Mad Max

Weird. We So let's get out in front of it just right here. Mel Gibson not a great person, not my not not me saying, not me saying that. I think just generally overall, mel Gibson seems like a kind of a clown an ass. I mean, he makes an ass of himself all the time, and then people vouch for him, and then he makes an ass of himself again, and then people vouch for him.

It's it's hard to get on the mel Gibson train. That being said, I just want to get out in front of it here because it doesn't matter, because we can separate the art from the artists, and we're about to do that for the next hour because we're gonna be talking about a film that Father Malone was shocked. Shocked, I say, to learn that I had never seen it. I had seen him, I'd seen Fury Road. But that doesn't I guess that counts, but it doesn't really.

I mean, well, we'll get to it when we get to it. There's a lot going on here. It counts. But are we even talking about the same franchise as my point, I don't know, Yeah, yes, oh yeah, well let's get here, you know, what I mean, yes, and but uh so yeah. On this episode of the Culture Cast, I am joined by Father Malone for this very special botherm Malone programmed bonus episode of a series of one, two, three, four leading up to Furiosa, which will be a projection booth ex culture Cast thing because we're going to try to cover more new movies every month, which means we make more work for ourselves in the long run by covering other things too.

There's an alternate universe where we covered all the Planet of the Apes movies leading up to Planet of the Apes. Instead, Uh, that would have been good. Yeah. Instead we're doing Mad Max, which I think for a lot of people, myself included, is the bigger of the two big box office movies of this month, a higher profile I think. I think most people don't even know there's a Planet of the Apes movie coming out, but everybody knows furios is on the way, yeah, which I mean is a credit to George Miller and Anya Taylor Joy who That's why I'm going to see it, because she's amazing period the end.

Right, Oh, I'm going to see it because it's another Mad Max. Sure. Jason's story by George Miller like recent adjacent and then leading up to another Mad Max movie in the near future. I hope so get going right now, Matt Mad Max the Wasteland supposed to see will I will watch that immediately. But on this episode of the Culture Cast, this bonus episode, we are talking about nineteen seventy nine's original Mad Max.

Mad Max. He's the only law in a future world, gone man. They killed his partner, attacked his wife and child. Now it's his term and Max is mad Mad Max The Maximum Force of the Future, Rated R. Directed by George Miller, screenplay by George Miller and James mccauslin, by a story by George Miller and Byron Kennedy.

It stars, like we've already mentioned, Mel Gibson, Joanne, Samuel, Hugh keys Burn. His name's going to show up a whole bunch in these four episodes, so will Mel Gibson's a couple of times, and the couple times, not all of them, twice two more times and yeah, Mad Max, what is it about? It's about a near a dystopian near future Australia, a few days in the future. Even that's there just a couple of days from now, we're all going to be living in Australia and motorcycle gangs are going to be roaming the highways, running over children, killing people and just causing havoc. But hey, there's one man for the job and his name is Boy.

The last name is what makes me laugh because it's so funny. It's funny, right, Max Max rakkatan Ski rakatan Ski. It's just like the most goofiest of goofy things to like Max rocketank scheme. Yep, hey man, he's Polish. Represent Yeah, how's it spelled?

Just like it said. It's like it sounds just that crazy rakatan Ski. Yeah, and uh yeah. Mel Gibson plays the titular Mad Max. Who will talk about it.

There's a lot going on in this movie. Again, I didn't even know what to expect, to be perfectly honest with you, because, like I said, haven't seen any of these movies other than Fury wrote so Father and Malone. I'm gonna kick it to you for a couple questions. A. Why is Mad Max so important to you?

B? Why is Mad Max important to cinema overall? Which is part of the reason your response to me not seeing it was the way it is because you, like myself, are a person who considers themselves well well watched as a cinema goer, and this is something that clearly you have a reason to feel is important to the film conversation as a whole. So I'm curious what that is. And then what did you think?

Can you be watching it for this episode? And when was the first time you saw it? Well, I guess I'll go backwards there. First time seeing it was on cable television. Interestingly, Chris Over on Midnight Viewing.

We were in our latest episode. We were talking about heavy metal, and in that I tell a story about the night I discovered Heavy Metal magazine. This was the same evening, oh now, at my cousin's house where we watched Mad Max and then I found a stack of Heavy Metal magazine the formative evening. It's pretty vivid in my mind. Yeah, so I must have been nine years old at the and Mad Max at the time felt very new and very modern and in a lot of ways a rejection of Hollywood, sort of prim and proper kind of filmmaking.

It was. Look, there's always been independent film here in America, but for some reason, right then, at that moment, Mad Max represented this influx of sort of crazy, batshit Australian movies, the best of which was Mad Mac. And it was unlike anything American audio cinema was doing as far as the commitment to the physical stunt work. I mean, look, there was a lot of stuntwork going on in America, but it wasn't as fucking insane as it was here. Like just how Needham was doing stuff like this, Yeah, like but that's it really yeah, hell Needam, and how Needam was doing stuff with very trained stunt people who had been in the industry for decades and you never get a sense as cool as the stunts are, And how Needam film that anyone is in danger.

