The Mad Max sequel Furiosa is one of the most anticipated sci-fi films of the year. It would be a flawless epic if it weren’t for Chris Hemsworth and his band of warriors
In 2015, no one could avoid the apocalypse. The sci-fi masterpiece Mad Max: Fury Road was released in cinemas and blew action fans away. Understandably, millions are now eagerly awaiting Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, which tells the prequel to the blockbuster with Anya Taylor-Joy and Chris Hemsworth. Is the movie good? Yes, very good. But it would be even better without Hemsworth’s drivel
Is Furiosa better than Mad Max: Fury Road? The action-packed sci-fi epic has two major strengths
Furiosa recounts the childhood and youth of Furiosa (Alyla Browne/Anya Taylor-Joy), who appears in Fury Road as a hardened warrior. The prequel shows her as a child who is abducted by the biker leader Dementus (Hemsworth) and cruelly robbed of her mother (Charlee Fraser). Only later, in the wake of Dementus’ rival Immortan Joe (Lachy Hulme), does she get her chance for revenge.
Watch the latest Furiosa trailer here:
To put it bluntly: Furiosa doesn’t quite come close to Fury Road. But that’s not a bad thing. Fury Road was a straightforward, extremely well-made movie, a brilliant snapshot, a royal flush at poker. It was as if the stars had aligned perfectly. That can’t be repeated. And Miller doesn’t try.
Furiosa’s first strength: the action is again extremely thrilling
Furiosa’s story spans 15 years, shows a wide variety of locations, various factions, a love story, dramatic emotions and moral gray areas. Where Fury Road is a masterful, lean action flick, Furiosa aims for a different scale. The film sees itself as a 2.5-hour epic with many different stages. Nevertheless, the action scenes are absolutely stunning.
When Taylor-Joy’s Furiosa races through the desert in an armed tanker truck for the first time, Fury Road is alive and kicking again. Motorcycles race, harpoons explode, warriors smeared with white mud throw themselves to their deaths. 1000 secret weapons from parachutes to gigantic morning stars mill their way through an army of cruel bandits. The action is in no way inferior to its predecessor. But Miller fires it up in selected places instead of letting it off the chain for 120 minutes.
(Anya Taylor-Joy as Furiosa)
As in its predecessor, he opts for a visually stunning production with an ultra-dynamic camera, time-lapse zooms and panoramic shots. Every cut is perfect. And anyone who feared the digital look of the film after seeing the trailer can rest assured. It doesn’t ruin the action epic. The focus is on Furiosa, everything else blends in well with the flow of flashy images
Furiosa’s second strength: Anya Taylor-Joy is simply stunning
Anya Taylor-Joy is the inferno that sets the movie ablaze. She may only have 30 lines of dialog (in my opinion it was rather less), but she embodies Furiosa so perfectly that she carries the film in every emotional state. She shoots and thrashes and stabs with every muscle fiber, pushing us viewers to the edge of our seats. Taylor-Joy’s Furiosa hates and loves with such intensity that it becomes painful. She burns through the movie like an open wound.
The Furiosa movie has one major weakness and it’s particularly evident in a Chris Hemsworth scene
When Miller turns his gaze away from Furiosa, the movie’s only weakness is revealed: the banter between Hemsworth’s Dementus and his comrades-in-arms and opponents becomes irrelevant and dull. Their characters are good as grotesques or decoration, but not as perspective carriers of the Furiosa world. This becomes painfully obvious in the finale. Spoiler alert:
(Chris Hemsworth as Dementus)
There, Dementus faces death at the hands of Furiosa. And he gives a speech like 1000 villains in 1000 movies have done: He and Furiosa are the same. He too has lost his love and hope and has therefore become hard and brutal. The dialogue is intended to emphasize Furiosa’s steep and sometimes sinister development.
The sci-fi firework Furiosa has only one annoying weakness
Dementus opens up a new perspective here with irrelevant words that it doesn’t even need. Dementus’ backstory can stay stolen from me. I don’t care about the socio-political mass tragedies of this dystopia. Hemsworth’s words would carry weight if we had gotten to know Furiosa as a meek naïf. But she is a fierce warrior from the very first second. Her toughness is a foregone conclusion.
So Chris Hemsworth’s character had better shut up when her words fizzle out so pointlessly. The moment feels like a kind of stopgap, intended to further enrich Furiosa’s moment of revenge, but briefly robs the movie of some of its impact. It’s a good thing that it’s only one of very few dull moments that are quickly forgotten.
Thanks to its visually stunning action, an explosive lead actress and an emotionally effective story, this sci-fi thriller is an extremely entertaining near-masterpiece that only falls a few meters short of Fury Road. Miller’s apocalypse will also ignite a wildfire in 2024
