Fast and ‘Furiosa’ (Review)

metroweekly.com:

Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga doesn’t miss Max, who cedes the spotlight in this installment to the fearsome post-apocalyptic female warrior Furiosa, introduced in George Miller’s 2015 Oscar-winner Mad Max: Fury Road.But this movie is missing something, because, although it looks and sounds impressive, it doesn’t approach the pulse-pounding potency of Fury Road.In that film, Mad Max-meister Miller undergirded the bone-crushing vehicular mayhem with compelling purpose.

Furiosa, then portrayed by Charlize Theron, was on a mission to free the enslaved wives of water-hoarding tyrant Immortan Joe, chillingly played by Hugh Keays-Byrne.She also had her own score to settle with Joe, and did, by summarily sending his lower jaw flying off in a different direction than the rest of his face.For Furiosa, Miller and returning Fury Road co-writer Nick Lathouris rewind the clock to recount their heroine’s harrowing origin story.

After her first blockbuster adventure, most moviegoers might rather have seen where Theron’s Furiosa headed next, than retrace where she came from, but Miller apparently wants to build out this universe.So, we meet young Furiosa (Alyla Browne) as a courageous kid residing within the “green place,” a tranquil community tucked inside a forest, until she’s stolen from this “place of abundance” by vicious biker bandits.Furiosa’s equally tough and courageous mother, Mary Jabassa (Charlee Fraser), mounts a daring chase across the desert to retrieve her, giving the film its first riveting setpiece, highlighted by the image of a rider on fire, speeding through a raging sandstorm.

Fraser and Browne make persuasive mother and daughter badasses, establishing this chapter of the Mad Max saga, like the 1978 original, as a tale of.