Movie Review – Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga

It may take George Miller almost a decade to get a movie out, but when he does he doesn’t disappoint. I really can’t believe that Mad Max: Fury Road came out in 2015. Where do the decades go?

Everything You Would Expect

When I think of George Miller the first thing that comes to mind is the visuals and cinematography. Both in this movie are outstanding. Cinematography is a team effort, so it isn’t fair to give Miller all the credit, except that he’s also the director and producer so he hired the people who did the cinematography and then directed them. The result is signature Miller. You couldn’t ask for more.

I don’t like to describe things as perfect because there’s always room for improvement. That being said, if this script isn’t perfect it is asymptotically close to it.

Acting

Anya Taylor-Joy is of course magnificent. In particular, her role calls for a lot of expression acting, and she nailed it. She didn’t over sell or under sell her emotional expressions. And that’s a fine line to walk. What really surprised me was the demanding role that Chris Hemsworth had and how amazing he was at it. I’ve never thought Chris was a bad actor. Sure, he’s been in a couple of movies that had less than stellar writing and directing, and he did okay. But dramatic acting wasn’t something I expected from him. He owns his Thor in the MCU. I hardly think he has to act much now to be Thor because he knows the character so well. Going into the movie one of the things I was most looking forward to seeing was Chris’s performance. He was more than impressive, especially considering that he character had a lot of really dense dialog to deliver, especially at the end of the movie. I certainly have a newfound respect for Chris.

Story

Rolling in at about 2h and 18min of movie time, not counting the credits, this is a fairly long movie, but it never dragged or felt overly padded. Sure, some of the action scenes could have been half as long and still worked, but I think the length of the action helps because Miller doesn’t just have an action scene for the sake of spectacle, of which there is plenty. He also tells the story during action scenes. Something few writers are able to do well. All told, I wouldn’t choose to shave one minute off this runtime.

Grade: A

About The Peetimes: The last Peetime is easily the best of the bunch. It’s mostly driving and scenes of the desert. None of the Peetimes have any action. I had some trouble with my timer app. I think the Peetime start/end is correct, but I’m not certain.

There are extra scenes during, or after, the end credits of Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga.

Rated:	(N/A) Sequences of Strong Violence | Grisly Images
Genres:	Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi
Starring:	Anya Taylor-Joy, Chris Hemsworth, Charlee Fraser
Director:	George Miller
Writer(s):	George Miller, Nick Lathouris
Language:	English
Country:	Australia

Plot
The origin story of renegade warrior Furiosa before her encounter and teamup with Mad Max.