I had never watched the original Mad Max movies starring Mel Gibson because I was either not born
yet or too young to have watched action movies when the genre was at its heyday
in the 80s. It was not until I’ve watched Live
Free or Die Hard and The Expendables
that my fascination for the genre was awakened. Those movies brought to me the
nostalgia of watching my father watch his classic action movies as I
momentarily glimpsed the cool action sequences that my father and grandfather
and uncles have loved so much.
After seeing positive feedback for Mad Max: Fury Road in BuzzFeed, College Humor, Cracked, and 9GAG, I
was compelled to check it out myself. Besides, the impressive cast, including
Tom Hardy and Charlize Theron, and younger thespians Nicholas Hoult and Zoe
Kravitz, has won me over. But that wasn’t all. Mad Max: Fury Road turned out to be exactly as good as those
popular humor websites have claimed.
The action-packed, post-apocalyptic dystopian epic is fun to
watch. It has a stunning atmosphere reminiscent of Waterworld, except that the setting is a desert rather than an
ocean. The influential but menacing villain and his noisy mooks distinctively
reminded me of the Smokers who were constantly after the Mariner and the
tattooed little girl in Waterworld. In
addition, the costumes and makeup, and the props are impressive. Coupled with
the atmospheric camerawork, thrilling score, and breathtaking performances, Mad Max: Fury Road is an awe-inspiring
saga of survival and political intrigue.
According to my best friend, Waterworld was actually inspired from the original Mad Max series. This makes me look
forward to watching the original series starring Mel Gibson in the title role.
I would like to see how much of the original series inspired Waterworld and Mad Max: Fury Road visually and atmospherically.
Furthermore, what’s really refreshing about Mad Max: Fury Road is the refreshingly
high number of women who are well-rounded characters in their own right. For
the first time, I was watching an action movie made just for me. It’s not at
all like other action movies where the female lead is designed to titillate the
male target audience, like the Underworld
series, the Tomb Raider movies; or
worse, Sucker Punch and Lucy. Here, even if Max (Tom Hardy) is
clearly the main character, Imperator Furiosa (Charlize Theron) establishes her
own story and sustains it throughout the movie. Immediately after the
introductory sequences, we are introduced to five beautiful maidens, played by
Zoe Kravitz (X-Men: First Class, Divergent), Riley Keough (the villainous
romantic lead in Justin Timberlake’s “TKO” music video), Rosie
Huntington-Whiteley (the romantic lead in Transformers:
Dark of the Moon), and models Abbey Lee and Courtney Eaton. While the five
are not as prominent as Furiosa, they are clearly distinguishable characters
even though, collectively, they are all the main villain’s brides/sex slaves.
Although Furiosa takes it upon herself to protect them, the five brides put up
a good fight against anyone who threatens them.
While the brides are literally sex objects in the movie,
they are, more importantly, people who want to be anything other than dolls to
play with; whereas with action heroines like Selene or Baby Doll, it’s the
other way around. Selene, especially, is an fighter whose status as Michael
Corvin’s lover doesn’t necessarily define her, but dressing her in a corset and
a form-fitting catsuit and then giving her slow-motion shots to emphasize her
curves lets you know that, ironically, she is still designed to be a sex object
for the audience. The same is true for Baby Doll and her scantily clad posse.
Furiosa and her young wards might be nice to look at, but the narrative
presents them as much, much more than that by avoiding putting emphasis on
their bodies. We get a good look at them when they are first introduced, but
any chance of objectification is quickly dashed by using their thin physiques
and grimy white dresses to show that they have suffered for it and want to
escape, especially the pregnant one with ritual scars on her face.
Like the male characters Max, Nux, and even the villains,
they are people letting their claws out to fight for survival in the harsh
wasteland. Having Imperator Furiosa, a gang leader who works for the villain,
ultimately betray her boss to rescue his young brides from him sets off the
familiar feminist narrative. However, it does not play upon the usual gender
conflict dynamic as blatantly as Sucker
Punch does; instead, our heroines enforce their rights not just as women but
as people seeking freedom from oppression, just like our hero Max. When he
proves his worth to Furiosa and her wards, they accept his aid and he becomes
their protector alongside Furiosa for the rest of the film. They become
partners seeking common goals: dignity and freedom from oppression.
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