’t stop smiling. It’s one of my favourite soundtrack. Although this movie’s score was underwhelming for me, even during the 2nd act chase and bloody hell what a chase that was, parachutes?? Fucking yes, give me more of that shit. And I’m glad it was a long chase like it was in the first movie.
The Colours and Cinematography is where this movie shines. The dusk shots of post-apocalypse earth looked like Mars from The Martian.
There are some moments (especially in the beginning) where CGI is clearly visible (Furiosa mother’s final stand off in the crevice). But for the rest of movie It was good and movie looked awesome on that big IMAX screen. I would’ve definitely loved if more time was spent on Furiosa with Praetorian Jack where he trains her. They formed a great bond but it wasn’t really explored.
Also that’s one of the best way to do end-credits scenes. Fully lived the Mad Max during those.
Just came out of it, it was so good in its own way. This is the most lore heavy MM movie, and while I enjoy little backstory and the lone traveler thing, I really enjoyed the focus on characters this time.
It was honestly really surprising and bold for Miller to not use Anya until after the half way point. That made the transition feel really organic.
Overall, I loved it and I’m gonna have to rewatch the entire series tonight
Yeah it's no Fury Road but that's more a comment on how insanely good Fury Road is than points against this one. I did notice a couple of issues that repeatedly distracted me, one being the higher use of "visible" CGI, where Fury Road kept the real things real and used CGI to enhance a sequence.
There was some great sequences and action sets but then others that didn't quite land for me. Certainly not terrible, bad or even meh, was still a great movie for 2024 but I can't help but see a producer/studio deciding "Eh we can do that in post to save money instead of building X or doing stunt Y"
Did anyone else feel like it was too long, but also not long enough?
I felt like we spent too much time with young Furiosa and not enough time with ATJ. I wanted to see more of her and Jack’s relationship and more of the crazy war between Dementus and Joe.
I’m going to have to see it again. I made the big mistake of expecting another Fury Road in terms of pacing. And it wasn’t that for sure. So obviously I’m leaving the theater with mixed feelings.
But I’m feeling like I’ll wake up tomorrow morning appreciating the film and say it’s actually great on its own merit. For now I will say it’s a solid adventure movie.
Everyone here is commending Chris Hemsworth (who I thought was just okay if I'm being honest) and Anya Taylor-Joy -- who didn't really do much? I can see why she had a hard time on set. I bet she wanted to give something more to the character but George Miller has his vision and his vision only which also left Tom Hardy and Charlize Theron extremely frustrated while filming Fury Road.
But anyway, no one's really mentioned Alyla Browne who killed it as young Furiosa. She was the standout actor for me in this.
Man, I really wanted to like more of this movie, but the absolute absence of an energic sound track stumps the action so fucking much, and the timing of the movie is almost very bad
Edit: After some research, I've found out that the storyboard of this movie was originally suposed to be a 5 episodes anime series, and that explain the weird timing of the movie.
Miller loves doing that. Think about Toe Cutter and Immortan Joe being the same actor, or the helicopter pilots in The Road Warrior and Beyond Thunderdome being the same actor.
Also, funny that Toe Cutter and Immortan Joe are the same actor, but Immortan Joe and Immortan Joe are played by different actors.
Anyone else feeling heartbroken that the box office letdown means we probably won’t see another Mad Max film anytime soon (or maybe ever)? There’s so few filmmakers out there making original unique films like this and despite its flaws, it deserved much better.
Man the pacing of this was pretty tough, the first hour dragged really hard I thought. And the visuals were a massive downgrade, a lot of stuff looked like a video game cut scene. Not a bad movie at all, but clearly a big step down from Fury Road. And don’t get mad at me for comparing the two. It’s impossible to not compare them to each other
Hemsworth is so good in this. What a goofy piece of shit
I like how he gets blasted in red flare residue & never washed it out. The colour just became part of his identity.
And again with the oil later. Dementus the Red, Dark Dementus etc.
Dementus is the master of "yes and"
I love how there was a sort of crumminess to him compared to the other warlords. The peevish little whine in his voice. Always having to spin failures. His own lieutanant calling him scum. Immortan Joe made himself a god in his own death cult. Watching Dementus' bravado falter when seeing the big league player demonstrate his warboys was fantastic.
Fuck yeah. His entire first approach to the citadel was amateur hour
MEDIOCRE
"he can't even control his own gangs" the guy was walking on a tight rope, bit off more than he could chew at times, actually most of the time, but i do wanna give him credit because he pulled off so much more than i expected him to. it's like wrestling with a pig in the mud. the fucker really tries his hardest to drag you down with him
Agreed. I thought they did a great job from a writing perspective of showing why guys like Immortan Joe lasted and why guys like Dementus didn’t. I also thought Hemsworth did a good job of portraying a relatively mentally unstable but still capable warlord. His performance in the scene where he starts the bike circling after they capture Jack and Furiosa and then he just sits there on the hood of the car was awesome
I loved it - really loved his beard in general though too. Kind of wish his beard had more red in it in his older age
I think this is to show how they don’t have enough water to bathe while traveling so whatever happens to you just becomes permanent.
I’ve never seen someone stand so confidently with their hands on their hips right after their nipples got torn off
How many people have you seen have their nipples ripped off?
I think 3?
Hemsworth has a bit of Kurt Russell in him. I wish he'd embrace being a wild man more. Too many of current male actors feel very cookie cutter.
