Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985)

Listen All! This is the Truth of It.

I haven’t had a great deal of luck with the Mad Max series, but like a Band-Aid, it’s best to just do them all as quickly as possible and move one. I felt that the first two were entirely overrated, but the second one was much more watchable. And though today’s Mad Max movie is the lowest rated of the series, Rotten Tomatoes and I have been at opposites over the series so far, so it makes me hopeful. Well, there’s only one way to find out. I must review Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, written and directed by George Miller, co-written by Terry Hayes, co-directed by George Ogilvie, and starring Mel Gibson, Tina Turner, Angelo Rossitto, Paul Larsson, Bruce Spence, Angry Anderson, Helen Buday, Tom Jennings, Robert Grubb, Frank Thring, and Hedwin Hodgeman.

Max Rockatansky (Mel Gibson) makes his way to a small, sleazy community in the middle of the wasteland called Bartertown. On the surface, the town is run by Aunty Entity (Tina Turner), but the electricity is controlled by Master (Angelo Rossitto) and his muscle Blaster (Paul Larsson), who maintains his control by placing embargoes on the energy to show who is actually in control. Aunty hires Max to kill Blaster, leaving Master powerless and under her thumb. Max challenges Blaster to a fight in the titular Thunderdome and defeats him, but he refuses to kill him when he realizes that he’s mentally disabled. Everyone else is not so kind and they kill Blaster, but decide to exile Max into the wasteland for reneging on their deal.

As I suspected, I appreciated this movie more than I liked any of the other movies in the Mad Max series. Rotten Tomatoes and I will forever be at odds on this. The story of this movie was nothing special, but it was coherent and more along the lines of what I expected. It’s pretty much just a straight forward action movie. As little as I cared for the stories in the other movies, I did take issue with the fact that this movie seemed to completely disregard the history of the series. Road Warrior ends saying that it was the last time any of them saw Max, that Jedediah took over as the leader of the tribe, and that the feral kid took over after his death. The very first thing this movie does is have Jedediah and his son rob Max, and they see him a few other times later. So it wasn’t the last time they saw him, apparently. Also, Jedediah is a pretty shitty leader because the tribe is never seen, even though he is a few times, so he’s at least neglecting his duties. And I’d even say it was unlikely that the feral kid would take over for the former leader when that leader has a lineage. So fuck that last movie, I guess. I mean, I agree with that sentiment, but they’re the ones building on that legacy. They should show respect for the movies that came before them. The next time I got mad at the movie was at Max himself. When he defeated Blaster and stopped before killing him, my anger was twofold. The first problem was that he refused to do it. Why?! Okay sure, he does have a mongoloid baby face. That would add a level of emotional difficulty. But he was just trying to kill you. And if you let him back up, he will probably try to do it again. Secondly, that you turn to Aunty Entity and proclaim, “This wasn’t part of the deal!” What are you talking about?! The deal was for you to kill Blaster. That is EXACTLY the deal! Verbatim! Technically, I guess there was a third problem with that situation in that the fight was super goofy. Two mother fuckers fighting a serious battle to the death bouncing around one of those spherical jungle gyms on rubber bands? That is the definition of badass. Or the opposite. I’m not entirely sure right now. The movie actually found a way to get goofier when Max shows up at the village of the tribe of kids, but mainly because it felt like it was becoming Hook. Granted, Hook came a long time after this movie, but it was also a comedy/family movie. Not a post-apocalyptic action movie.

I really have nothing to say about the performances in this movie. They weren’t bad and they weren’t fantastic, but none even bothered to give me any material to make jokes about. Tina Turner did fine enough, but the highlight of her contribution to the movie was that “We Don’t Need Another Hero (Thunderdome)” song. Also (and I’m not entirely sure why) I found Helen Buday strangely attractive. I’ll have to look into that.

