After watching Mad Max: Fury Road I decided it was about time to watch the original trilogy that made Fury Road possible but after watching the first 2 I’m not sure I want to see Beyond Thunderdome. 

Starting at the begining the original Mad Max came out in 1979 (I was born in 1987) and I’m sure at the time that was a great movie but the acting, the camera angles and specially the music editing are clearly outdated. I started the movie with great hope but as the movie went on I started to lose interest and I ended up playing Minecraft on my iPad until the final moments of the movie. 

This is not a problem that only Mad Max has since I’m not the bigest fan of old movies. 

A berserk motorcycle gang member named Crawford “Nightrider” Montazano (Vincent Gil), having killed a rookie officer of an Australian highway patrol called the Main Force Patrol (MFP) while escaping from police custody, is attempting to outrun the other MFP officers in a stolen Pursuit Special. Though he manages to elude his initial pursuers, the MFP’s top pursuit-man, Max Rockatansky (Mel Gibson), then engages the less-skilled Nightrider in a high-speed chase. During a sudden game of “chicken”, the Nightrider breaks off first, his nerve suddenly broken in the confrontation with Max; he is unable to recover his wits, which leads to the Nightrider’s death in a fiery crash.

The next day, Goose gets Max’s attention, leading him to where the police mechanic reveals a Police Special under repair, but all in black. As Max looks on, Goose and the mechanic reveal the engine: a V-8 engine with a supercharger, which would make it the fastest car on the road. Max, almost hypnotized by the sight, agrees enthusiastically with Goose and the mechanic to get the car completed quickly for him to drive. Although the mechanic says he collected the parts to build the engine, a wiretap listening in on the exchange reveals that MFP Captain Fred “Fifi” Macaffee (Roger Ward) commissioned the car to be built to be Max’s own personal vehicle, to help convince him to stay on the force.

The Acolytes, Nightrider’s motorcycle gang, led by Toecutter (Hugh Keays-Byrne) and Bubba Zanetti (Geoff Parry), are running roughshod over a town, vandalizing property, stealing fuel, and terrorizing the population. Max and fellow officer Jim “Goose” Rains (Steve Bisley) arrest Toecutter’s young protégé, Johnny “the Boy” Boyle (Tim Burns), who was too high to leave the scene of the gang’s rape of a young couple. When neither the rape victim nor any of the townspeople show for Johnny’s trial, the federal courts throw out the case. Goose, furious at Johnny’s release, must be restrained as he and Johnny exchange violent threats at the city police station. After Bubba drags Johnny away, Fifi tells his officers to do whatever it takes to combat the gangs, “so long as the paperwork’s clean”.

A short time later, Johnny sabotages Goose’s motorcycle while he attends a show at a nightclub in the city. The next day while out on patrol in the countryside, the motorcycle locks up at high speed, throwing Goose into a field. An uninjured Goose calls a towing service, also borrows a ute to haul his damaged bike back to the MFP HQ. However, Johnny and Toecutter are waiting in ambush, with the former throwing a brake drum at Goose’s windscreen, causing him to crash the ute. With Goose unable to get out of the ute, Johnny—under pressure from Toecutter—throws a match into the petrol leaking from the wreck, triggering an inferno that severely burns the helpless Goose. After seeing Goose’s charred body in a hospital intensive care unit, Max becomes disillusioned with the MFP, and the fear of losing his sanity convinces him to resign. His superior, Fifi, talks Max into taking a holiday before making his final decision about the resignation.

While vacationing, Max stops at a roadside garage to have a tire repaired while his wife, Jessie (Joanne Samuel), and their infant son, Sprog (Brendan Heath), go for ice cream. The two encounter Toecutter’s gang, who attempt to molest Jessie. Max and his family flee to a remote farm owned by an elderly friend named May (Shelia Florence), but the gang learns of their destination from the garage mechanic and follows them. Jessie is waylaid by the gang after a trip to the beach; May holds them off with a shotgun. May, Jessie, and Sprog manage to escape in the van. After the van breaks down on the road, Jessie attempts to flee with her son on foot, but they are run down by the pursuing gang on their motorcycles; Max arrives too late to intervene.

With Sprog having been killed instantly and Jessie near death, a rage-filled Max dons his police leathers, and takes the supercharged black Pursuit Special from the MFP garage to pursue the gang. After torturing the auto mechanic for information, and forcing several members of the gang off a bridge at high speed, Max methodically hunts down the gang’s leaders. He shoots Bubba Zanetti at point blank range with a shotgun (after sustaining a significant gunshot leg injury of his own), though Johnny escapes when he sees Bubba killed. As Toecutter flees on his motorcycle, tailed closely by Max, he veers into the path of an oncoming semi-trailer truck and is run over.

Max eventually locates Johnny, who is looting a car crash victim he presumably murdered. In a cold, suppressed rage, Max handcuffs Johnny’s ankle to the wrecked vehicle, and sets a crude time-delay fuse involving a slow fuel leak and Johnny’s lighter. Throwing Johnny a hacksaw, Max leaves him the choice of sawing through either the handcuffs (which will take ten minutes) or his ankle (which will take five minutes). As Max casually walks away, Johnny begins pleading, then laughs, telling Max “Yer mad!” as he fumbles with the hacksaw. As Max drives away from the bridge, the wrecked vehicle explodes, presumably killing the inept Johnny. Now a shell of his former self, Max drives on to points unknown, pushing deep into the Outback.