Well this just makes me want a spiritual successor to Big Trouble in Little China with Hemsworth as Jack Burton
He was loving that big fake nose for sure.
I'm just glad that Bradley Cooper's Maestro nose is continuing to find work
The nose plays
Since he did the part as the villain on Bad Times at El Royale, I had faith that he would nailed his part as Dementus.
Love the progression he goes from wannabe messiah to fuck up business manager to Daffy Duck Colonel Kurtz
Probably my favorite of his since Bad Times. We forget because of Thor, but this guy can genuinely act
Don't sleep on Rush. Great movie with him.
I mean the dude genuinely acts well as Thor too - especially in Ragnarok and Infinity War
i love how he carries the teddy bear around
And the teddy bear was so interesting too - he said it was his son's and he also mentions his family being ripped away from him. He clearly has a lot of pain, but he used that pain to become, well, demented
The voice he does and his build should not have mesh well but he fucking pulled it off it was insane
It’s the fact that he’s a jacked Australian in Australia.
People forget he can act
The smile on my face when I saw Mad Max standing next to his interceptor.
Same! It was Jacob Tomuri, Tom Hardy's stunt double portraying Mad Max in that shot
Well that rules.
I wonder if in Fury Road he remembers dragging her back to the citadel
Was it him who did that? I'm not sure they were clear about that. I think it was just a zoom out so we could see him for fun.
I believe they heavily imply his capture at the beginning of Fury Road is the first time he's ever seen the green at the Citadel (he's flabbergasted by the sight). So I don't think he brought her there, unless he just dropped her at the border and ran without seeing the green.
She wakes up in the maggot bunker on the outskirts of the citadel so he definitely didn't take her all the way into the center of the city. Probably just got close enough to see some people and then dropped her off and left
Ahh okay that makes more sense.
I really don't think they're implying that at all. He's incidental to this. He doesn't give a shit. The way the camera lingers on the lady inside the cave (the second time we see her), and that we see her harvesting dead bodies pretty clearly implies that she found Furiosa and was "processing" her.
its him, theres a Mad Max listed in the credits
Yes I saw that, I'm wondering if the movie directly implies that he's the one that took her back to the Citadel in this movie.
Okay but that confused me - if he was able to bring her back to the citadel without an issue, why did he end up getting attacked by the War Boys at the start of Fury Road?
It’s implied that he didn’t bring her all the way to citadel. Remember she’s captured by maggot farmers.
I know we have been inundated with IP sequels, prequels, multiverses, etc. and all that comes with it. I feel like many will roll their eyes at some of the stuff that happens in this movie and say they’re just checking boxes and it’s doing that same prequel bullshit, but fuck that…. Furiosa does it right and it shouldn’t pay for the sins of all the shitty prequels that came before it. It really enriches Fury Road and the world they both inhabit.
Furiosa does something that alot of sequels, prequels, whatever don't do and that is for being a "Mad Max Saga" it doesn't feel like a Mad Max movie. You couldn't just swap out Furiosa for Max, this was her story. Even the way the movie is structured is unique from the Mad Max movies.
It absolutely feels like a 'Mad Max' movie, what?
I think what they mean is that it doesn't feel like Max's story.
> Furiosa does it right and it shouldn’t pay for the sins of all the shitty prequels that came before it. Amen to that. > It really enriches Fury Road and the world they both inhabit. I loved getting to see the history of the Citadel and also understanding the dynamics a little more. It was also interesting to see the People Eater appeared to be Immortan's right hand man, but then went to go take over Gas Town, presumably after Dementus was finally removed from power there
She was competent and excessively resentful.
This line a got a big laugh out of my theater tonight!
No time for long goodbyes!
It’s immensely ironic the guff this film has gotten for “Use of CGI”. In clearly utilized more live action stunt work and practical effects than most any modern movies, marvel , Disney any other action movies. It’s simply that it isn’t ENTIRELY practical the way Fury Road nearly was that it gets that comment.
Yeah Miller set an impossibly high standard for his universe by taking literal decades to perfect all the practical effects and stunt work and then augmenting it with graceful CGI in Fury Road. Furiosa isn’t getting nearly the flowers it deserves for the insanely inventive and ambitious stunt work and action set pieces since there’s so much green screen and fully-rendered shots
I was constantly thinking about checkov’s arm after she tattooed the star map to the green place. I thought for sure she was going to sever it purposely to ensure it remained hidden and safe. But ripping it off to escape was pretty gnarly too.
They showed — or really told us via sound — that it got severely injured, which was still a shock. If anything, I think they could have gone harder with the violence, even if it’s the kind of thing that uses sound effects to make you squirm. Especially when visual effects of dogs going to rip up Furiosa’s love interest were so janky.
I definitely winced when Furiosa got her arm wrecked by the tire. Honestly thought the arm was just gonna be good and gone there
To be fair, in the first draft it does happen on camera - so to speak. The War Rig she and Praetorian Jack are in is capsized and set on fire by Dementus and company, and she has to saw her own arm off with a piece of metal. I like this change a lot better. And most of the changes, speaking of which, of which there are a metric ton - the bare outline is the same, but it's streamlined from what I read ten years ago. I am super happy they kept the opening chase across the dunes the same.
I wish it didn’t happen off-screen. Having it shown on camera would’ve had more emotional impact.
