Death Race 2024
Anya Taylor-Joy is dynamite as an apocalyptic Angel of Death in the outstanding ‘Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga.’
Furiosa (Anya Taylor-Joy), the female heroine of Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, rises from the swirling sandhills like the phoenix she is.
Slim but strong, young but worldly, battered but resilient, Furiosa stands above her nemesis, a wasteland overlord named Dementus (Chris Hemsworth). She delivers justice for all the horrific actions Dementus has done to her: childhood kidnapping, enslavement, the murder of a parent, and the killing of a friend.
Moviegoers know that Furiosa is up to the brutal task because they have met her in the previous Mad Max installment. Audiences remember an older Furiosa, played by Charlize Theron, in filmmaker George Miller’s outstanding 2015 action epic Mad Max: Fury Road. For Furiosa, the fifth installment in the Mad Max series, all set in a near future, apocalyptic wasteland, Miller and writer Nico Lathouris deliver the nail-biting Furiosa origin story that fans desperately want.
Like waiting for a tea kettle to whistle, Miller crafts his sand dunes-set actioner at a steady pace. Furiosa ages before our eyes, shifting from the child actor Alyla Browne to the twenty-something Taylor-Joy. Furiosa also moves from Dementus’ encampment to the outpost controlled by The Immortan Joe (Lachy Hulme), a dueling warlord from Fury Road. Along her tortuous journey, she acquires the fighting and mechanical skills needed to return to her childhood oasis.
The operatic action sequences where Furiosa strikes back at the over-the-top Dementus are worth the lengthy wait.
Miller stages four action sections supporting the 148-minute adventure.
Early in the movie, Furiosa’s mother undertakes a stealth mission to retrieve her stolen daughter from Dementus and his gang of crazies.
In the film’s third act, a grown Furiosa joins a driver-for-hire named Praetorian Jack (Tom Burke) on a supersized fuel tanker going to the wasteland’s lone gasoline refinery. Dementus and his army of goons attempt to capture the tanker with incendiary bombs but Furiosa and Jack prevail.
Later in the movie, Furiosa and Jack survive a second ambush by Dementus and abandon their supertanker to escape during an elaborate desert chase.
Every action moment, edit, visual, and sound effect unfolds like beautiful choreography. Miller is a Blockbuster Auteur and Master Filmmaker. Director of Photography Simon Duggan, Production Designer Colin Gibson, and Sound Editor Robert Mackenzie round out the creative crew. Miller is a filmmaker with the rare talent to transform action movies into art and pulpy storytelling into mythology.
Chris Hemsworth is having fun playing Dementus as a chiseled clown with an impressive beard and modest intelligence. Dementus is a comic book villain, a comfortable role for someone best known for playing a Marvel Comics hero.
Anya Taylor-Joy, chilling in the indie horror The Witch, sly and stylish in the crime drama Last Night in Soho and the chess tournament-set miniseries The Queen’s Gambit, flashes courage, grit, and heroics aplenty as Furiosa. She also boasts a killer mechanical claw for a hand.
Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga wraps with me wanting more movies featuring Taylor-Joy’s battered heroine, although the closing credits show the story leaping forward to Mad Max: Fury Road.
Is Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga all there is for Taylor-Joy? Does she only receive one opportunity to play the apocalypse’s angel of death? It seems unfair.
Rating: Rated R for strong violence.
Cast: Anya Taylor-Joy, Chris Hemsworth, Tom Burke, Alyla Browne, and Lachey Hulme.
Director: George Miller
Grade: B+ George Miller’s action opera deserves a trip to the cinema.
Tagline:
It’s astounding how filmmaker George Miller has made Mad Max movies for approximately 45 years. After nine years between Mad Max: Fury Road (2025) and Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, actress Charlize Theron cannot play a younger version of her Fury Road character even with CGI effects. It’s a rare opportunity for Anya Taylor-Joy to headline an action blockbuster.
