If you enjoy a good summer blockbuster and would like to do that from the comfort of your own home, I have a terrific pick for you today.
If you enjoy car chases through the desert in a post-apocalyptic wasteland, filled with outlandish characters, massive explosions and some of the best action sequences ever filmed, look no further than Mad Max: Fury Road, George Miller’s epic action masterpiece which lands on Netflix today.
It’s hard to believe, but the film is actually ten-years-old now. I still remember seeing it for the first time in theaters a decade ago and being completely blown away. I’ve seen it several times since, and that feeling of pure awe never leaves. Even beyond the adrenaline-filled, heart-pounding action, there’s just something so incredible about this movie and how it was filmed.
For starters, director George Miller and artists including Brendan McCarthy came up with 3,500 panels of storyboards before any work was done on the script itself. Miller, who had written only a brief outline at this point, wanted to visualize the film and effectively created an extensive graphic novel in the process. The final cut of the film mirrors these storyboards almost exactly.
The concept and storyboard work began in the late 90s, but 9/11 happened and plans to film in Africa were thwarted. The production moved to Australia, but flooding left the landscape too verdant for a Mad Max movie, and so well over a decade after all this began the filming moved back to Namibia in 2012. Mel Gibson was originally slated to reprise his role as Max, but the delays made this impossible and the part was recast with Tom Hardy filling Gibson’s boots. Charlize Theron was cast as Imperator Furiosa.
The story follows Max as he helps Furiosa escape the dastardly warlord Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-Byrne) and his War Boys, including Nux (Nicholas Hoult). Furiosa has freed the slave-wives of Immortan Joe, but the warlord won’t let them go easily. What follows is one of the most intense, brilliantly filmed car chases ever put to film.
Over 200 outlandish cars were created for Fury Road and kept for years in storage until filming could begin. It’s genuinely one of the most insane cinematic works of all time and while I absolutely recommend you watch it on a 4k Blu-Ray disc (or check out the black and white ‘Black and Chrome’ edition, which is Miller’s preferred version) it will still look and sound great on Netflix. Miller wanted to release a silent version of the film, but this never happened.
Netflix is also about to lose Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga which serves as a prequel to Fury Road. Definitely watch them in the order they were released, however, as the prequel functions better once you’ve already seen the original. While I recommend you watch the first three Mad Max films also, you certainly don’t have to prior to watching Fury Road, which is effectively a franchise reboot more than a proper sequel. I thought Furiosa was excellent with great performances from stars Anya Taylor-Joy as a young Furiosa and Chris Hemsworth as the rather demented warlord, Dementus – though it’s still not on the same level as Fury Road.
Be sure to also go watch Ryan Coogler’s Sinners, which just became available on streaming last week.