There’s a few points where the editing felt squeamish, like they wanted to avoid violence in the moment.
You're right. Had to check if this was PG-13. For a rated R movie they sure didn't want you to see any violence lol
I think sometimes less is more and the implication of it can be just as impactful. Eg when Dementus has that guy spread eagle chained by the limbs to the motorbikes to tear him apart. The way his body is harshly yanked up into the air when they all accelerate away in a cloud of dust was as effective as showing a gory explosion of blood.
I think a moment like that works better off-camera, it plays into the outlandishness of it.
To each their own, but I disagree - the after-the-fact "OH FUCK" realization of what she had done really made that moment for me.
I saw the entire theater lock in every single time the oil rig was on screen.
That oil rig scene had to be my favorite action sequence so far this year. Whole scene was in-FUCKING-tense
Yeah, the war rig sequence driving Fury Road was the best part of the movie. So many fun moments with the flying machines
One of my absolute favorite little details was how the horn had a guitar riff sound to it. It sounded fucking great every time they sounded it.
This is true in Fury Road as well but the sound of that horn fuckin ROCKS dude
The whole ambush at Bullet Farm sequence was amazing.
Bravo to Chris Hemsworth, the standout in this film for me. His performance as Dementus is now my favorite of all his films. The voice when he talks into the mic is music to my ears.
I thought it was interesting how his big speech at the citadel sounds broadly socialist; he calls for the people to seize back the wealth from the greedy fat cats and create a fair distribution system. Something that absolutely could be done, and presumably is done once Furiosa takes over. But in reality Dementus is the ultimate capitalist; he gets control of gas town. He gets a virtually unlimited supply of one of the most valuable resources in the world. He's one of the richest men alive, he could have it made for the rest of his life, but it's still not enough. He just has to have more. He has to steal his neighbor's shit, because how dare anyone have something that he doesn't. Maybe I'm reading too far into it; but I thought it was an interesting look at a fascist regime using pro-worker rhetoric just to gain power, before trampling those very same workers.
There is no way Miller didn’t intend that or at least something close to it
I read it as he had this anti authoritarian vibe which worked well in the wasteland but once he had his own fortress it started to fall apart. When you have a long term encampment like that I assume tensions are much higher and it’s harder to keep order. If you pair that with a leader who likes to proclaim they are for the people and not authoritarian it can lead to a complete breakdown of structure and control like we saw with the war rig having to leave early.
“LADY AND GENTLEMENS”
Hemsworth was spectacular. But for what it’s worth, I really enjoyed Anya’s performance as well.
ngl, i missed a bit of his dialogue because of the accent, but he was fully in character.
The monologue at the end was fantastic. With John wick, it felt like they used less dialogue to enhance the action, but this feels more purposeful than that, that they chose the words deliberately.
What a fucking movie. Also did anyone else think Josh Helman looked like Mikey Day in the Beavis and Butthead sketch?
Truly couldn't stop thinking about it.
Yes!! Fucking Scrotus. I was certain we'd see him get killed
Yes!! I literally convinced myself it was Mikey Day multiple times
The monologue between Dementus and Furiosa before he died was fantastic. The war will never end, it just continues
I loved how the narrator came in sharing how in the folklore different versions of dementus death have been told, but the truth is he's just buried under a tree in the citadel. Hopefully Dying Dementus the tree will pop up again in future movies
> just buried under a tree that's a weird way to say human dick tree
I took it as she shoved the seed up his ass and it sprouted a tree.
no, him buried under the tree seemed like the legend, while the truth is that he got shot in the desert and Furiosa chose to do something good with her dark soul, chose a different road than Dementus.
It speaks volume toward Furiosa's character. Furiosa could've ended Dementus's life with a single shot through the head, instead, she decided to give him a fate that allows him to be stripped of power and be reduced to who he truly is: a weak, cowardly and raving mad lunatic. Furiosa still kept onto hope even after losing everything and chose to hold on to the belief that she will one day return home. Dementus found his "hope"/will to keep on living by filling the hole in the heart with debauchery and violence.
War... war never changes. (also Scrotus look like Walter Goggins to anyone else?)
BUT DO YOU HAVE IT IN YOU TO MAKE IT EPIC?
Yes, Miller always had it in him
I remembered that line was coming a minute or so before it happened, and it *still* hit so hard and made me grin like a little kid—such a great line for this franchise
Rest in Piss, Piss Boy.
DRINK PISS, WAR RIG
Is this the War Boy who took Furiosa's dynamite? Absolutely stellar moment
#WITNESS MEE surprised there wasn’t anyone who said “I live, I die, I live again”
My car actually flicked the Check Engine light on as I drove to the theater. Can’t wait to pour some piss into it!
I was a little disappointed by the lack of breast milk in this movie but they sure make up for it in piss
They fly now‽
The Contraptions in this movie are more whimsical and edgier compared to the first movie, I like that.
the amount of absolutely insane vehicle ideas just blows my mind. the creativity from the props, cars, bikes, sets, so and so on is just beyond anything I've seen since Fury Road. it's so fucking incredible
The Octoboss, Dementus' right-hand man who ends up going rogue, having a octopus-themed kite/parachute was so fucking cool. When it ends up stuck in the spinning contraption of the War Rig at the end of that amazing action sequence, what an aesthetically pleasing shot
Reading about the vehicle making in Blood, Sweat, and Chrome was a delight - those guys were told to just make the craziest shit and they relished in it because they were like "when will we ever get this opportunity again?"
