- Directed by George Miller
- Written by George Miller, Brendan McCarthy, Nick Lathouris
- Stars Tom Hardy, Charlize Theron, Nicholas Hoult
- Run Time: 2 Hours
- Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEJnMQG9ev8
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
This isn’t quite a sequel or a reboot of the first three films. It’s more of a parallel set in the same world of the third movie, with a different Max in a different part of Australia. It takes the elements and mood of the third movie and cranks up the volume, with almost non-stop action. Charlize Theron and the baddies carry the movie about as much as Max does. We thought it was very entertaining and well made.
Spoilery Synopsis
We hear about the “Oil Wars” as credits roll. Max narrates his earlier life, and then the nuclear war, and then the world fell. We zoom in on Max, who kills and eats a gecko. He gets back into his car as he’s pursued by a gang of bandits. They overturn his car spectacularly and drag him to their lair, where they cut off his hair, tattoo him, and start to brand him. He almost escapes, but we see that he’s haunted by his past. Credits roll.
We cut to Furiosa, getting into her monster truck as the leader of the town, Immortan Joe, puts on his elaborate outfit and monster face. There’s also a little Darth Vader element to what he’s wearing that is helping him breathe. Joe sends his war rig to bring back bullets from Bulletown and gas from the Gastown factory, with a tanker of water in trade. He runs the cult of the War Boys, a bunch of bald young men. There are a lot of people in this desert oasis, but Joe controls all the water; he distributes the water to the people in the most inefficient way possible. He has quite a setup going with slaves, machines, and his followers.
Down in Joe’s dungeon, we see Max in a cage. On the road, Furiosa turns the truck away from Gastown; she wants to go East. Joe’s weird sons see that she’s off-course, and Joe runs to his vault, which is empty. His many wives have vanished– Furiosa has stolen his wives!
Immortan Joe alerts his War Boys, who get their muscle cars ready for battle. Some of the War Boys fight amongst themselves. They’ve even got a truck with a chained-on guitar player and drummers. Nux, one of the War Boys, has Max tied to the front of his car like a hood ornament as his blood source. The soldiers with Furiosa see flares and know they are being pursued.
The porcupine sand people see the War Rig and move in to ambush them. The well-armed War Boys mess up the porcupine people without much effort. Nux’s car catches up to them, and it looks rough for Max, especially with all those spikes on the bandits’ cars.
The bandits are all defeated, but before Nux, Joe, and the War Boys can grab Furiosa, she turns the War Rig into a huuuuuuge sandstorm. Nux follows her in, with Max clinging to the back of his car. The sandstorm is full of lightning and tornadoes, very excessive!
Nux plans to blow up himself and his car to stop the War Rig, but Max breaks in to stop him. This goes badly for them both, as the car crashes.
Max wakes up in the morning after the storm has passed. He finds himself still chained to Nux, who also isn’t dead. He carries Nux to Furiosa’s War Rig, which stalled out not too far away. He runs into the brides, one of whom is pregnant. He orders the girls to cut his chain off, but they attack him instead. Max gets the upper hand just as Immortan Joe’s people appear on the horizon.
Max takes the War Rig, leaving all the women behind; it stalls out immediately; Furiosa has installed kill switches. She negotiates with him, and they all drive away with Nux hanging from the rear. They are off to “The Green Place.”
Joe’s group and the men from Gastown are about to intercept the War Rig. The Bullet Farmer is coming from the opposite direction.
They drive through a narrow pass in the cliffs and then stop. The people Furiosa made a deal with double-cross her, but they set off an avalanche that will slow down their pursuers. The bandits get into another running battle.
Joe catches up, and Nux is eager to help him. During one of the battles, the pregnant wife is killed; Joe stops for her. Nux, who failed miserably, knows that Joe will kill him next. The War Rig breaks down at night, so Max and Furiosa set traps and landmines as Joe’s people approach.
The People-Eater, from Gastown, complains about the cost of this chase to Immortan Joe, who has paused to cut the baby from his dead wife’s corpse. The baby is dead too, which enrages Joe. Nux, who knows what Joe will do, volunteers to help the good guys escape.
Max and Nux get the War Rig running again. Furiosa explains that she was born in the Green Place and was stolen as a child. She wants to get back there and help Immortan Joe’s brides escape their life of captivity. They arrive there, but the Green Place isn’t green anymore. Some of the people there know who Furiosa is, and her story checks out. On the other hand, there’s no green place, and there are only a few of Furiosa’s people left alive. One old woman has a bagful of seeds she’s saving.
Furiosa wants to abandon the rig and cross the salt to whatever’s on the other side. She invites Max to come with them, but he declines. He wants them all to go back to the citadel and take over there. They might be able to sneak in while Joe and his men are out looking for them.
Joe and his group, still out there, see the War Rig heading back the way they came, and turn to pursue. This leads, surprisingly, to another battle. Most everyone gets injured pretty badly, and there’s some crazy explosions.
Joe’s largest son, Rictus, grabs some of the women off the truck, but eventually gets into a fight with Max. Furiosa catches up with Joe himself. She literally rips his face off along with his breathing mask. All the women climb off the rig onto Joe’s car. Nux, still in the War Rig, crashes the War Rig into the narrow pass, blocking the rest of the baddies from getting through.
Furiosa’s dying, and Max works hard to save her, even giving her a transfusion of his own blood.
They arrive at the citadel, and Max shows them Joe’s body. The crowd cheers. We see that Furiosa is back too, and she looks– alive, at least. They go up to the tower and release enough water for everyone. Max slips away in the crowd…
Commentary
This takes all the stuff from the third movie that was great and cranks it up to eleven. It’s bright and colorful, which is odd, considering the setting, but it all works. It’s one high-speed thing after another, and the majority of the runtime is one long, high-intensity vehicle chase.
Max doesn’t speak much in this, since he’s played by Tom Hardy, that’s a good thing. Immortan Joe, Rictus Erectus, the Bullet Farmer, and the other villains are all very interesting. The truck with the flame-throwing guitar player and accompanying drummers may be the craziest thing ever.
The budget here was insane, and it shows it. It looks good, the characters are fun, and it’s non-stop action.