Everyone is in danger in Mad Max. Everyone is in danger when the camera is on and George Miller is behind it, if it and if it's not, bravo even more as a filmmaker, because it feels dangerous. That's another thing about this movie. It feels unsafe, right, uh. And the impact of this movie I don't think is as pronounced as the reaction to The Road Warrior would be, at least here in America.

I know. Mad Max was popular, definitely, and a lot of people saw it, but more people I think saw it because they needed to see where this Road Warrior movie came from, right then the other way around. So I'll say Road Warriors actually the more impactful overall. But to your first question about what the character means to me, I have to I can't just speak to his appearance in this movie. I kind of have to talk about Max overall.

Sure, because it's one of the most unique film series of all time in that not only do we get a post apocalyptic hero that we follow from film to film, but we essentially get a it's gonna sound crazy, but a sort of very modern day Gulliver Lemuel Gulliver from Gulliver's Gulliver's Travels, because people think of that story and all they remember is giant Gulliver and the Liliputian, whereas Gulliver goes to many many lands and has many different adventures. So what we're getting here in Mad Max is a it's a dystopian, but it is not post apocalyptic. This is what's funny is in nineteen seventy nine he's saying this is a few minutes from now, It actually is a few minutes from now. Yeah, it's it's not this.

This movie is not post apocalyptic at all, Like, oh, this movie could very well be right now. In fact, let's see in the six months if we're not there, right. Oh, this is a much better movie if we're talking about the near future than a movie like Civil War is because I think this is actually grounded in the way the world could be if things went a certain way, which is lawlessness reigns supreme, And that ends up being the big thing about this this movie is that, Yeah, I was expecting a post apocalyptic thing, and when it opens the Road Warrior, and when it opens the way it does, I was like, okay, maybe it still is. And then the moment they cut to the inside of a diner, I was like, wait a second, is this just like the normal world now?

And that's when it hit me, Oh, okay, so there must and I realize, all right, so there's more going on here. It's not like you said, it's a couple minutes in the future literally right So here in Mad Max, this is that's the world we're given. And then when we come back to mac Jesus Christ's it's so different. It's it is the post apocalypse now now there is no society, and now it's basically a western. So what we were given in the first film is kind of a crime cops on the road chase movie action flick.

The second film becomes this pokest apocalyptic western flick. The third one is so far afield from those two. It's about him trying to like basically save these children in this like paradise situation. And then Fury wrote is a non stop fucking chase movie. Again.

It's it sort of returns to Mad Max's initial idea but amps it up and fucking goes crazy with it. Each of the movies are so distinct. What amuses me when people criticize them from film to film is that like, well, this one was great and then this one sucked. But because this one isn't a mad Max movie, that's the criticism. I keep hearing, well, that one is a mad Max movie, but that one's not a mad Max movie.

It's like, none of them are mad Max movies. Mad Max is the only Mad Max movie. The next one has nothing really to do with the other one. And that's the thing that I again, I again, I didn't look into this intentionally. I wanted to go into it as blind as possible.

And that is the thing that shocked me with this movie is that this is when people remember Saw, they remember it as a horror movie. It's a cop procedural film. The original film is everything else past that another fucking story entirely Saw two on Those are horror movies straight up Saw one or Saw, not a horror movie. Cop procedural. This has that same feeling to me where it's like, this not at all what I was expecting.

And here's the thing I will say, it's not that I didn't enjoy this movie. I'm more excited to see where we're headed with this stuff than this movie because in terms of osploitation, which this is kind of the original one or the kind of the biggest name, it's the most well known here in America. Yeah, it feels kind of tame compared to some of the other ospilitation movies I've seen. Oh, definitely right, like it really is. Which is the crazy thing, because I feel like the way you're kind of talking about where we're headed is shit's going to get real crazy, real fast.

Essentially the next movie. Yeah, there's no compared. This movie is all like pushing the pedals as steadily as you can, whereas in the next film, the it goes from you know, it doesn't go from zero to one hundred. It starts at one hundred, and this movie kind of starts at one hundred as well. I would say it starts with a pretty long chase between the night rider, the night right at writer, the night writer who's just running rough shot on.

So these are the main force patrol, so they're like a basically they're the highway patrol chips, right, yeah, okay, So they're trying to take him down, and the best guy for the job is the man we see putting on his gear, putting on his lotion, on his hands, getting ready. Because it's mad Max, Max Rokatanski, it's Mel Gibson, who look for all of his problems as a human being man. He's a charismatic actor, and it's fucking unfair frankly that he's kind of an asshole too, because if he were a charismatic guy, that would be more fun. If he was charismatic actor and a great person as well. It's not the case, but hey, it is what it is.

He's a great actor when he's on, he's fucking on and in this movie, he kills it. Yeah, there's no question that. Look, he's a good actor. He is a charismatic actor, and you just can't not look at him. Fact that he's a fucking piece of shit doesn't a that.