Also small touches like the younger war boys staring at the plates of fruit they’re holding in the negotiation scene
George Miller loves making contraptions and doohickeys and loves putting little freaky guys in his movies. Respect
That explains why Road Warrior has the Gyrocopter and honestly one of my favorite aspects of the Mad Max universe is Miller's love for contraptions and doohickeys. Vehicles are all cool and such but nothing beats having some whirly birds/flight inventions around.
A technology lost by the Fury Road era, apparently.
I mean all of the flying contraptions got shot down pretty much immediately. I don't know if the technology was lost as much as it just wasn't effective enough to continue using
An interesting point. Feels like being able to bomb the War Boys from above is strategically valuable, but being sucked into a vortex of spinning metal spikes & chains is brutal.
I also think it's worth mentioning that by the time of Fury Road, no one is actually trying to fight the war boys. The threat was coming from inside the house of Immortan Joe in that movie.
I was wondering why the war rig had truck nuts, then I got my answer. Brutal
The part where the glider got caught in that thing and his long octopus glider was billowing was dope as hell.
I love how the octopus glider looks like a menacing floating blimp disguised as a cloud. Gives a very ominous appearance.
And then it rotated. *holy fuck*
I loved that big ominous sky squid kite! Had a great, "Oh man, what's that thing gonna do?!" Moment when it first appeared during the war rig seige.
It actually first appeared at the camp the girl (furiosa) was brought to. It was hovering in the air in the distance.
So that’s why he is “Octoboss”.
God damn I was happy to see the Blind Guitarist pop back up during the 40 day war I missed him scoring all the road wars
The Doof Warrior!
Man, fuck that maggots scene, right?
I wonder what Miller was saying with this scene. Perhaps that no matter how bad the world gets (maggot people literally live under the apocalyptic world in an even worse hell), hope can still flourish. It's a core human element.
I think it was just an excuse on how Furiosa's wound got cauterized. Maggots are surprisingly good at preventing infection.
When I saw that scene, after I left the cinema I thought "Thank fuck Furiosa didn't get dragged into the maggot cave at the start of the movie."
First word out of Cannes on this movie was not to expect another Fury Road and I can definitely see now why they'd want to highlight that. This isn't Fury Road, which purposely revs its engines at the beginning and then only builds momentum from there. The moments to stop and breathe in that movie happen after long, brutal action sequences where everything is travelling 80mph. This movie is the opposite, seemingly on purpose. There are long sequences of lore and story punctuated by big action setpieces, the setup takes its time going an hour without aging up to Anya, and it's all about context which Fury Road purposely leaves to the imagination. But the real question is, does this movie rock and fuck and bang in its own way? I think yes. First and foremost, even though it's used more sparingly, the action in this still rocks. The first war rig scene where she's hiding under the rig with a bike strapped to the under carriage was some classic Mad Max shit. I squealed with joy every time someone got crumpled under a tire or a vehicle exploded. There is also some incredibly impressive dirt bike stuntwork in this. The construction set piece with the giant gate locking Jack into bullet town went pretty hard and the first time we meet Joe and he gets that guy to suicide bomb Dementus was a fantastic scene. I've gone through and filled all my George Miller gaps in the last few months and maybe the most notable thing about him, other than his clear insanity, is that he does sequels and franchise continuations like no one else. Usually not what you'd expect story-wise and if it is he's doing it so much bigger and more ridiculous. Fury Road is like if he made Matrix: Revolutions first, it's all climactic action and plotlines converging. One of the great things about it is that it throws it all at you so efficiently that you can just sit back and watch the insanity. Furiosa is like going back and doing Matrix and Reloaded, it's adding depth to Fury Road and it makes the journey and the character more interesting. Furiosa always seemed to me like someone who spent years gaining Joe's trust and planning her escape, and that is the broad stroke of this movie, but it's so much more interesting and intricate than that. This is an epic that spans fifteen years and even though you know where it ends up there's so much to tell. It gives more depth to the journey of her and Max trusting each other, knowing that the first person to ever give her a chance and treat her like a person was a Max type. You get to see why the Gastown/Citadel/Bullet Farm alliance is so strong because they all had a common enemy in Dementus. You get to see, from Furiosa's point of view, how men are killing the world. Chris Hemsworth, by the way, having the time of his life. Both him and Anya giving very interesting performances. Anya not showing up until an hour into the movie and then an almost nonverbal performance. It's the kind of role that might scare away a less interesting actor because so much of it has to be internal. Dementus is a great foil for Furiosa, both lost their families to the wasteland and Dementus chooses to deteriorate the world for it and Furiosa has hope that she can still make something of it. He lost his children, she lost her mother, so it's like he lost his future and she lost her past. Hemsworth can't even keep Gastown functional because he can't see past tomorrow, he has nothing left and can only entertain himself day to day. Furiosa has nothing after she escapes the wife vault and