In former British colonies like Australia, cinema has historically played an important cultural role in legitimising the presence of settlers. And from its relatively modest beginnings in the late 1970s to today’s billboard-hogging blockbuster franchise, the Mad Max series occupies a lofty place in the pantheon of this kind of cinema.
The latest film in the franchise, Furiosa, is the first to shift focus entirely away from the eponymous Max Rockatansky. Instead, it tells the gripping origin story of his chief rival in 2015’s Mad Max: Fury Road, Furiosa (played by Anya Taylor-Joy). The film’s high-octane, non-stop action is interspersed with the kind of character development and myth-making befitting its full title, Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga.
The precise space the Mad Max films occupy – both literally and cinematically – has always felt a little vague. Mad Max (1979) was set “a few years from now”, and offered only fleeting glimpses of the near-future meltdown that was central to its sequels, Mad Max 2 (1981) and Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985).