But I can also sort of pull myself out of it and watch this movie because you know, Max is kind of a cipher here. Yeah, not real emotional. It's called mad Max. Is he angry or is he crazy? What's your definition of mad?

In this movie? He's angry this movie, he's angry. I'm assuming at some point he's not going to be angry, he's going to be literally nuts. Yeah, I think we get there. We're driven to insanity.

Because that's the other thing mad Max Fury Road is chronologically and canonically the fourth movie, but he's been recast correct correct, okay, younger man, and it takes so much further into the future. But here's the interesting and this is another thing that makes me love the series overall, is that, other than this movie, which is the story of Max Rokatanski before the war, this is the only verifiable part of his tale. All of the rest have different narrators and therefore could be just folk tales about this mythic character wandering the wastelands after the apocalypse. So while we got them in the order we got them, who knows when they actually occurred, right, And that for me is also the interesting thing about series is the idea of that kind of being the case.

Further down the road is it's less less Oh, this specifically happened, but again, like you said, a folk tale of the person roaming the wasteland who everybody knows, because if he were this guy, he would be this well known if he were able to do the things that I'm assuming he's going to be doing in the next couple movies. You know, around this time this Max kind of represented and Snaked Pliskin represented. There was a whole movement of anti heroes. Right these days, everyone's an anti hero. You can't have a traditional hero.

He has to be flawed and fucked up. But at the time to have somebody who is flawed and fucked up and force them to be our hero was at least to me. Look, I guess I was nine years old, but it was definitely felt new. It felt like part of the danger of the movie. So that goes a long way in sort of cementing the character Chris, you mentioned that this movie was not what you were expecting.

To that end, I have to ask, were you in any way expecting the first scene of Max in at home would involve his wife serenading him with a saxophone solo. Nope, not in a million fucking years. Uh yeah, boy again, Like that was the thing I didn't know. I wasn't aware that that the point of this movie was effectively to set up everything else. And you know what's funny is it doesn't actually like I had you seen it at the time, it wouldn't have felt like right.

This was just a couple minutes into the future adventure story and revenge picture. What I mean again, a film being made in Australia. I love the fact that they use the same goddamn mask from Strange Behavior, because Max puts that, I forget who the fuck that is. But isn't that that's the mask that they use in Strange Behavior? That same Yeah, isn't it the same?

It's that same guy. I don't forget who the hell he is. It's like a horror icon, right, because they're going in that movie, they're going around like stabbing with the he's wearing in that like first scene in the movie when he's at home, Oh Max at home, Yeah, he has that like mask on. Oh yeah, yeah, that's that's the same one that they use in Strange Behavior. I forget what I was.

I guess I was unaware of that, Like I don't think I've seen Strange Behavior for like thirty years or something. But that's an Australian film as well. It was just weird that that was like that was them me. Yeah, But I mean again, I'm amenable to something like this, even if it's not what I was expecting, because I really like Australian filmmaking. I feel like Australians like as a people, they're like they're very much themselves and they're filmmaking.

Really. That's also the case like when a film is shot in Australia, brother, you know it. Peter Jackson, I think makes movies that are specifically him, that are in kind of informed by his New Zealander sensibilities, and Australian films made clearly by Australians are informed by their Straelian sensibilities. And George Miller's the same way. I mean that George, I love George Miller as a director because he makes some of the strangest choices possible.

Babe too. Pig in the City is a fucking nutsoid movie, and it's directed by the guy who directed Fury wrote Okay, Sure, and the director of The Witches of Eastwick and Lorenzo's Oil and the nightmare twenty thousand feet segment of the Twilight Zone movie, which I think for me, that's my favorite segment in that movie. Is that John Lithgow, Right, yeah, how could it not? It's spectacularly Oh the stuff with Dan Akroyd's pretty good too. To be sure, to wrap around that didn't count.

That's fair. That's why rap rounds can ruin some stuff. Though. Looking at William Sadler in a wheelchair screaming at people, oh stop it, that's fantastic. But George Miller makes interesting choices consistently, I feel like, because I mean, we didn't even mention happy Feet for Fox's sake, like the right, it's just he seems to just go where he wants to go, and even if it's a failure, you gotta go, oh yeah, you make it a penguin dancing movie.

Yakay, Well, and The reasoning behind that was because of him seeing how the MOCAP technology was being used in Lord of the Rings, and so he was like, I kind of want to make a how does how We're going to do the Penguin movie. It's like, okay, sure, whatever, George like and again there you go. And he wrote the goddamn movies too. On top of everything else, he's a writer director, which for the most part, I think a lot of people attribute certain things to certain directors that they definitely didn't write. Like, essentially most things Steven Spielberg has done, he has not written a damn thing for the most part.

