Hello gents,
I caught Mad Max: Fury Road again on DVD the other day and thought I would pen a quick(ish) review of it.
I know a lot of people here have seen it, and thought it a gynocentric pro-feminist abomination. That’s cool, I am not writing this to prove such folks wrong, to argue or change anyone’s mind. We’re all grown men and have the right to our opinions and I don’t need to change yours, nor will I cry myself to sleep if you don’t share mine.
I am writing this, rather, for such guys as have not seen it and have come to suspect it has no redeeming merits based on the negative press in the manosphere. I am of the opinion that is a fantastic action film and well worth watching.
Disclaimer – I can’t stand Charlize Theron. Never liked her. She seems to mainly do movies that have male body counts – Aeon Flux, Monster, that Alien one where she roasts a guy with a flame thrower, the one with Johnny Depp where she kills him and damns the whole human race to alien invasion because reasons (the alternate ending was worse). What would people make of a male actor who needs to kill women in every movie? We know the answer to that. (I think she did a rom-com recently too but needless to say I didn’t bother with it).
And, as some critics have noted, this is her movie. The story arc and character development, such as they are, centre on her. Max is along for the ride and frequently gets centre stage, but it’s still her movie, so naturally people are p~~~ed at that.
Why recommend it then? Well, two reasons.
Firstly, as an action movie, and indeed as a Mad Max movie, it is superb. The action is brilliantly, perfectly choreographed. There is a fight scene where she and Max first meet and with her cold-blooded “I hate men” feminist stare and the choreography, it seriously looks like she is trying to kill him. It includes a few almost Jackie-Chan-esque moments with props – a chain, a car door – that should have looked, well, theatrical, but instead worked perfectly. The whole movie is like that, every scene and shot flawless. For anyone interested, have a look at THIS video where someone who can analyze such things explains shot by shot why it works.
But so what – Michael Bay can shoot brilliant action, his movies still suck. This has so much more than the action. It has the set design, costumes, the characters and the humour that made the first two so awesome, and the third memorable in many ways even if not up to their standard. This is the action genre at its best, because it does all the rest of the film so well.
The second reason I recommend this movie is the underlying ethos.
No, this is not a red pill movie, I won’t p~~~ on your chips and call it vinegar (heard that on a youtube the other day, my new favourite phrase). But it is not simply a feminists movie, not at all. Yes, feminists will see ‘strong independant woman’ and rave about the movie, but these are the same f~~~tards who were told, ‘murdering your baby in utero is the path to freedom’ and actually bought it. Their view, like the rest of their ideaology, is irrelevant. Let’s deal with the movie on the facts.
The movie gives us a world like Mad Max 2 & 3 – society has collapsed (still), people make their own cars and drive around in savage bands led by warlords.
But things have advanced slightly, going beyond ‘Bartertown’ of Mad Max 3, which was itself a step forward from the world of Mad Max 2. Now they’ve found how to make bullets, and the bullet warlord, the petrol warlord (‘gasoline!’) and the water (and milk) warlord are able to trade and work with each other. This is significant.
The movie is very much set up with a clash of cultures, or of tribes, at its heart, and that clash is fundamentally a gendered one – a clash between the male warlord tribes and the ‘vuvalini’, the female tribe. In the end, the women (the ones who survive) seem to come out on top, so the feminists rave about it. But they are too stupid to see the underlying point.
It is the men who are driving the advancement of civilisation, as they always have. The main protagonist is Immortan Joe, and he rules over a savage and brutal society. This is where civilisation originally came from. Whether we look at ancient civs like the Assyrians that conquered Israel, who were seriously brutal, or the ones in South America who built amazing pyramids so they could sacrifice people on top, the birth of civilisation came from such savagery. Organised, systemised savagery and warfare led to organised and systematized life, otherwise known as civlisation. Immortan Joe has created this, he has used the male edge – brains and technology – to pump water from the ground, grow food, and create the other thing that sets civilised socities apart from tribes – irrigation. He has created a society where ordinary peasants, who wait for their water, at least have a place, a way to survive: these were missing from the band of marauders that Humungous led in Mad Max 2, so we see the first struggling genesis of modernity in the group Immortan Joe rules. As mentioned, they trade with other tribes and while they pick off a loan wanderer like Max passing through their territory, well, here in Australia we do the same to anyone who crosses our borders so that’s not so uncivilised.
Most importantly, Charlize Theron’s ‘Furiosa’ – a one armed woman, a woman with a disability – rises to the rank of Imperator (a general, presumably) in this ‘male’ society. Women have a place there. Some are peasants, some are breeders, some supply milk, Furiosa makes it to Imperator. On merit.
When we meet the female society though, we find something very different. The women there have seeds – yay, hippy happiness! they can plant and grow! I’m having an Aquarian orgasm!
Except they can’t. The land has become saline, and with no technology, they are F~~~ED. They are all over 40 (yes, even the glorious Megan Gale is in her 40s now) and soon they’ll be gone.
What do they contribute? NOTHING. How do they survive? When we first see them, they are using a naked Megan Gale as bait. For what? One of the wives (who are portayed as a useless bunch – the old woman flat out call them ‘soft’) asks an old women if she’s killed anyone with her gun.
“Everyone I’ve met out here. Headshots”, she replies.
With no tech they are reduced to murderous parasites who bait any passing men and murder them for their resources.
So, those are the two societies contrasted – a brutal male society where women have a place based on use and merit, and within which we can see the nascent origins of civilisation, and a useless, murderous female society that left to its own devices would have soon died out.
The feminists who cheer this simply didn’t understand it. George Miller tells us what anyone with a brain already knows – an all female society, left to it’s own devices, will soon die out. Women are essentially useless, particularly without a man to marshall them.
Max does just that in the movie, but this is already too long so I’ll leave it there. Miller’s ultimate ethos and message is, I believe, deeply humanist – he is arguing that men and women, put simply (or lyrically), need each other, and both bring something of value to the table: the men their tech and brains, the women their ‘seeds’ and the nurturing to make them grow. Miller unites the tribes at the end because he believes this is the best way forward.
But you don’t have to buy into or believe that – you can just watch a damn good action movie, and if you want, laugh at the women too.
Russky 3 years, 3 months ago.
