George Miller... "Why yes, yes I do. Well sort of anyway..."
I really really wanted to love Furiosa but in the end I didn't, I liked it but didn't love it. Big big shoes to fill, I completely love Fury Road - a perfect action film in every way, so I was prepared to have this film fall in its shadow. Which it did. Furiosa is fun but its sadly no FR.
The good news:
You want action? There is action, loads of it. Like any good Mad Max story it holds true to its promise to entertain the masses with spectacle. Glorious. We get the hot rods, big wheels, diggers, bikes of all shapes and sizes, as well as flying contraptions, weaponry galore and no holding back on the violence. Explosions, bodies flying, witness me etc. Plenty. It can be brutal and nasty but true to form and true to Mad Max. What more do you want?
Casting is good, perhaps a few too many characters leaving each of them to have not quite enough to do especially with Immortan Joe's followers. Anja Taylor Joy is good as Furiosa and Hemsworth seems to really be enjoying himself. Dementus is a great villain, a sort of love child of Immortan Joe and The Humungus; the presence, the wee speeches, his villainy is fun. And he gets to be very Aussie no need to hide that accent. I also liked a younger and much cleverer Immortan Joe; in this film he's not the core bad guy and without the need to get his 5 wives back as a motivator making him crazy we get to see him as the warlord he is. Smart and patient and in control.
And there's world building! Which was very cool. We got to see more of the Wasteland and get hints of how it ticks and what made it so.
The bad news:
Visually Furiosa is a bit of a mixed bag; sometimes we get stuff worthy of its predecessor and other times we get stuff that is... less so. The colour is much more pale than the richness of FR and the cinematography is no where near the standards. Occasionally the CGI lets the film down just a bit. In Fury Road you got the impression that it was almost all practical effects even if it wasn't. In Furiosa there are sequences where I went... 'eww, yikes' as the standards of the film dropped. Only a few moments but be prepared.
The music is often absent or very lacking. The sweeping epics of Fury Road are almost gone instead we get much more background stuff or even sadly largely silent action sequences. This leads to a lack of tension, nothing edge of your seat here.
The writing and edit isn't great. The characters lack spark and bits feel missing. Miller is trying to tell a story but seems unsure of how to write characters in which one can invest. Furiosa has more ambition in its story telling and I think its execution is lacking. The core story solid but it seems a bit empty on the screen. The film jumps at times skipping over character development worthy of exploration.
In the edit i really really missed the fast cuts of Fury where Miller really built his scenes through tight production and cuts and edits where everything builds beautifully and leads to a great conclusions. Miller did this scene after scene in FR whereas in Furiosa its really lacking. Means theres not as much tension, not as many 'that was close' nor 'that was amazing' moments.
Overall I did like it. Furiosa is a good Mad Max film but its no Fury Road. I'd be surprised if the film is recognized at Oscar time, where Fury Road won 6 Furiosa might get a nomination or two in the technical but no nominations for Directing or Best Picture.
By my deeds I honour him...
By my wallet I honour George Miller, Witness Furiosa. Its worth your time and money but not more than that.