He really wait, hold on, he hasn't if we're talking about the things that he's famous for. You know, he wrote AI, he wrote that screenplay, he wrote, like I said, Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Sure, if you read his screenplay for Poltergeist before the rewrite, it's very close, like the rewrite is. I think Spielberg could have could have arbitrated and gotten sole credit on that. I mean, I always say that that's his only real horror that Holtergeys says, Spielberg's actual horror movie, because it it's a fucking Spielberg movie.

I know that's total horror. I mean he's working on an alien he's working on an alien thing. Now, that might be as horrory as Close Encounters gets, But I think Close Encounters is probably remember back in the day he he had initially he hired John Sales to write that, like the attack on the farmhouse? Yeah movie if is it that? Because oh boy, would I love to see Steven Spielberg do a movie about just a family fight.

Not I guess they just did Nope, so you can't really do it again. But yeah, that that kind of is the the Hopkinsville Goblins story but blown up. Yeah, I don't know. I mean that's the thing when I think of certain directors, I think they're unfairly given writer credit for whatever reason. And they're not a lot of high profile writer directors.

There's like a handful, and those are the people that are considered tours. As much as it pains me to say it, Quentin Tarantina, Chris Nolan, George Miller, Stanley Brick, Ryan Johnson are you are you being seriously sarcastic? No, I'm serious, Ryan Johnson. I'm including him as a as an interesting Yeah, I don't like his Star Wars movie, but I understand everything else in his I mean, I loved Brick. That movie is amazing, but I've never seen it.

Fucking a. Okay, this is that? That? That wasn't? Was that?

Is that? The one with Hayden Christensen? No? Is that? What Jumper is that one?

Jumper? That's Jumper? Looper is with Bruce Willison. Uh Uh that name is why I didn't watch it. I'm not a super big JGL guy, never have been.

Oh you should give it a shot, Okay, I mean I will on your suggestion alone. I've heard that it's good. I mean again, Brick's amazing. Brick is and that's Joseph Gordon Levitt like again. But you know it's weird because in uh Looper, you know, he's got that they tried to make him look like Bruce Willis way around, so he's got the contacts in and they've kind of made his face a little more brucey.

And it's a weird performance, but it's a great pot mean, give him a prosthetic, nos, I'm pretty sure most likely. Yeah. But like Ryan Johnson, I think George Miller makes interesting choices, which as someone who watches a lot of movies like you do. I appreciate a director who writes something that he directs and that it's him in a movie or her or them. And I think George Miller is present in everything I've seen of his Yeah, because even if he's not sitting right in that screenplay, you look at these movies and you just go there, he's improvising everything here, like he's putting this movie together in the editing.

That's what the script is. Have you said, try checking out the screenplay for Fury Roads. Sometime. I can't even imagine the sketch. I mean, it's just like a pamphlet in my mind.

George Miller does what Ridley Scott has never been able to do, which is actually be successful at making an epic film in a modern setting. Because Fury Wrote is a modern epic. And I like everything that Ridley's goot has tried to do has been has fallen short because he's just trying to do a big ancient war movie. Yeah, he's he's trying to make a like nineteen fifties CinemaScope right classic. He wants to do Lawrence of Arabia.

It's just that he doesn't have the patience to do Lawrence. He wants that classic now, so he gives us all of the pretty pictures. But who cares about any of these movies, right, But with something like George Miller's Fury Road, he takes the idea of the chase movie and turns that into the epic, which I for me, is much more interesting, which is taking something that has really I mean, there are a couple epic chase movies, but I think Fury Road is like the it's the epic chase movie like period of like all time. It's pretty high up there. It's kind of hard to beat.

I mean, the things that would come close in my mind are something like The Hitcher in terms of like the frenetic pace, never letting up. But that's a much shorter movie. It's not three hours, you know, Loy. Yeah, Fury Roads up big loud movie, best enjoyed in imax. Even I would concede that's a movie that needs to be watched in the biggest, loudest screen possible.

Yeah, there's a lot more going on than Fury wrote going on in The Hitcher. The Hitcher is very simple. Yeah, But I mean, for me, when we talk about George Miller and like this being his starting place. Even here, I can see it. I can see the sensibilities that he will continue to bring to everything he works on from here on out.

Absolutely, But you know what we're going to be lacking in all the other George Miller movies. Just Goose, Oh my god, love Goose. He really kind of is for me, the most memorable part of the movie because he's I don't know, Steve Bisley is just for as much of a cipher as Max is. Steve Bisley's Goose is not at all a cipher. He is, so he runs away with the movie anytime he's on screen.

Absolutely, you could have called this movie the Goose. And then what an ignominious way to go out too, And for that is not the Goose. He just dies off screen. It's just and he's dead. It's just and then he's dead.

It's just ignominious. I mean, I appreciate that though, because they don't hang anything on it. It just happens in the movie continues. Yeah, it's unfortunately that world well, and that's I mean that kind of comes back at the end of the movie where spoilers for a movie from nineteen seventy nine, So it's way past the statute of limitations for spoilers as far as this show is concerned. Mad Max's or Max's family dies and we learn that essentially a dr the child died, and the wife's essentially brain dead.

