'Mad Max 2 (1981)' features everything you first think of when someone says "Mad Max". It's set in a post-apocalyptic desert hellscape filled with leather-clad weirdos who ride around in cobbled-together vehicles and terrorise anyone they come across in the hope of stealing the precious petrol that will allow them to continue the cycle of violence that has come to define their new existence. Its protagonist barely says anything and prefers not to get involved, but he's capable of besting almost anyone in vehicular combat and is unafraid to do so if it will net him some much-needed fuel. He wanders through the outback with his dog, always on the move and looking out for nobody other than himself. Between siphoning gas and chowing down on dog food, Max scavenges what he can and kills who he has to. One day, he's introduced to a fuel refinery in the middle of the desert that's being bombarded by attacks from a clan led by a slightly more articulate version of Jason Voorhees known as The Humungus. This proves to be the perfect opportunity for him to strike a bargain and walk away with as much fuel as he can carry, if he can survive the gang that he's competing against that is. The film is much better than its predecessor. Although it has a generally slow pacing and takes a while to get into gear, it's eventually a really exciting and energetic action movie that makes good use of its distinct world to deliver some delightfully tactile carnage. There's a sense of loneliness underlying even the driest of moments, and the less engaging segments are used to compound this sense of being perpetually lost within a vast landscape filled with nothing other than things that want to see you dead. Basically, the film uses the ebb and flow of its pacing to establish an atmosphere, which gives even its least entertaining sequences a valid reason to exist. Plus, when it cooks, it really cooks. The final chase sequence, in particular, is spectacular, filled with cars crushing other cars and people leaping from one vehicle to another. It's chaotic, tactile and really enjoyable. It also strikes the perfect balance between silliness and danger, feeling almost like a much more brutal version of 'Wacky Races'. Some earlier action scenes are also fun, but the climax is clearly the film's zenith. Something else the movie does really well is build up this sense of mythology around its central character, primarily by framing the story from the perspective of someone whose life he wanders into and out of. You get the sense that Max is much more important to those he's involved with than they are to him; he'll be in their stories for far longer than they'll be in his memories. Each entry in the wider series sort of acts as a retelling of the adventures of this wasteland warrior from the perspective of someone who has encountered him, which accounts for the slight inconsistencies between interpretations and timelines etc. He's like a legend of the desert, someone who was once real but has since ascended into fantasy, remembered for eternity by the children of the children of the children of those who really knew him. It's an interesting angle to take, for sure, and it gives the franchise this almost ethereal vibe that acts as a nice counterpart to the wheel-spinning mayhem at its core. Ultimately, this is a really solid action film that's as strange as it is successful. It has its weaker aspects (including once scene that's so dark its majority is literally a black screen), but it's generally a lot of fun and makes excellent use of real stunt work to drive its gear-crunching, metal-scraping, tyre-squeaking, blood-spilling set-pieces.