I thought Beyond Thunderdome was the best of the Mad Max movies, but I also don’t really get the appeal of the series. The story remained nothing special, but it was at least more coherent and more in line with what I’d expect out of an action movie. The action was good enough, but I find the rubber band jungle gym fight to be leaning more towards goofy than anything else. I can’t honestly recommend any of the Mad Max series, but this one was the better of the group. They could well have been epic when they came out, but I don’t think they’ve held up. Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome gets “Congratulations! You’re the first to survive the audition!” out of “Two men enter, one man leave!”

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Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior (1981)

I’m Just Here for the Gasoline

When I went into watching Mad Max, I was very excited.  I had a mad hankerin’ to watch that movie.  That did not work out well for me.  But I was already committed, and I already own the sequel, so what was I to do?  Obviously, I was to continue reviewing!  I was also not very comforted when I saw that this movie has an even higher rating than the first movie, even though this movie has a perfect 100%.  The super high rating that the first movie got didn’t help me, why would it change anything for this one?  Am I going to be the first professional critic to hate this movie?  There’s only one way to find out.  Let’s review The Road Warrior, aka Mad Max 2, written by Terry Hayes and Brian Hannant, co-written and directed by George Miller, and starring Mel Gibson, Kjell Nilsson, Michael Preston, Bruce Spence, Emil Minty, Vernon Wells, Virginia Hey, Arkie Whiteley, and Max Phipps.

The world is, like, so dystopian it’s like not even funny.  Max Rockatansky (Mel Gibson) has kept on truckin’ around the wastelands of Australia in a seemingly endless hunt for fuel that he uses to power his car to further search for fuel.  Eventually, he comes across the captain of an autogyro (it’s like a helicopter thing … also he’s played by Bruce Spence), who he takes as his prisoner when the pilot tells him of a community with nearly unlimited funds of fuel.  While surveying the community, Max finds that they’re being threatened by a gang lead by ‘roided out Jason Voorhees called “The Humungus” (Kjell Nilsson).  Max gets inside and makes a deal with their leader, Pappagallo (Michael Preston), to bring them a semi-truck that they can use to carry their fuel north to safer lands.

I agree with Rotten Tomatoes insomuch as I feel this movie was better than the first one.  It was okay, but I still don’t think it’s earned that 100%.  The story was less confusing, though no more atypical.  At least it wasn’t as best I could tell, because parts of the movie seemed disinterested in allowing you to hear the dialogue.  There were parts of the movie that I only realized were intended to be dialogue because the subtitles were on.  Then the story was decent enough, but nothing spectacular.  It was just Max wanting to find a truck so he could get gas for his car.  The action was still decent, and this time they added a few action scenes that were more up my alley: gun-shooting and face-punching!  So I found it more interesting in that respect as well.

One problem I had with the first movie is that Max was always set up to be such a badass in my mind and I never really saw in that movie.  He gets to do a little bit more of that here.  At first, he’s a pretty simple lone wolf type character that just wants to be left alone.  Not a very charismatic character choice to be sure, but it works for the badass part.  Then he starts getting his heroic notions towards the very end of the movie, and that unleashes more of his badassness.  I was also a little excited to see Bruce Spence in this movie, but mainly just because I recognized him from Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls.  His character in the movie came a little too close to comic relief for my tastes for me to really enjoy that part of it.  Emil Minty’s character confused me too.  He was basically a little monkey boy with a boomerang.  I didn’t find him particularly compelling, which I feel like they could have fixed if they gave us a little backstory about why he was a feral little boy that hung out with people all the time.

Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior is a start on the path towards being what I actually expected the Mad Max movies to be.  The story is okay, but nothing special.  The action was decent, and the world finally looked like a dystopia instead of just looking like Australia.  And Max finally started to act like a badass and not just a regular dude that was a little upset with the world.  There were some sound issues with the movie, but the movie itself was sound.  I would not necessarily recommend this movie for a watch just because you might want to watch the first movie first, and I still don’t recommend that.  Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior gets “It’s MY snake.  I trained it; I’m gonna eat it!” out of “I am gravely disappointed.”

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