In Brief Episode 2

I have finally, at long last, watched the two sequels to Mad Max: The Road Warrior and Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome. I've got something to say about the latter two, but before I get there, let me fulfill this episode of In Brief.

Mad Max (1979)
In this, Mel Gibson's first real movie role and George Miller's first feature-length film, we meet Max Rockatansky. He lives in a world that seems "post-apocalyptic," as they say, although that isn't exactly explained until this movie's sequel. At best, the world has degenerated into a state of lonesome highway speed demons banding together in gangs and destroying each other using spectacular speed- and stunt-driving maneuvers. Max is a cop whose difficult job is to stop them. But when Max's personal life begins to be affected by terrorizing street gangs, he takes it personally and takes violent vengeance on those who have threatened his family.

Mad Max is a movie that I consider a guilty pleasure, but every time I call it that, I feel like I'm doing the movie some horrible injustice. It's really a good movie, especially if you watch it with the original Australian soundtrack. See, when the movie was originally released, the American distributors thought that the Australian accents were too difficult for American audiences to understand. This is, of course, untrue. If you were able to follow Steve Irwin, you can make it through Mad Max. The movie is well-shot, well-acted, and full of really good, explosive action. No, your brain doesn't need to be functioning to get the full effect of Mad Max. You can just enjoy it. And there's nothing wrong with that.

Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior (1981)
I've always heard this refered to as simply "The Road Warrior," but IMDb has the main title simply as "Mad Max 2." This is my review, so I'll call it what I want to, dammit.

At the end of Mad Max, Officer Rockatansky takes care of business and disappears down a long, dusty highway, a rogue, a changed man, his loyal dog trailing him. The first thing that happens here -- we're given insight into how the world came to be the way it is. It involves a war over oil and a sudden lack of gasoline, which is now a more precious commodity than ever before. Nuclear war breaks out, leaving the world in a state of street gangs and Mad Maxes.

Max almost immediately makes enemies with a new street gang whose crew members include Dude With Leather Shirt Everywhere Except His Nipples, Guy With Loud Red Mohawk Who Rides A Motorcycle With Nipple Guy Riding Bitch, and their leader, Really Big Guy Who Appears To Be Wearing Clothing But Who Is Really Just Wearing Strappy Leather Underwear. In truth, I think their real names are Pappagallo, The Toadie, and Lord Humungus. There's this oil refinery that's producing actual gasoline in the middle of the Australian desert, and there's a group of people who have set up camp around it. They want to get out and go to the sea a couple hundred miles away, but cannot due to their inability to move the enormous tank of gas with them. Max can help, and he leverages the community for some gas of his own. It is action-packed and explosive, and also a pretty good movie if the outrageous and frequently skimpy costumes don't bother you too much. Most of all, this film and its prequel remind me of a time when special effects were real and not computer generated. That's perhaps the best part of both of these.

Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985)
Here we find Max entering one of the more civilized areas of post-apocalypse Australia: a place called Bartertown. Max's instant reluctance to obey the rules earns him a visit to the leader of Bartertown, Aunty Entity, played (to death) by Tina Turner. His audacity impresses her, and he learns of the town's method of producing electricity: burning pig feces for the methane, and of their method of dealing out justice: a caged, domed arena complete with fatal weapons called Thunderdome. Max causes some trouble and is banished from the outpost, where he wanders on the verge of death in the desert until he discovers a random river and a colony of youngsters there who believe Max is Captain Walker, an assumed war hero who they idolize as a messiah. Max and the new crew head back to Bartertown to teach them a lesson.

This movie starts off really well, with better cinematography than the previous two, but quickly loses steam when you realize that Tina Turner's part is not really a small one. Also, where the first two movies are gritty and ugly, giving a very grimey and visceral feeling like the audience should be glad they don't have to live in the films' setting, "Beyond Thunderdome" suffers from being gritty and pretty. It feels more like Indiana Jones - a glitzy, Hollywood adventure flick -- than a disgusting piece with any real merit. I found it to be pretty enjoyable, but without the same flair that the two prior films had. I won't be watching it again any time soon.

Something worth saying
I feel that both The Road Warrior and Beyond Thunderdome have something important to say. Or at least they start off that way. Niether really goes into much depth on their subjects of choice, but here's what I get:

The Road Warrior talks about the scarcity of gasoline and how it really is in short supply. It talks about a war that broke out over that matter. What are we fighting for in Iraq right now if not oil? Let the politicians say what they want - it's a war for freedom, it's a holy war, whatever. It's a war for oil. How far away are we from a reality like Max's?

This ultimately leads to a situation as in Beyond Thunderdome, where justice is served gladiator-style and political struggles occur based around those who claim to have political control over an energy crisis much like our own, and those who have manual control over it. Of course, at the present moment, the people with political power are also the ones with manual power, and that's a bad thing, too, but we may be headed toward this kind of gridlocked eventuality.

I wish the movies explored these themes more fully, but they don't. They're action flicks, and there's nothing wrong with that. But it still all leaves me feeling like I wanted to see a proposed solution. Perhaps that's what the action was after all. If there's a conflict without an easy solution, simply destroy the problem completely and totally with unrestrained, vigilante violence. That's not too far off from the message of V for Vendetta, which is one of the most important films of the past decade. People should not be afraid of their government. Governments should fear their people. Likewise, the folks who think they control their system should never forget the likes of "Mad" Max Rockastansky, a man who doesn't understand totalitarian control, and won't stand for it.