Like okay, to him, Lie to him though, tell him it was fine, right, I mean, that's the finality of it. But I mean we witness the sort without, you know, without being too graphic at least, which I was surprised by it. I was surprised he restrained himself, but like, at least he understands, like we don't need to see that happen, like you can just give us the thing rolling into frame, which I thought I thought worked. I mean, for me, I was surprised to your point, I was surprised the restraint that was used because I was I was expecting something closer to Sam Raymi with this, like and like really like amping it up and going for it. And I'm not saying George Miller doesn't go for He goes for it in different ways.

And the violence, the graphicness, the graphic nature of the violence is not something he's interested in showing in this movie. Which is I was kind of shocked by. Honestly. Yeah, you see a lot more of people beating up on cars than other humans. Right.

It was kind of me alluding to it being a tame ozploitation movie. I'm not even sure it is oz ploitation. Oh, it's like the of it. It's just the one where they went, yeah, let's just focus on the story here, right, which I again I was surprised by because I was expecting it to be post apocalyptic thing from the start, and we're because correct me if I'm wrong. The whole thing about the next movie is they're looking for gasoline.

Oh yeah, okay, so that's what I was expecting here, and it wasn't it. It wasn't that at all. It's Hugh keys Burn playing a dickhead, which he's I mean, fun, I mean fuck, we're gonna be talking about him a whole lot too. He's fucking amazing in this movie. Again, speaking of someone who just kind of steals it every time he's on screen.

Yeah, Shakespearean here, like, he elevates the movie. This could be just a stock raving villain, and yet he seems to have a depth to him. You know, we spend a lot of time with our villains here, and I don't think we agree with anything they're doing, but they all seem fascinating in some way, and that's because he's at the center of it. Well, and I think it's very telling that he comes back in Fury Road. It's it's perfect.

Actually, he could have been all of them all. Honestly, he could have been the villain in each of the films and it would have been totally acceptable, just like just like the myth of Max, the myth of all of his villains could be one villain right well, and I kind of thought that that was what it was going to be, because again, given that he shows up here in the last one, I was like, Oh, so he's got a I know Tina Turners in the third Oh, yes, that's all I know. Auntie Entity is that her name in the movie? Goddamn right? It is, dear God God, George miller Man just making what he wants to make, which I like, I said, I really appreciate as someone who watches a lot of movies, because a lot of stuff just feels very workmanlike and wrote and this is far Even if this movie doesn't push the envelope as much as I was expecting it to.

It's not, like you said, not at all like things that were being made in seventy nine. No. And and keep in mind, of course, that George Miller is a doctor, right, He is a doctor. Yeah, and helped the budget of this film by working at emergency rooms and effectively treating people who were in car accidents, and then when you had enough money, went out made the greatest car accident movie of all time. I mean, hey, I I I appreciate.

I appreciate his ability to pivot. And then I mean, actually as a hell of a pivot. That is one hell of a pivot. That's a hell that's like what is that fucking Ken Jeong? Like forty years into his life just because I want to do stand up?

I'm a die And he's a fucking doctor too, isn't he like straight up? Yeah, hell of a pivot? What a pivot? And that's the thing about George Miller, like for me watching this movie, like I get where he's coming from with this movie, Like I get him as a director by just watching his sensibilities in this movie. Because like we haven't even talked about this yet.

This movie was made for fucking nothing four hundred thousand Australian. Yeah. What was the global take? I can't even imagine. Uh they said, they said it's around one hundred million, which is a's a good investment.

Yeah, boy, that's like hitting the lottery, literally, but hitting the lottery with an awesome, fucking cult classic right well. And then on top of everything else, because this movie is so good, it ends up setting the stage for more movies to come, which is I mean again, the it's like hitting the lottery two, three, four more times. I'm convinced George Miller will he will end his career making a Mad Max movie. I think he's thematic a die on it. Yeah, right, but only after the editing.

I don't want him to die while making the movie. I want him to die after saying that's it, and then you can follow over George right there in that moment. Yeah, it's like Dewey Cox. He died five minutes later. But that's the thing.

Like for me, I always I think about George Miller as one of those like consummate filmmakers like Germo del Toro and if you have a page of unrealized projects on Wikipedia, movies that didn't get made, but yet we have a Wikipedia entry for all of them. That's I mean again, that's that we're talking about someone who's engaged creatively in a way that a lot of directors don't have any interest. And I'm not saying that's a good or bad thing, but not every director wants to write the stuff that he directs, or vice versa. Frankly, yeah, I mean, look, we're lucky we still have him, But even if we didn't, even if he hadn't made Fury Road, I'm convinced that that original trilogy of Mad Max films, like will and can withstand the test of time, you know, Like, I'm glad he's still working, but the legacy is absolutely secure.

Yeah. Well, and that's the other thing, you know, having not seen these three movies that lead up to Fury Road, I assumed that that was the case, that these movies were being made subsequently because they were good. And clearly that's the case. I mean, sometimes shit just gets made because it made money. Transformers is a very good example of that, how and it is seemingly done the thing where it came back around and now it's good again.

