Mad Max Is Just a Movie

I watched Mad Max: Fury Road yesterday and it’s all kinds of ridiculous. Who waits 30 years to continue a franchise? Who makes an entire movie one long car chase? Who threatens a boycott of an an action movie because it’s too feminist?

Mad Max is all kinds of absurd. And it’s awesome.

The best example of its absurdity: Bringing your own theme music along on a chase scene, complete with a rock ‘n roll car, fronted by an insane guitar player who can—wait for it—shoot fire from his guitar.

What?!

Exactly.

That flame-throwing guitar is real, by the way. No CGI involved.

If anyone expected Mad Max to make a lot of sense, you’re in the wrong movie. It’s just a lot of crazy action and some bad ass people.

What is perhaps the most absurd thing about the movie is how everyone is calling it a feminist movie. Yes, there are strong female characters. Yes, Charlize Theron’s character totally overshadows Mad Max. Yes, there’s a crew of old-aged biker chicks with the mantra, “One man, one bullet.” (78-year-old Melissa Jaffer did her own stunts.) And yes, the damsels in distress are pretty well rescuing themselves.

So what?

It’s awesome. It fits perfectly in the post-apocalyptic world to have women reduced to objects and pushed to the point they fight back. Girl power isn’t exactly new in Mad Max. Tina Turner was quite the bad ass in charge. There was even the Warrior Woman in Road Warrior, fighting off the horde to the death.

It’s refreshing to see an action movie that takes women seriously. But do we really need to call it feminist? Can’t we just call it a movie?

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