Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome

Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985)

Runtime: 107 minutes

Directed by: George Miller... and George Ogilvie

Starring: Mel Gibson, Tina Turner, Bruce Spence, Helen Buday, Tom Jennings

From: Warner Brothers

Yep, I finally saw this movie again late last night... unfortunately. I was not expecting it to be bad as I never remembered it as being bad. I was mistaken. I explain why below and I will return tomorrow night.

Like many on the site, I am quite excited to Have A Lovely Day and watch Mad Max: Fury Road so to celebrate the other films have been watched or rewatched... at least that's the case with the first two. I have noticed that not has many have watched this particular film. Me, I have watched the first two a number of times, including in recent times before I saw them again this week.

Thunderdome, I saw last often and I don't even know when I last watched it in full, except that it was a long time ago. I remembered it as being “not that bad” so in no way was I expecting to give this such a low rating before I sat down last night and saw this on Blu. At least the picture looked real good...

As for the reasons why I did not enjoy watching this last night, let me list the main reasons why:

* It seems like this movie was neutered. It might as well have been PG if not for all the swearing and talk of feces. In no way is this like the first two movies in the series; going in another direction is not a sin of itself... unless it's done like this and it seems like “Mad Max, but this time the entire family can watch it”.

* Mad becoming a Christ figure to a bunch of incredibly annoying and irritating children. This just did not work at all and I couldn't stand most of them. Note that this is a big part of the run time.

* What action scenes you do get just aren't as good as in the first two. I do understand why there ended up being two directors for this (more on that later) but it seems like it did not amount to much. Even the big Thunderdome cage fight was more lame than anything else. I don't know what to make of the shocking reveal during the brawl, but the action itself there was more lame than anything else.

* The story itself: just a gigantic mess. You can forget about such things as “character motivations”.

* Why is Bruce Spence back as a pilot but a different character than the gyro pilot he played in The Road Warrior?

* But the biggest issue for me is that I just don't care about the story or what happens in it. I don't give a damn about those kids or the feud over who really controls Bartertown. I couldn't care less.

As for the casting, Tina Turner as the main villain... I guess she was fine but it comes off as incredibly cynical due to the fact that at the time she was experiencing a huge career resurgence. Another singer has a big role, that being the small man known as Angry Anderson as Ironbar. Anderson is the lead singer of Australian rock band Rose Tattoo, who are mostly unknown in America but as I am a nerd I have heard of them before. He was fine as a short bald tattooed dude.

I do feel like a heel saying I did not enjoy this film at all; I do realize that while location scouting Byron Kennedy (the producer who was the Kennedy in Kennedy-Miller Productions) died in a helicopter crash and that obviously was a crushing blow to George Miller to lose a close friend like that by tragic means. That had to be a reason why this had two directors, and George Ogilvie handled the non action scenes.

At the same time, I still have to accurately rate movies even if they have unfortunate moments behind the scenes or there are awful incidents during production, and aside from cool sets, some quality cinematography, the Tina Turner songs and the trademark weirdness of the entire series, this is pretty bad in my eyes; I know people who rate it highly and that's fine; me, I can't get on that train.

It's unfortunate for this movie that a key part of the plot is methane being used as fuel for Bartertown; you see, pigsh*t is literally used to create that, and it's rather easy to say that is what too much of this film is, pigsh*t. At least it is easy for me to pretend that the Max here isn't the famed Max Rockatansky and the series jumps straight from The Road Warrior to the hopefully incredible Fury Road.