With bumblebe with Bumblebee. Yeah, so I didn't know if Mad Max was like that, because again to your point, the other thing that I had always heard was the complaints about the third movie. Yeah, which just again that's crazy to me. It's like the gulf between The Road Warrior and Mad Max is so vast, like you can't complain that it's switched gears, like you know, sorry, like Max did some other stuff, like it can't all be cod pieces and give us the gasoline. What's funny is the three movies following Mad Max are all about power, like literal power, like gasoline, Like the Thunderdome is run on like a methane, Like that's the whole thing point in that Fury Road.

It's all about getting the gasoline, like the and the Guzzoline. But Mad Max is the only one that isn't. Mad Max is just about watching society fall around you and whether or not you can stand up to that or not. Right, And it's about Max having his family taken away, Yes, Max having everything taken away, right, which I again like, if this is kind of the origin story of Mad Max, which it effectively is, I think it's a pretty compelling origin story because where it leaves him at the end is guess he's nuts. Yeah, I mean that's what it feels like, right.

I'm glad you watched it first though, because, and you know, it's easy to forget with how badass the rest of the movies are and his place in them, that this is where he came, Like Max loses everything and then loses everyone, you know, like all of those characters are just living in Mad Max's story after the fact, you know, right, Well, and that's the thing. I didn't expect Mad Max to have a family, Like I didn't. I didn't know he had a wife and son. And I was like, well, I guess they're going to die by the end of this movie. Like they're going to be fodder for everybody.

Like that's the thing. Like they're chased and terrorized multiple times in the movie, which at some point I was like, how many more times these people need to get terrorized before they're just murdered one more time? Right, and then this is the time that they get murdered. I do like that the chase aspect of the movie, where these two kind of storylines keep intersecting with each other and it doesn't seem like they need to but the fact that they keep intersecting means they're going to be on an eventual collision course permanently, which is where the movie ends up. And I think that in the third act of the movie it really picks up.

I mean, the movie kind of really picks up even more than it I mean, again, it's already kind of to your point, it's not full pedal to the metal, but it is it's moving at a pretty good clip. But the third act of this movie is pretty great. Yeah, And where that the sort of velocity the third act ends up at is kind of where we go from then on with Max, you know, which is what I'm excited to see. And I'm glad you kind of said you were happy I watched this one first, because I would kind of be curious how I would receive have received this movie rewatching it after having seen everything else, because it it is, it's such a weird spot for this to start in where I know it's going to end up that, Yeah, like the next one you talking about, the next one in the in the tones you've talked about it.

I'm excited to see how much of the pedal hasn't been let off because the movie at the end is just like yeah, and he's nuts and he's going to fucking just do what I it's not even made clear what happens at the end of the movie what he's going to go do. He just drives off right, go do whatever it could be. Anything where it ends up, however, is so far not even a field. It's it's it's so appropriate because once once his wife and child are are killed, and now and Goose is dead, and he effectively is no longer a cop because he's just going out to murder this person, not in the name of the law anymore. Like everything is gone is It's a literal world falls down situation, and that's where The Road Warrior takes us from.

So it's crazy that we can have a character whose world falls apart emotionally mentally for them, but then it is reflected in the outside world, which is and that's what I'm excited to see with the next ones because it watching the psyche of Max like go and seeing where he ends up at the end of the movie is I mean, it's it's interesting because mel Gibson, I think does a good job, I mean, as much of a cipher as he is. You feel by the end of the movie that he has truly lost it. And there are some shots at the end where he's just he's just doing, He's just going and doing. There's some shots of him alone in the car and he's back lit and he's just there's nothing there, just kind of like he's going.

He's gone, And I like it. Yeah, I like that about him as a character because I think that wherever the character goes from here, that those not lack of stakes, but the fact that the stakes have been removed. He can just do whatever the fuck he wants. The birth of an anti hero, And that's the thing. I mean, he's is he is one of the Is he one of the top five, top ten?

I think so? Yeah, definitely as a character. I can't overestimate the impact of Max as a character on popular fiction and you know, movies after the fact. Well, and like we alluded to in the intro, mel Gibson, I mean, as much as this made George Miller's career, this made Matt this made mel Gibson's career too. Oh, a's straight straight up, Yeah, this is his first thing, right, he's like twenty three or something here.

Yeah, it's crazy, like for this to be your first thing, holy shit, like Jesus Christ, Almighty, what a gift. But that's and then that's the problem because again, like I don't think for me, mel Gibson, like the Highs with this franchise, does he ever even get back there as an actor? I guess with lethal weapon, that's like the other thing that he's kind of known for in this world. Definitely that hence Pal Jesus. Well, it's well, well now his pal Jesus, that's what it should have been called, Mel Gibson and his pal Jesus, Jesus Christ speaking of Jesus.