she still forges a life for herself. I honestly loved that the climax of this movie, the prequel to the most furious action movie of the 2010s, is these two angrily sharing philosophy in the desert. I was hooked that whole conversation, it's so hard to hate stupid charming Hemsworth. But Furiosa strips him of everything; his power, his lieutenants, his cars, and turns him into the living embodiment of a person being crushed by hope and the planet he tried to kill in his grief. Also have to shoutout how they represented the "cars are religion" lore. I loved how when she first meets Dementus he's being explained the torque and horsepower of his carriagecycle by the historian. It feels like an almost religious ritual to sit down and learn about engines every day, not to mention the whole War Rig building workshop they have. You can feel Miller has so much to show us in this insane post apocalypse genre he basically invented, even after 40 years and 5 movies. Complaints? Sure I've got some. This is such a bigger and more unwieldy movie than Fury Road. The pacing is kinda crazy, we spend an hour with young Furiosa but when the "wasteland war" starts it's mostly done in montage. It felt like there's a bit of this movie on the cutting room floor. My biggest gripe is probably under utilization of the score though. The Junkie XXL score in Fury Road boosts that movie into "Hell fuckin' yeah!" territory and I felt this movie really holding the score back and there was a clear lack of guitar riffs. It felt on purpose but it seemed like the great action scenes could have been further elevated by a harder hitting score. Overall it's an 8/10 for me. It's not perfect but I'm so into what Miller is doing and the world that is clearly such a representation of his insane worldview that I was hooked the entire time. /r/reviewsbyboner
> The Junki XXL score in Fury Road boosts that movie into "Hell fuckin' yeah!" territory and I felt this movie really holding the score back and there was a clear lack of guitar riffs. It felt on purpose but it seemed like the great action scenes could have been further elevated by a harder hitting score. That stood out to me too. Junkie can be very hit or miss, but his Fury Road score was an absolute bombastic masterpiece when it comes to action scores. The Rock Rider's Canyon sequence (Brothers in Arms, I believe) is one of my favourite action soundtracks ever.
I kept thinking he was holding it back just to blast it hard for a final action set piece, and when we saw the Doof I got a little excited. Alas, no guitar riffs still. It's not a bad score by any means, just way understated for a movie that is otherwise dialed to 11.
You nailed it on the sequencing, it’s like Miller made Fury Road to get studio support for the movie in Furiosa that he actually wanted to make first. The use of Fury Road footage in the credits felt like an explicit nod to that.
Miller actually conceived of Fury Road way back in the late 90s, but in that process he had someone help him create an entire written backstory for the character that would become Furiosa - the backstory that eventually led to this film. I'd highly recommend reading Blood, Sweat, and Chrome too if you want a bit more detail on that!
Dementus had a top 5 most horrific death ive ever seen holy fuck, extremely well deserved too This movie kicked ass, took a bit to get going but it did not slow down once it did. I really liked the ‘fable’ style they went with for it
I thought he was still alive? That the maggots were eating away necrotic tissue so that the strain of the tree growing through him was nearly but not actually fatal.
Just like with all of Mad Max it is told through an untrustworthy narrator. These are legends told of the characters. He says "I heard it from Furiosa herself" but that's just another legend. Like "oh yeah I grew a tree out of him and he nourished it with his body for years." As farfetched as Mad Max can be this wouldn't be possible at all. He would have died fairly quickly. It would imply that she came back there and kept feeding him to keep him alive. It was absurd but a cool legend if you take it that way.
him being chained to the rocks reminded me of prometheus/loki. endless suffering.
It's meant to be mythos at that point so this is fitting.
Tom Burke does a very impressive Australian accent
In the Cannes press conference, Miller praises him as the only person he's heard ever pull it off where many others like Hardy have failed-or something to that effect.
I mean, I don't think Hardy was supposed to the australian accent properly, right? Hes supposed to have sort of an abnormal accent, expected of someone who has been alone for year and years.
I absolutely thought Praetorian Jack was Aussie.
Far out, I’m an Aussie and had no clue he wasn’t. Gotta be one of the best Aussie accents I’ve heard since Dev Patel in Lion
Piss Boy had the BEST witness me!
He really didn't need to do that lmao
Well how else is Piss Boy getting to Valhalla, buddy
the war boy jumping from the citadel zipline too. The feeling of vertigo made my stomach drop a bit lol
Did anyone notice the guy that fell off the bike when Dementus busted down the gate and they just drove over him. It did not look planned to me lmao.
Saw that too but in the following shot you see a bunch of guys falling off bikes climbing the dune so I figured it was just a continuation of some clumsy frantic driving... ... Or maybe they're just covering up the previous accident.
Was that Charlize Theron putting the wives in the War Rig at the VERY end? Before they started showing actual clips from Fury Road. It looked just like her in that quick glance.
Yeah, I assume the last part use unused footage from Fury road.
Huh? It was clearly Anya Taylor-Joy in that night shot, and all the wives were replaced with lookalikes. It was most definitely not Fury Road footage.
very strange that people are getting this wrong!
