{"id":11189,"date":"2016-07-04T20:00:28","date_gmt":"2016-07-05T01:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/?p=11189"},"modified":"2016-06-27T15:25:44","modified_gmt":"2016-06-27T20:25:44","slug":"mad-max-2-the-road-warrior-1981-george-miller","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/archives\/11189","title":{"rendered":"Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior (1981, George Miller)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Opens by telling us that yes, the first movie<\/a> took place after the Oil Wars, and now we’re in the post-apocalyptic future wasteland, and I appreciate them clearing that up. I’m still not convinced that Max is all that mad, not even in the fourth movie. Gibson seemed madder in Lethal Weapon<\/em>. That said, the climactic road race is pretty damned mad.<\/p>\n

Max w\/ flamethrower:<\/em>
\n<\/p>\n

These details aside, this movie is electrifying, with an expert mix of intensity and absurdity. Setting the pattern for parts 3 and 4<\/a>, Max is out in the desert minding his own business and looking for fuel when he stumbles into a situation where people are being oppressed by an evil authority. Max doesn’t set out to save them because he’s a noble hero – it’s in his own self-interest. Max doesn’t even make friends with the gyrocopter pilot who leads him to the oil town (Bruce Spence, later a Dark City<\/em> alien), keeps him chained up until needed.<\/p>\n

Gyrocaptain and snake friend:<\/em>
\n<\/p>\n

Max has a cool dog, who comes to a predictably bad end:<\/em>
\n<\/p>\n

Villains: hockey-masked sharpshooter Lord Humungus and his rage-filled biker enforcer Wez (Vernon Wells, villain of Commando<\/em> and Innerspace<\/em>), who is excellent. Also really good is the eight-year-old boomerang moppet – but not good enough to justify the proliferation of kids in part three.<\/p>\n

Wez – there are no bad shots of this guy:<\/em>
\n<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Some advanced Babe<\/em>-foreshadowing via pigs, like when Dekker put a message from the Monster Squad in Night of the Creeps<\/a><\/em>. I didn’t realize when watching this that Thunderdome<\/a><\/em> would be absolutely full of pigs.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Virginia Hey, later a blue-skinned alien in Farscape:<\/em>
\n<\/p>\n

Toadie reminds me of Dennis Hopper in Waterworld:<\/em>
\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Opens by telling us that yes, the first movie took place after the Oil Wars, and now we’re in the post-apocalyptic future wasteland, and I appreciate them clearing that up. I’m still not convinced that Max is all that mad, not even in the fourth movie. Gibson seemed madder in Lethal Weapon. That said, the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[357,198,187,598,503],"class_list":["post-11189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movie","tag-1980s","tag-apocalypse","tag-australia","tag-george-miller","tag-snakes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11189","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11189"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11189\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11217,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11189\/revisions\/11217"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11189"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}