Yeah that yeah, man, melk oh, well that in fucking Apocalypto. Apocalypto. I enjoy that movie. I'm not saying the guy's not telling that. He's just such a fucking waste of space.

Yeah, yeah, it's it's unfortunate. I mean, he's been working pretty consistently since like twenty ten as an actor. I haven't seen anything he's been in, but I know, I guess Daddy's Home too. I did see that, which wasn't better for him being in it, That's for sure. There is something you should say.

The Continental, the series, the oh John Wick prequel. He's the villain in the interesting boilers. Everybody. You'll really enjoy the ending if you don't like fuck and he went there. So what you're saying is mel Gibson is totally in the next season of the show.

Oh yeah, he's coming back for the second season. If you go Supernatural, then yes, right, yeah, it's again like mel Gibson. The melk Gibson of it all is a little hard to get to. But at this but at some point, Matt, Max and mel Gibson are not like mad Max is going to be in the new movie. But it ain't gonna be mel Gibson.

Oh yeah, no, it's not going to be Tom Hardy either. I'm assuming so well. It's the great thing about Max is that I'm comfortable with other people playing right, like as a hardcore fan from the fucking beginning, y'all, uh, if the actor is good, like, you know, if they can carry it great, like put him in and And I think that's an interesting perspective because I think a lot of fans bristle at any sort of recasting of the titular most famous iconic character in the franchise for which they are named. For but yeah, mad Max has been able to withstand that in a way that like, think of another franchise that has recast the lead and anybody has shown up for that second movie or third movie. Right, even when a co main character in the third Mummy movie gets recast, people didn't show up for that one because it was not great because Rachel Weiss wasn't in it.

I mean, the I think the only one that maybe the highest profile one that gets away with it but he's not a main character is Terrence Howard and Don Cheatle. Yeah, well there you go, but that's again, like you just said, not a main character, like you know, oh, I guess I would say Edward Norton and Mark Ruffalo technically still not a main character. Yeah, I mean certainly not once he gets to Marvel. Oh yeah, that's weird because it I think for me, mad Max is like the highest profile recasting of the lead character. But in a lot of ways, it doesn't kind of matter.

Honestly, once you get through, right, we are now Max is established. We don't need to see him being emotional about anything. He's just there to get the job done and we're cool with that as long as he's cool. I'm not even sure he has to be there. Well, we'll find out, right, I mean, I I don't anticipate Furiosa being bad.

Yeah, I can't see. I can't see missing him in this world. Like if Miller's behind it and we're I'll go with any story George Miller wants to tell in this universe, right, And And that's the crazy thing about all of this is where this starts, is where this starts versus where we are now, and the fact that it's all chronological and it's all part of the same universe. It's not a recast, it's not a legacy sequel, horseshit. This is all of a piece that's pretty crazy in this day and age because this is seventy nine to twenty twenty four and beyond, probably for at least five more years.

Because that's the other thing on top of everything else. These kinds of movies aren't made quickly, because these kinds of movies are made for real, the way movies aren't made anymore, actually making them, actually doing practic, large scale, practical set pieces. I haven't seen furios but I can guarantee you there's gonna be some shit in that movie that's going to blow all of our minds the way Fury Road did because of the practical nature of the effects being done and the meshing of practical and CGI. Yeah that's the ultimate part. But there's plenty of CGI and Fury Road.

But I get the idea that I'm Furio. So they're probably not going to be using the volume, right, Well, probably not. But that's the thing. Even in a movie like Mad Max the original, where there's not there are a couple I mean it is a car chase movie sort of but not really like it's where we end up being is so far removed from this that the thing I wonder, unlike myself, if someone were to watch Fiery Road and then go I want to pop in Mad Max, they're gonna have a hard time with this movie, right, I don't know, right, Like I don't. I don't know either, Like I say that they might, but I also could see them not.

But like I don't know, is it high pace to No, certainly not. But then they'll have a problem with the Road Warrior if if that's really okay, Yeah, they'll have a problem with They'll have a problem with all of them if they think that's what Mad Max is. That's not it, right, The mutability of Mad Max is what makes it so fucking cool, right, yeah, I mean, like you, like you've already mentioned they pivoted already. The next movie has nothing to do with Mad Max. It's literally Anya Taylor Joy and and probably and I've heard that the younger ad the actor who plays her as a child, spends like half the is in half of the movie.

So well, I mean that's the other thing. And that's the thing that I'm curious because again haven't seen two and three, but in this movie we've kind of already alluded to it. You Keys Spurn, they give him a lot of time on screen, So I'm assuming with the Chris Hemsworth character in the new movie, they're gonna give him a lot of time on screen. Gave him Morton Joe a shitload of time on screen. M hmm, they gave they gave toe Cutter a pair.