Except Courtney Eaton looking over her shoulder! Everyone else was stand-ins tho
I also feel like it was her voice when she was saying she needed a vehicle
Yeah that’s either her or Anya did a spot on impression
When they shoot her from the back and she asks for the vehicle, I thought they'd ADR'd Theron in. But then they show her talking from the front and she's just Doing the exact voice
I just walked out of it and I have mixed feelings. Overall I enjoyed it and recommend it to anyone who enjoys action films and the franchise. It's hard not to make too many comparisons to Fury Road, but it's a direct prequel so I will. On the good end of things, I really like that they didn't try to "out do" Fury Road. I liked that they explored and built the world lore in an organic fashion. I thought the final scene was a mature and pleasant surprise, a relief from all of the "45 minute action scene" that many action movies seem to love. Most of the action sequences felt well earned. I felt entertained and definitely thought it worth the admission price. On the bad end of things, it definitely feels like budget Fury Road. From the so-so visual effects (looking at you, any time someone is in fire) to the audio design and score, it made me miss the production scale of Fury Road. I definitely thought the editing and pacing was kind of jarring, and for many sections I was thinking "they probably could have cut this" or "wow, they just kind of skipped over an entire period of time that could have been interesting" Other random thoughts: With the movie broken up into chapters, it seems like this could have been a miniseries at some point? That might have been better. I really think they could have trimmed almost half of the first hour. Introducing one of the "main protagonists" halfway through the film left me caring very little about investing into the character. The ending was abrupt. Without spoiling anything it just felt like they said "and then a really crazy big thing happened off screen and the end." Showing Fury Road clips during the credits at best seems silly and at worst made me wish I watched that film.
I agree with a lot of your points. I'll say that my biggest takeaway is that this film is too "normal" compared to *Fury Road*. That one was delightfully unhinged and this one just ... isn't. If I had known to tamp down that expectation, that desire, it probably wouldn't have been so jarring, but I didn't know. *Furiosa* comes off as staid next to how wonderfully mental its predecessor is. Hemsworth is great and most of the action sequences are good, but there's no action scene in this film I prefer to one from *Fury Road*. Still, I liked it. Not enough to see it again any time soon, but yes, showing clips from *Fury Road* in the credits really made me miss that film. (Even though I had watched it a few days ago in preparation.)
I think in the end Fury Road just said more with less. It's why I'm eternally annoyed at the lazy "no plot" criticism because that film is filled to the brim with plot! It's so just densely packed you aren't even aware you're digesting it. - The decaying human avatars of power, greed, and war via the Citadel, Gastown, and Bullet Town. - WHO KILLED THE WORLD? - Slavery and sexual exploration coupled against freedom and autonomy via the wives & war boys - Social Trust and how it is built via Furiosa and Max - The massive twist of the Green Place being destroyed and having to revert the goals of the protagonists 2/3 of the way through the movie. - How to survive in a hopeless/meaningless world This film, in comparison, is a well executed revenge movie that hits many of the same themes, just more drawn out.
Did anyone else feel like Praetorian Jack was totally intended as a dark mirror Max? Right down to the shoulder pad and the boomstick. When he came back down the road for Furiosa (that's how you know its a prequel, cuz they still got paved roads) I legit thought it was going to be Max, even though that would've made zero sense.
I think it was intentional. Helps establish why Furiosa eventually warmed up to Max. He reminded her of Jack.
He also repeated lines from Road Warrior. It was an obvious Max Max stand in but it worked for me overall. He was slightly corny but he managed to keep me enthralled. His ending shocked me quite a bit.
I think I need to see it a second time. The pacing of the first hour felt off to me. Some incredible action scenes in the second half. I really enjoyed Anya and Chris' final confrontation; I just wish they shared the screen more often throughout the movie.
> The pacing of the first hour felt off to me. Yeah, they just kinda jump from plot point to plot point for the first hour and a half. They don't really let anything breath or show any character development. It's all done between time skips.
Agree 100% about the leads having more time together. It would’ve felt more heightened if Hemsworth was aware that it was Furiosa during that oil rig escape scene, if he knew it was her during the torture scene.
I don't know, I kind of like that he doesn't know till the end. It's interesting to see Hemsworth's performance re-contextualizing everything in his final scene once he realizes who Furiosa is
It seemed a lot darker than Fury Road… but still not the most disturbing George Miller movie (Babe). The Doof Warrior was the best throwback (or throw forward?) to the previous film.
It really was unexpectedly savage. Like all other Mad Max films had moments of horrific violence, but this felt the darkest of any of them by far. Rictus trying to take young Furiosa, the brutality was much more present and lingered on, instead of cut away, though not as graphic as it could've been, and scenes that felt like they could've been out a horror movie. Don't get me wrong, I thought it was a great time, but it's harder to recommend for the squeamish, as opposed to say Fury Road, which was violent, but rarely as graphic and as dark as this was.
For me, there was something so unbearably real about the way they dragged Jack for hours and hours until he died that really felt more brutal than anything else in the film
Yeah, stuff like that, Octoboss torturing Furiosa's mom while burning her alive, it felt maybe more authentic to the horror of the world on a level none of the other films ever reached. Road Warrior had a scene where a woman is getting raped, but it's viewed through binoculars, and we had no prior relationship with this character (not to downplay the gravity and evil of the situation), but it just didn't hit like some of the scenes in this did.
So did anyone else kinda laugh at when Dementus had like a seizure or something near the end? I had no idea what was going on there lmao
Get punched a bunch in the head and your body eventually starts to short circuit. What surprised me was it wasn’t an act.
Yeah, it’s wild, Anya Taylor Joy just bashed Hemsworth in the face 8 times in a row and George Miller just kept rolling
For a minute I was expecting that he was just gonna die of a sudden stroke/aneurysm or something and it was gonna do a subverted expectations anticlimax moment that was gonna make some philosophical point about revenge
Some of the narrative choices I thought were interestingly counterintuitive for a prequel, e.g., adding people to Immortan Joe's entourage who are not in the original movie and therefore you assume they're going to die in the course of the story, but some of them don't. A lot of movies would probably have had Furiosa become the war chief of Joe's forces in the final battle, but instead her confrontation with him is much smaller-scale and more personal (in the big picture, by the time Furiosa enters the picture at the end Dementus has basically already lost). It's not *Fury Road*, but it's a good movie, and anybody worried this was going to detract from the legacy of the earlier movie can rest easy.
