Mad Max: Fury Road - 2015

"Mad Max: Fury Road" - 2015
Dir. by George Miller - 2 hrs.

Official Main Trailer

by Clayton Hollifield

Now this is a dystopia I can get behind!  Sure, I dig a good dystopian movie from time to time, and they're all usually dusty and ragged and jerry-rigged worlds, but rarely do you see something like "Mad Max: Fury Road," where the world has evolved into something truly horrifying (and spellbinding).  Although the premise isn't new ("The Road Warrior" covered some of this, once upon a time), the visuals certainly are, from top to bottom.  The visual aspect of this film is so strong that the story is nearly irrelevant, other than as a road for the frequent clashes between groups to follow.

Max (Tom Hardy) is a haunted man with a past and a bad-ass car, the Interceptor.  But he's quickly set upon by the War Boys, captured, and turned into a blood bag (which is pretty much exactly what it sounds like - the lowest classes in this film are used solely for the fluids they can produce).  When Furiosa (Charlize Theron) makes a break for it with Immortan Joe's (Hugh Keays-Byrne) harem, Max is strapped to the front of a war chariot vehicle, and the War Boys set out to capture Furiosa and Joe's concubines.

All of that isn't necessarily important; this isn't a plot film.  "Mad Max: Fury Road" does what comes rarely in film, and what frequently only comes from truly bizarre or surreal works: this is an experience.  You can dissect the plot, the action, the acting, even the movie poster, but it all comes second to what the experience of watching this film feels like.  And it truly feels, man.  There are truly epic sights, like the War Boys' hometown, which feature giant earthen towers containing all the good stuff (like water), and the wretched who live below, who are periodically given a few drops of water while being warned not to love it too much, lest they resent its absence later.  There's a giant (and I mean giant) sandstorm, which was in the trailer, so I'm not spoiling anything.  There are endless waves of inventively welded-together vehicles; if you have any weakness for cars, this movie is going to blow your mind.  Most of all, there are two full hours here of insane, bespoke, impressive sights that really put you in the middle of the endless fighting and racing through the desert.

In tone, "Fury Road" feels a lot like "The Road Warrior," but with the time to create every nook and cranny from scratch, and the budget to make it a reality.  As is the norm for the Max movies,  there's no CGI in any of the stunts, and you can feel the difference.  I'm not prioritizing one over the other, but when real-world stunts and action are performed and performed well, there's a tangible difference from even the best CGI.  And that's the big deal about "Fury Road."  It's hard to explain exactly why it was so exhilarating; telling you that it's non-stop action for two hours might sound numbing, but it wasn't.  Telling you that the action was top-notch doesn't really get that across.  Telling you that there is originality oozing out of every pore of the film doesn't get across how awesome something like the war guitar guy is to see.

"Mad Max: Fury Road" is completely gonzo, over-the-top, violent, crazy, inventive, original.  I need to see it again on a big screen just to try and catch some more of the details that I might have missed the first time around.  It delivers on everything that the trailer promised.  It's an experience.  You should probably go see this, if you're on the fence about it.  If you're not, "Pitch Perfect 2" came out this week, too, and people seem to like that one.

4.5 / 5 - Theatre (3D)

Prometheus - 2012

"Prometheus" - 2012
Dir. by Ridley Scott - 2 hrs. 4 min.

Official Trailer

by Clayton Hollifield

I think the bottom line with a film like "Prometheus" is whether or not it was a cool film.  And yeah, it was a cool film.  There are essentially two kinds of films: ones that are story-based and ones that are experience-based.  "Prometheus" is the latter, almost by default.  That's not to say that there isn't a story here, there certainly is.  But in a movie that devotes so much attention to its visuals, or to put it another way, sheer spectacle, parsing the film for plot points misses the point.  It's like this: sure, a spaceship lands on a foreign planet.  Is that the point?  No, the point is that the ship looks awesome, and the reveal of the alien planet isn't something that can just be conveyed by telling someone that there were mountains and stuff.  You need to experience the reveal itself in order to "get" what the filmmakers want you to get.

So, what exactly is "Prometheus" about?  I'll sketch that in broad strokes.  A pair of archaeologists, Elizabeth Shaw (Noomi Rapace) and Charlie Holloway (Logan Marshall-Green), discover a set of 35,000 year old cave painting in Scotland, which happen to depict something that has also been depicted by other primitive cultures, ones that couldn't have had any contact with one another.  They take that as an invitation to the stars, and ten years later, they head a commercial space expedition shrouded in mystery, with a Weyland Corporation representative (Meredith Vickers, played by Charlize Theron) in ultimate charge.  And then a bunch of other things happen.

I'm not sure to what degree it's a spoiler to mention that this is an antecedent of the "Alien" franchise.  "Prometheus" stands on it's own, and honestly, there's only the most minor of connections made explicit.  As far as to whether or not it ties directly into the other films, that falls into the "I don't know/I don't care" category.  It's been a number of years since I've watched any of the other films, and I'm not watching four films in preparation to maybe glint another line or two out of "Prometheus."  One thing I can tell you is that the visual design sense of H.R. Giger (the artist who's work was the basis of the franchise) is present (and still spooky).

Breaking down the plot or analyzing the acting wouldn't do much good here.  The story hits all the points it needs to in order to get out of the way and let visually interesting or harrowing events to be shown.  If a film is not going to be able to manage to break new ground in terms of story, that's about the best alternative.  What is important is that the story is told with a maximum of visual flair.  Two scenes among many stand out: the initial scene set at a waterfall is spectacular, and there's a computer-generated scene of what appears to be the creation of the universe that is equally breathtaking.  Those aren't the only winners, but without spoiling things (and part of the joy of this film is one visual marvel after another), let me use that word "cool" to let you know that your eyes are going to be very, very happy while watching "Prometheus."

I liked this film a lot.  It's tense, visually interesting, and the run time flew by.  The "Alien" franchise isn't one of my personal favorites, so that wasn't really a factor in my enjoyment.  And I don't think that it would be fair to view "Prometheus" as an "Alien" prequel, as you don't really need to know anything about those film in order to appreciate this one.  If you're going to see "Prometheus," be sure to find the biggest screen in your area that you can.

3.5 / 5 - Theatre