  
Mad Max 2: Road Warrior was a little closer to the kind of world dystopia I was looking for in the first one but the Gyro Captain and Feral Kid ruin the movie. Lord Humungus is awesome and reminds me of Imortan Joe from Fury Road. The action sequences are better than the ones from Mad Max once again reminding me of Fury Road but this is still a 1981 movie with some of the same problems I listed before but far more enjoyable than the first (I didn’t play Minecraft during this movie, I only checked Instagram for a little while). 

Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome is the end of the trilogy and I will probably end up watching it soon but I’m more cautious about it since I read a lot of people think of it as the lowest point of the franchise (some say it’s the highest). 

I should note that Mel Gibson actually impressed me in these movie and seems to improve a lot in the second. 

Supplies of petroleum have been nearly exhausted in the near future following a major energy crisis and a global war. Ex-Main Force Patrol officer “Mad” Max Rockatansky (Mel Gibson) roams the now depopulated and desolate desert in his scarred, black supercharged V-8 Pursuit Special, scavenging for food, drink, and gas. His only companions are an Australian Cattle Dog and a rare functioning firearm–a sawn-off shotgun–for which ammunition is very scarce.

The film opens with Max trying to escape a group of gang members, led by a crazed motorcycle rider named Wez (Vernon Wells). Max manages to crash two of the gang member’s vehicles and injure Wez; recognizing his defeat, Wez flees. After collecting some fuel from the destroyed cars and checking a nearby Mack semi-truck, Max inspects a nearby autogyro for fuel. Its pilot, the Gyro Captain (Bruce Spence), ambushes Max and manages to capture him briefly before being overpowered. In exchange for his own life, the pilot guides Max to a small oil refinery nearby. Max arrives just as the facility is under siege by a gang of marauders riding a motley collection of cars and motorbikes. The gang leader, known as ‘Lord Humungus’ (Kjell Nilsson), tries to convince the refinery’s defenders to surrender the facility in exchange for safe passage out of the area.

A group of defenders attempts to break out of the compound, but the marauders capture, torture, and kill all but one of them, who is rescued by Max. Max makes a deal with the mortally-wounded sole survivor: he will bring him back to the compound in exchange for a tank of fuel. The man dies shortly after they enter the facility, and the facility leader, Pappagallo (Michael Preston), reneges on the deal, saying it died when the survivor died. His group is on the verge of killing Max when the marauders return, and Humungus repeats his offer. When the Feral Kid (Emil Minty) kills Wez’s male companion, Wez becomes enraged, urging his leader to take the compound; Humungus wrestles Wez into submission, but placates Wez by revealing he has no intention of letting any of the settlers leave. Max offers Pappagallo a different deal: he will retrieve the abandoned Mack semi-truck, which is capable of hauling the tanker trailer that the facility inhabitants use to store the fuel they refine, in exchange for freedom, his vehicle, and as much fuel as he can take with him. The group accepts, but keeps Max’s car to ensure his cooperation. Max sneaks out, joining forces with the Gyro Captain to return to the truck.

After finding the truck, Max drives it back to the compound, evading Humungus’ men. The defenders want Max to escape with the group, but Max opts to collect his petrol and leave. However, his attempt to break through the siege fails: Wez gives chase in Humungus’ nitrous oxide-equipped car and runs Max off of the road, wrecking his vehicle and severely injuring him. The marauders kill Max’s dog with a crossbow, then attempt to siphon the fuel from the Pursuit Special’s tanks, but trigger an explosive booby trap, which kills some of the attackers. Max, left for dead, is rescued by the Gyro Captain as he is trying to crawl back to the refinery.

With no other means of escape and with the refinery’s defenders preparing to make their escape, Max insists on driving the repaired truck. He leaves the compound in the heavily-armoured truck, accompanied by the Feral Child he has befriended and by other inhabitants aboard as defenders. Pappagallo escorts him out in a captured marauder vehicle. Humungus and most of his warriors pursue the tanker, leaving the remaining inhabitants free to flee the compound in a ramshackle caravan and buses, blowing up the refinery as they leave. Pappagallo and the other defenders of the tanker, as well as numerous marauders, are killed during the chase and the Gyro Captain is shot down. Max and the Feral Kid find themselves alone, pursued by the marauders. Wez manages to board the truck and attack Max, but a head-on collision with Humungus’ car kills both Wez and Humungus. Max loses control of the tanker and it rolls off the road. As the injured Max carries the Feral Kid from the wrecked tanker, he sees not gas, but sand, leaking from the tank.

The truck and its trailer are thus exposed as a decoy, allowing the other settlers to escape with the precious fuel in oil drums inside their vehicles. With Pappagallo dead, the Gyro Captain succeeds him as their chief and leads the settlers to the coast, where they establish the “Great Northern Tribe.” Max remains alone in the desert, once again becoming a drifter. Years later, the Feral Kid, now the Northern Tribe’s new leader (voice by Harold Baigent), reminisces about the legend of the mythical “Road Warrior” (Max) who now exists only in distant memory.