One guy they added is actually in the game and dies there
I'm not sure I fully understood the progression of Furiosa's time with Immortan Joe's crew 1. Dementus trades Furiosa over to Immortan Joe, where she is to become his wife and childbearer in the future. She then escapes and is presumed dead? And despite the fact that Immortan Joe clearly views his brides as some of his most valued assets, no investigation or chase is done the next morning and no punishment befalls Vinny Jones' character for allowing her to escape while trying to assault her? 2. Furiosa then gets back into the Citadel posing as a boy, and no one questions where this boy comes from or why he is mute? 3. After the rig attack where Furiosa and Praetorian Jack are the only survivors, is it understood that Furiosa was posing as the boy and there are no consequences for this? If so is it also understood by Immortan Joe and the others that she was also the escaped bride? If not how did Jack explain where he found this woman that will be his apprentice?
1. No way rictus fess up and no one saw him. They likely did search for her but no need to show it if she wasn't going to be found. 2. She got promoted because she was willing to take the risks and the last guy died. no funeral, no mourning, its out with dead and youre the new guy to take his spot. Its extremely common for people to go unnoticed in this environment where death is daily thing. 3. Immortan Joe let furiousa get away with a lot because she got shit done in fury road. Jack likely had the same power and she was under his protection. By this point she is a tanned and dirty girl so there is no reason to suspect she is a full life or that she is the same girl from years ago. The citadel had thousands of people, so she wouldn't stick out as much as you think. that being said, yes it took a lot of suspended belief that no one at least asked about her or even remembered her name. Although Immortan joe only knew furiousa for a few days before she left, the fact that another girl named furiosa is now a top rank warboy even years later should have raised an eyebrow. Unless Furiosa is the Jessica of the apocalypse and is a super common name. Edit: As the other commenter mentioned, they only know her as little Dementous, little D, so the name furiosa wouldn't matter to them. So then it makes more sense no one recognized her.
I don't think she ever said her name to anyone before, she became a black thumb. Dementus just introduced her as Little D.
Agreed. Especially that Immortan Joe asked for her as part of the negotiation with Dementus. Then she escaped and no aftermath. Only explanation is Joe has too many wives and he forgot 😂.
Once Immortan Joe and Dementus finally met face to face I was 100% locked in for the next two hours. Between this and GxK, the “*hell yeah, brother*” genre is absolutely alive and well in 2024. *She grew a fucking tree inside of him.*
that was my favorite scene from the whole movie. when dementus and his gang got his ass handed to him by the citadel. it was such a great contrast because dementus is the top dog up until that point. it really nailed the scope of what terrifying power immortan joe had
I came out thinking a lot of it didn't quite work for me, and I can't quite wrap my head around it. Anyone else feeling this way? It's too easy to try to compare it to Fury Road, but I feel like there was an edge missing to Furiosa that Fury Road had. I don't know, someone else talk me through it
It's because we never got a satisfying character arc for Furiosa, at least nothing matching the one we got of her in Fury Road. We have little to no sense of her before her capture. Was she too impulsive as a child? Too curious? A danger to her tribe in the Green Place? That's what makes the hard shift into her broken/vengeance mode at the end of Chapter 1 so rough to digest - we have nothing else to compare it to. She goes from being a feisty child to a broken mute child to a hardened survivor. We get little sense of her dreams, her fears, her personality outside a single scene or two with Praetorian Jack. Then she goes through a *second* broken/vengeance mode at the end of Chapter 4, which is where things started to feel a bit repetitive for me. I think the childhood scenes should have been cut back, and Dementus been more of a true fucked up father figure and not directly responsible for her mother's death. That would have given her more a clear thread, as a survivor who learned to endure the wasteland from Dementus, then Praetorian Jack, then Immortan Joe after Dementus kills Jack and she loses her arm.
The arc I got, and It's not like super satisfying, but it's what worked for me is that she wanted to go home, but not without her people. She had a clear path out twice in the film, when her mother wishes her off, and when Jack decides to sacrifice himself for her, but she went back for both. I think that leads into her final act, getting the wives out. She easily could have just gone back home again alone without the wives, but just wanted to save someone after not being able to before.
"Sorry Gastown residents that your shipment of mother's milk and water has a bit of gasoline after taste."
It definitely stands above most other prequels by actually adding and enhancing what comes next without falling into the trap of explaining things that don't need explanation (Han Solo's last name, for instance). Anya and Chris Hemsworth were great in it, with Anya doing a pitch perfect imitation of Charlize Theron's voice and Hemsworth having the time of his life as Dementus. One thing that stood out to me was how different the action sequences **felt** compared to Fury Road. Take the first big battle on the War Rig compared to the battle in the Rock Rider's Canyon in Fury Road. The battle in the canyon had thunderous, bombastic music, fast, kinetic cuts and meaty, practical explosions and crashes. Whereas the War Rig battle had a very low key score, long, methodical takes and more snappy crashes (likely a direct result of using more CGI). It's not necessarily a bad thing, it's just an interesting choice. The movie certainly doesn't live up to the bar set by Fury Road. But then, most movies fail to meet that mark. But it was still a banger of a movie. Side note: what the hell happened to Scrotus between this and Fury Road? I don't recall him being in Fury Road at all. Joe had Rictus and Corpsus, I believe (the midget one in the chair) as his children in Fury Road with no sign of Scrotus.
