Mad Max: Fury Road
May. 30th, 2015 07:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
redfiona99My favourite thing about the film was how they gave everyone, good, bad and indifferent, character and purpose.
For instance, even before he joins the good guys, Nox is the most adorable little death wish fighter, and the film lets you sympathise with him. My stomach dropped when he had that disaster in front of Immortal Joe and ... damn good job by the film-makers and Nicholas Hoult. Seriously, Nox is adorable.
And it showed, not told, about how important driving was and how Nox (and indeed Slit) would do anything to be the driver of their car.
That's actually the other interesting thing, they do give the bad guys these moments where you sympathise with them without them ever not being the bad guys. Like Rictus (who is too stupid to be evil but is still a bad guy), when he goes 'I had a brother and he was perfect,' and some part of me wants to go 'there, there, it'll be alright' despite everything.
Or the Vuvalini, who get maybe 6 minutes of screen time between them before fight scene breaks out, but I can tell them apart without question.
And the cinematography was amazing. George Miller to direct a version of the Divine Comedy. That's what hell on Earth looks like.
And there's a fair bit of the Searchers in there too, but I couldn't say that outside of a spoiler cut because, well, spoilers.
It's actually the second film I've seen this year where the adverts were all about the male lead character where it turns out that the main character is in fact the female character (Jupiter Ascending was the other one). I am not going to complain about this trend at all :)
I liked how the female characters had different ways of being (and if anyone says anything about wah, Furiosa is butch, I will rend them limb from limb and then go get a manicure, because yay, butch female lead). Even if I am possibly less OMG wow about it than most of fandom because I come from a long line of Vuvalini.
Actually, that's one of the interesting things. In Immortal Joe's colony, everyone has a place and can't ever escape it (Slit wanting to drive, the Treasures are only there for breeding, the nurses are there to nurse etc) while on the outside, you do whatever's necessary and unexpected skills appear.
I liked the Dune parts more. Because I like world building. And it makes sense, if you're Immortal Joe, to run your colony as a death cult, because it keeps people more busy thinking about their glorious deaths than usurping you.
Also, I say Dune because you can't tell me that the Vuvalini aren't a Missionaria Protectiva. No, really. Terrifyingly so.
Tom Hardy did a lot of heavy lifting without saying much, and, as several times previously, gives a damn good not entirely with it. The same for Charlize Theron and the Treasures.
The other thing I liked was that the way the film was structured and scripted, it let the audience do a lot of the heavy lifting, like the fight scene we don't see between Max and The Bullet Farmer. It's quite interesting how different me and L who I went to see the film with "saw" that fight. We've both agreed that it was far too bloody to show on screen.
I could have done with a few fewer fade to blacks, and more coherence in the fight scenes, but overall, it was a good solid film.
Also, yes, I had seen various of the actors as aliens in Farscape (or the bad guy in Girl From Tomorrow). And wrestling fans, yes, that was Nathan Jones. Also, Slit is young Stryker from DOFP. I hope they all, particularly that last one, put to rest that nagging voice going 'why do I recognise them?'
For instance, even before he joins the good guys, Nox is the most adorable little death wish fighter, and the film lets you sympathise with him. My stomach dropped when he had that disaster in front of Immortal Joe and ... damn good job by the film-makers and Nicholas Hoult. Seriously, Nox is adorable.
And it showed, not told, about how important driving was and how Nox (and indeed Slit) would do anything to be the driver of their car.
That's actually the other interesting thing, they do give the bad guys these moments where you sympathise with them without them ever not being the bad guys. Like Rictus (who is too stupid to be evil but is still a bad guy), when he goes 'I had a brother and he was perfect,' and some part of me wants to go 'there, there, it'll be alright' despite everything.
Or the Vuvalini, who get maybe 6 minutes of screen time between them before fight scene breaks out, but I can tell them apart without question.
And the cinematography was amazing. George Miller to direct a version of the Divine Comedy. That's what hell on Earth looks like.
And there's a fair bit of the Searchers in there too, but I couldn't say that outside of a spoiler cut because, well, spoilers.
It's actually the second film I've seen this year where the adverts were all about the male lead character where it turns out that the main character is in fact the female character (Jupiter Ascending was the other one). I am not going to complain about this trend at all :)
I liked how the female characters had different ways of being (and if anyone says anything about wah, Furiosa is butch, I will rend them limb from limb and then go get a manicure, because yay, butch female lead). Even if I am possibly less OMG wow about it than most of fandom because I come from a long line of Vuvalini.
Actually, that's one of the interesting things. In Immortal Joe's colony, everyone has a place and can't ever escape it (Slit wanting to drive, the Treasures are only there for breeding, the nurses are there to nurse etc) while on the outside, you do whatever's necessary and unexpected skills appear.
I liked the Dune parts more. Because I like world building. And it makes sense, if you're Immortal Joe, to run your colony as a death cult, because it keeps people more busy thinking about their glorious deaths than usurping you.
Also, I say Dune because you can't tell me that the Vuvalini aren't a Missionaria Protectiva. No, really. Terrifyingly so.
Tom Hardy did a lot of heavy lifting without saying much, and, as several times previously, gives a damn good not entirely with it. The same for Charlize Theron and the Treasures.
The other thing I liked was that the way the film was structured and scripted, it let the audience do a lot of the heavy lifting, like the fight scene we don't see between Max and The Bullet Farmer. It's quite interesting how different me and L who I went to see the film with "saw" that fight. We've both agreed that it was far too bloody to show on screen.
I could have done with a few fewer fade to blacks, and more coherence in the fight scenes, but overall, it was a good solid film.
Also, yes, I had seen various of the actors as aliens in Farscape (or the bad guy in Girl From Tomorrow). And wrestling fans, yes, that was Nathan Jones. Also, Slit is young Stryker from DOFP. I hope they all, particularly that last one, put to rest that nagging voice going 'why do I recognise them?'
