‘Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga’: A turbocharged quest for revenge

Anya Taylor-Joy, a force to be reckoned with, challenges Chris Hemsworth’s Warlord Dementus in George Miller’s action-packed epic, ‘Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga.’

Forty-five years ago, physician-turned-filmmaker George Miller gave us Mad Max, a character who roamed a gasoline-starved, post-apocalyptic wasteland in a souped-up automobile in search of vengeance, justice, survival, and fuel. Nine years ago, Miller added another figure with an angry nomenclature to this dystopian portrait, Imperator Furiosa (Charlize Theron), a one-armed avenging angel on a quest to rescue captive women and escape with them to the haven of her idyllic childhood home. In between, Miller gave us dancing penguins (“Happy Feet”) and a pig who dreamed of being a sheepdog (“Babe: Pig in the City”).

Now, Miller is back with “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga,” an origin story about the character played by Theron in “Mad Max: Fury Road” (2015), featuring Anya Taylor-Joy and an excellent Alyla Browne as Furiosa as a girl. We meet the young Furiosa (Browne) while she is still living in the so-called “place of abundance” as she comes across a band of marauding bikers who kidnap her as a gift for their barbaric leader Dementus (Chris Hemsworth), a warlord of the Wasteland who rides a chariot drawn by three motorcycles. Dementus and his biker underlings resemble biblical beardos (some sport skull masks) and attempt to conquer Immortan Joe (Lachy Hulme) and take control of his Citadel, one of the three fortresses of the Wasteland. At the same time, the grown-up Furiosa strives to find her way home. In pursuit of this, Furiosa tattoos stars on her wrist that are an astronomical map leading the way.

Anya Taylor-Joy as Furiosa in “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga." (Warner Bros. Pictures) — *Anya Taylor-Joy as Furiosa in director George Miller’s action-packed “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga.” (Warner Bros. Pictures)*

With his false nose and wheedling voice and manner, the muscular, red-haired Dementus recalls Fagin, the villain played by the English actor Alec Guinness in the 1948 David Lean classic “Oliver Twist,” Guinness, of course, is best known as the screen’s original Obi-Wan Kenobi. Hemsworth, aka Thor from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, is fun to watch as the twisted Dementus, even if the name, like many in the film, is too on the nose. Dementus is a monster who blames others for making him behave horribly (Hmmm)

Furiosa, on the other hand, does not like to make her presence known. In fact, she barely speaks, making her captors think she is mute (Furiosa is almost a silent-film performance). After Dementus is forced to trade the young Furiosa to Joe, the child hides from Joe’s pedophile son Rictus Erectus (Nathan Jones)—that name thing again. Joe is still the god-like leader of the “war boys,” young men who worship death and fast cars and hurl grenade-tipper spears. Later, the adult Furiosa teams up with Praetorian Jack (Tom Burke, a huge plus here), a notably Han Solo-like driver, who pilots an enormous tanker truck from the fortress known as Gastown to other parts of the Wasteland, usually harried by biker-pirates, recalling the primary action of Miller’s “Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior” (1981).

Chris Hemsworth in "Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga." (Jasin Boland/Warner Bros. Pictures) — *Chris Hemsworth is Warlord Dementus in “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga.” (Jasin Boland/Warner Bros. Pictures)*

The tremendous, trademark action sequences of “Furiosa,” which variously recall “The Wizard of Oz” (1939), “Lawrence of Arabia” (1962), Homer’s “Odyssey” and any number of John Ford Westerns, most especially the landmark chase film “Stagecoach” (1939), are set against a monochrome backdrop of orange-yellow sand and blinding sky. The Wasteland resembles nothing as much as Ford’s signature setting, Monument Valley, a desert landscape marked by wind-carved sandstone buttes eerily recalling modern sculpture.

At its heart, “Furiosa” is also a species of those wild biker movies of the 1960s and ’70s, including Roger Corman’s influential “The Wild Angels” (1966), if you transported those films to the post-nuke landscapes of 1980s comic books. Swan-necked Taylor-Joy, whose recent interviews suggest she endured genuine mental distress shooting the film, is a wonder as Furiosa, her opalescent eyes gleaming like fire. She deftly handles the insane-looking action and fighting scenes. You’ll also be left asking yourself why Burke isn’t a major star (hopefully, this film remedies that).

While not quite as great as the Namibia-shot “Fury Road,” “Furiosa” is a worthy addition to the Mad Max-Furiosa universe (next up: “Mad Max: The Wasteland”). Cinematography by Simon Duggan (“The Great Gatsby”), music by Tom Holkenborg (“Zack Snyder’s Justice League”), and costumes by three-time Oscar winner Jenny Beavan (“Cruella”) are all exemplary. Miller, 79, works like a filmmaker half his age. “Furiosa” is action-moviemaking of the highest order. But even the fans will feel like “Furiosa” begins to wear out its welcome at 148 minutes—still, those eyes.