“Furiosa” does not accelerate, it gets into potholes and the “Mad Max” saga does not advance | CRITICISM

Nine years after the phenomenon that unleashed “Mad Max: Fury Road”, filmmaker George Miller returns to one of his most beloved characters with a story that fills gaps in the saga and tries to tell his own story. But what exactly does he want to tell? That’s something the movie doesn’t settle on.

A film without focus

What is Furiosa up to in this movie? She understands that it is returning home, it is what moves the story; She has the plan literally written on her skin. Instead, what connects her to the audience is her revenge against her enemies; It seems so because of all the problems that they put her through in the extensive prologue, because of the looks that she gives them, which rest on Dementus coldly.

But neither the return home nor revenge become the focus of the film, which is torn between both plots and does not give strength to either. When the protagonist frees herself from her captors, the script jumps in time and the desire that she should have to fulfill her mission has been diluted. What has she done for so many years? She understands that she will survive. How has her life changed? It is not clear, except that the momentum that the film took to achieve with that beginning was emptied.

It doesn’t help that the film is divided into chapters, which undermines the rhythm: what starts slowly stops suddenly, then wants to accelerate, but collides with the limitations of a prequel. But within this self-imposed cage there are amenities, starting with the performance of Chris Hemsworth, who is finally given an interesting role, a cruel but funny guy, without reaching the point of parody (he is not a Dante Reyes in “Fast and Furious X “). There is dignity in his performance as a subject of childish behavior.

For her part, Anya Taylor Joy plays a correct Furiosa, although without offering the raw performance that would be expected from the film. Yes, the character has suffered like few others, but her face does not quite sell what the script tells for a couple of hours. The news has spread that this filming was a small hell for its actors, although without reaching the extremes that Charlize Theron and Tom Hardy experienced in the 2015 film; but apparently that did not translate into a better performance by the Argentine actress.

Visually, “Furiosa” is remarkable. Very well maintained plans, the same as in the lighting and the use of color. Also in the editing and camera, which complement well with those violent zooms. His style is inspired by “Fury Road”, but the visuals do not quite match this slower narrative. At times it seems like Miller wants to have both the fast pace and the reflective moments, but he doesn’t get it. The result is a film that doesn’t know what it wants to be, that ends up doing what it can rather than what it should.

QUALIFICATION

3 stars out of 5