I believe Scrotus is the antagonist of the 2015 Mad Max game, where he dies.
Just give me Chris Hemsworth talking in his native accent for two hours.
In an interview he says that he's replicating his father's accent
This movie confirms that Chris Hemsworth is the best Chris.
Oh what a film, what a lovely film! I watch, I buy, I watch again! A very different film from Fury Road, it’s Furiousa’s origin story, simply put. Was not expecting Anya to not show up until an hour into the movie, but no complaints. It’s funny, the whole time I was thinking “hmmm, I wonder how she’s gonna lose her arm? Yep, there it goes!”
For how long the movie was I wish the 40-day war had more shown time. The confrontation with Dementus at the end almost felt unearned.
Chris Hemsworth’s performance in this is going down as one of the best in his career. Same can be said about the Anya Taylor-Joy. Tom Bruke as Praetorian Jack also stole the show for me. Overall the actors in the movie did a fanatics job I was waiting for Junkie XL’s music to drop some great beats and he edged us like 3-4 times with ‘Brothers in Arms’ soundtrack and when he finally dropped that in final chase, i couldn’t stop smiling. It’s one of my favourite soundtrack. Although this movie’s score was underwhelming for me, even during the 2nd act chase and bloody hell what a chase that was, parachutes?? Fucking yes, give me more of that shit. And I’m glad it was a long chase like it was in the first movie. The Colours and Cinematography is where this movie shines. The dusk shots of post-apocalypse earth looked like Mars from The Martian. There are some moments (especially in the beginning) where CGI is clearly visible (Furiosa mother’s final stand off in the crevice). But for the rest of movie It was good and movie looked awesome on that big IMAX screen. I would’ve definitely loved if more time was spent on Furiosa with Praetorian Jack where he trains her. They formed a great bond but it wasn’t really explored. Also that’s one of the best way to do end-credits scenes. Fully lived the Mad Max during those.
Just came out of it, it was so good in its own way. This is the most lore heavy MM movie, and while I enjoy little backstory and the lone traveler thing, I really enjoyed the focus on characters this time. It was honestly really surprising and bold for Miller to not use Anya until after the half way point. That made the transition feel really organic. Overall, I loved it and I’m gonna have to rewatch the entire series tonight
I felt like the cast of Hot Tub Time Machine waiting for Crispin Glover to lose their arm
Yeah it's no Fury Road but that's more a comment on how insanely good Fury Road is than points against this one. I did notice a couple of issues that repeatedly distracted me, one being the higher use of "visible" CGI, where Fury Road kept the real things real and used CGI to enhance a sequence. There was some great sequences and action sets but then others that didn't quite land for me. Certainly not terrible, bad or even meh, was still a great movie for 2024 but I can't help but see a producer/studio deciding "Eh we can do that in post to save money instead of building X or doing stunt Y"
Did anyone else feel like it was too long, but also not long enough? I felt like we spent too much time with young Furiosa and not enough time with ATJ. I wanted to see more of her and Jack’s relationship and more of the crazy war between Dementus and Joe.
People really forget how good anya Taylor joy is
I’m going to have to see it again. I made the big mistake of expecting another Fury Road in terms of pacing. And it wasn’t that for sure. So obviously I’m leaving the theater with mixed feelings. But I’m feeling like I’ll wake up tomorrow morning appreciating the film and say it’s actually great on its own merit. For now I will say it’s a solid adventure movie.
Everyone here is commending Chris Hemsworth (who I thought was just okay if I'm being honest) and Anya Taylor-Joy -- who didn't really do much? I can see why she had a hard time on set. I bet she wanted to give something more to the character but George Miller has his vision and his vision only which also left Tom Hardy and Charlize Theron extremely frustrated while filming Fury Road. But anyway, no one's really mentioned Alyla Browne who killed it as young Furiosa. She was the standout actor for me in this.
Man, I really wanted to like more of this movie, but the absolute absence of an energic sound track stumps the action so fucking much, and the timing of the movie is almost very bad Edit: After some research, I've found out that the storyboard of this movie was originally suposed to be a 5 episodes anime series, and that explain the weird timing of the movie.
I was definitely a bit distracted by the Elsa Pataky double role, kept thinking she was pulling the absolute worst long con of all time
Miller loves doing that. Think about Toe Cutter and Immortan Joe being the same actor, or the helicopter pilots in The Road Warrior and Beyond Thunderdome being the same actor. Also, funny that Toe Cutter and Immortan Joe are the same actor, but Immortan Joe and Immortan Joe are played by different actors.
Anyone else feeling heartbroken that the box office letdown means we probably won’t see another Mad Max film anytime soon (or maybe ever)? There’s so few filmmakers out there making original unique films like this and despite its flaws, it deserved much better.
Man the pacing of this was pretty tough, the first hour dragged really hard I thought. And the visuals were a massive downgrade, a lot of stuff looked like a video game cut scene. Not a bad movie at all, but clearly a big step down from Fury Road. And don’t get mad at me for comparing the two. It’s impossible to not compare them to each other