Mad Max : Fury Road is a 2015 action drama film directed and produced by George Miller, and written by Miller, Brendan McCarthy and Nico Lathouris. This Australian-American co-production is the 4th installment in the Mad Max film franchise, the first 3 of which starred Mel Gibson. This time around the titular character is played by Tom Hardy with with Imperator Furiosa performed by Charlize Theron. The film also features Nicholas Hoult, Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, Riley Keough, Zoë Kravitz, Abbey Lee, and Courtney Eaton.

The road battle film starts off in a distant post apocalyptic world where the land is mostly desert and water & fuel are scarce commodities. Max is captured by the War Boys, a white painted bald headed set of wild men who work for the army of the tyrannical Immortan Joe, and taken to Joe’s Citadel. Despite his attempts at escape, with a madly pursued and fought chase scene, he is captured again and because he is a universal donor is kept alive to supply blood for the soldiers, mainly a sick young man named Nux. When a Lt in Joe’s army, Imperator Furiosa, deviates from the route to search for water & fuel in her large truck, Joe discovers that his five wives — women selected for breeding—are missing. Joe leads his entire army in pursuit of Furiosa, calling on the aid of nearby Gas Town and the Bullet Farm. Max is chained to one truck to continue supplying blood.

In the ensuing battle Furiosa is able to drive into a sand storm and loses the army. Max is able to get free and drags an unconscious Nux along with him and fight Furiosa for control of her truck. They decide to work together; Furiosa is taking the Wives: Capable, Cheedo, Toast, the Dag, and Angharad, who is heavily pregnant with Joe’s child, to the “Green Place”, an idyllic land she remembers from her childhood. Nux, after initially joining the rest of the army to get back the wives, has stowed away in the truck and having failed at his job joins the small group of people as they try to escape. They must battle a biker gang-controlled canyon t the Bullet Farmer’s army and Gas Town to get to their destination – only to find out that it has now become a barren swampland. With the help of the the Vuvalini clan of women, from whom Furiosa was kidnapped as a child by Joe, they decide to head back to the now unguarded citadel.

A few deaths, some awesome fight scenes (some incredible and some downright silly but fun in itself), lots of explosions, car crashes and battles Joe is killed by Furiosa. Nux sacrifices himself by wrecking the Rig, killing Rictus and blocking the canyon, allowing Max, Furiosa, the wives, and the Vuvalini to successfully escape in Joe’s car, where Max transfuses his blood to Furiosa to help her survive her injuries. At the Citadel, the impoverished citizens are overjoyed at the sight of Joe’s corpse. Furiosa, the wives, and the Vuvalini are cheered by the people and welcomed by the remaining War Boys, but Max walks away, sharing a glance with Furiosa before disappearing into the crowd.

Hardly much of a story but then again you don’t watch these kind of movies for the storylines or the acting. You watch it for the awesome scenery (that sand storm is spectacular) and fight scenes and violence and crashes. I don’t remember much from the original trilogy of Mad Max movies but this one gets an 8 outta 10!