Mad Max (1979)

Director: George Miller
Writers:   James McCausland, George Miller, Byron Kennedy
Cast:        Mel Gibson, Joanne Samuel, High Keays-Byrne

A vengeful Australian policeman sets out to avenge his partner, his wife and his son in a dystopian setting. The bad guys are a biker-gang and as the poster says-it stars Mel Gibson and a bunch of other guys. It was made for a budget of A$400,000 and made $100 million at the box office and held the record for being the most profitable film for twenty years, which it eventually passed onto Blair Witch Project, and thus spawning the Mad Max Franchise.

It is basically the origins story of what turned out to be a franchise. The plot is laughably basic and writing is absolute cringe. I almost resorted to fast forwarding through the film by about forty five minutes but at that point it kind of became a little bit coherent and I sat through the film. I read somewhere that the Australian voices were dubbed over with a much more US accent for its US release and the former is supposed to be miles better. I am not hundred percent sure as to whether I watched the Australian version but it did sound so even though the audio was out of sync. That might be more to do with the file that I watched which was very small for a x264. The action scenes are very well done in terms of how they were shot and most of the violence is off-screen. But those things don't quite salvage the film for me as the acting is laughably bad even from Mel Gibson, for whom it was a breakthrough role. I understand it is not about acting, characters, writing etc but watching it is a real slog.

Another one in the Mad Max franchise is coming out this year titled 'Fury Road'. It is directed by George Miller, starring Tom Hardy and Charlize Theron, and the visuals indeed look stunning from the trailer. Out of the Mel Gibson films, the second one in the series titled 'Road Warrior' is supposed to be the best and I am gonna give it a chance even though I absolutely hated the first one. Hopefully bigger budget and better writing means a far better film.

Rating: 1.5/5