I mean to the point where it's probably toe Cutter and mel Gibson's movie. Really, Oh yeah, it clearly it's you know, it's it's toe Cutter, mel Gibson and Stephen Bisley, right yeah, really? Which and he then bald fuck it and bar mustache fucking Roger Ward, my god in heaven, he's I mean, what's crazy is he's not the mustachio Nazi from Raiders of the Lost Arc. But but if they were looking for a guy to cast as the other guy who's his brother that had that fucking guy and he's still kicking around eighty eight years old, six foot three, love him and often did his own stunts. Roger Ward, my lord, Look, that's what I love about Australian filmmaking.

I do what are you writing? I need a slave? Oh I didn't know it. I didn't know how well it's all white it out, I know. I was like, what do you could just say it?

I mean, I have to edit it. This as is so fam alone. As we kind of bring this episode to a close, which I think is probably going to be the shortest of the four because I'm sure there will be plenty to say on the next two. Too much, too much probably for something like Mad Max and something like this franchise. What would you tell someone getting into it who has seen Fury Road but doesn't know what to expect, because again, like that's the question, because if a lot of people have only seen Fury Road, and that's you know, that's kind of unfair to Mad Max.

I think is a franchise. I'd say to fucking watch them in order. I'd say, it's a different movie. You're going to find out where Max came from, and it's before the war, and I think that should fucking do it. And then you're either going to like the movie or you're not.

Like I could not, I could not talk a twenty year old into liking this movie, even if they've seen Fury Road. You know, I can just say this is a fucking cool movie and here's why, Right, But ultimately you caught into a film or you don't. You know. Yeah, but I would definitely say, if you have any interest in the Max character, then you owe it to yourself to figure out where he came from. And like I said, this is the only actual story of Matt Max, right.

The other is some mythic character wandering the wasteland. Who knows if any of that actually happened, right? And hey, you know if at the time a reviewer, Philip Adams condemned the film, this is one of the funniest reviews I've ever read. Had all the emotional uplift of mind, comp and be and would be and I'm quoting him directly, here would be a quote special Jesus. This is this is some harsh criticism.

This is like nuclear a special favorite of rapists, sadists, child murderers, and incipient mansons. So what you're seeing in the movie means that that's what it's promoting. Correct, I got you? Okay? Yeah, And that's an Australian social comment or, film film, film producer and social commenter.

Yeah. That I think though the movie did its fucking job, is my is the way I look at it, Like, if that's what you're taking away from it, that's kind of what the movie's getting at, Like the nihilism of the near future. Dumb dumb, Like, yeah, you know you can, you can portray something without endorsing it. I've never understood that, you know. Like I remember Dennis Dennis Hopper saying he made a film about gang activity in South Central cal Colors, which is not a great movie because it's from the white officers perspective.

But I remember him in an interview at the time saying, like people were telling him not to make the movie, said like, you can't make a movie about this problem because there's a real problem going on here, like, well, that's why I'm making the movie right. Well, also, what a terrible name for a movie about that subject matter too, just unintentionally hilarious colors? What's the problem movie? The course? Jesus Christ.

Yeah, no, I'm I'm with you. In terms of this first, Mad Max, I think I think anyone who has seen Fury Wroade owes it to the slves to see where this comes from and how much this franchise seemingly that you've alluded to ramps up and gets to where Fury Road is and will continue to theoretically either ramp up or stay that insane thousand miles per hour pace. So yeah, so on to the next one, onto Mad Max two, The Road Warrior. Until then, Father Malone, where can people find you? And the things that you do?

Audio wise? Go over to Weirdingwaymedia dot com. I've got a bunch of shows over there, like Dark Destinations, it's a radio drama I write and produce, or Midnight Viewing the Horror Anthology podcast, which up until recently was a bi monthly but now it's a weekly show. So go check that one out. Over at weirding Way and oh, go to patreon dot com slash father alone and give me some money.

There's no pretense here, he just says it. I like coffee and you're listening, let's coffee together, or you pay for my cup of coffee and then fuck off and I don't have to hear from you. That works too. I'm in your ear. Oh that's fair.

Oh yeah, yeah, well yeah, I mean, somebody's not gonna just pay you for nothing, money for nothing, chicks, youree as for me, you can find me also at weirding Way Media, where I work on a whole bunch of stuff that I'm on and not on and you know, just guessed on and whatnot. But patreon dot com slash culture cass is where you can find something adjacent to this, which is the the ranking on Bond, which is every month Richard had him Mike White and I talk all about James Bond and if I'm the on'y gonna doing us pretty soon for some a live and let die action. Oh boy, yea far away, far away from what this movie is. But hey, you know what, I'm excited, but I'm even more excited to sit down and watch the next Mad Max movie.

Genuinely, the way you've talked about it here, I am genuinely excited to see where this goes because this was good. If this was good, where are we going from here? So yeah, thank you so much for for forcing me to watch Mad Max. Finally, it took a lot of months of badgering you, but here we are, well badger. Sometimes the badgering is needed and sometimes it's not.

But in this case I kind of feel bad for making you badger me, given how much I enjoyed it. Oh well, you know that's okay, It's all worth it. Yeah, and yeah, as always, we'll catch on the next episode.