Mad Max 2


Mad Max 2 is a 1981 Australian post-apocalyptic dystopian action film directed by George Miller, who co-wrote it with Terry Hayes and Brian Hannant. It is the sequel to Mad Max and the second installment in the Mad Max franchise. The film stars Mel Gibson reprising his role as "Mad Max" Rockatansky and follows a hardened man who helps a community of settlers to defend themselves against a roving band of marauders. Filming took place in locations around Broken Hill, in the Outback of New South Wales.
Mad Max 2 was released in Australia on 24 December 1981 to widespread critical acclaim; praise was given to Gibson's performance, the musical score, cinematography, action sequences and costume design, with its sparing use of dialogue in particular being unprecedented for an action film. It was also a box office success, and the film's post-apocalyptic and punk aesthetics helped popularise the genre in film and fiction writing. At the 10th Saturn Awards, the film won Best International Film and was nominated for five more awards: Best Director, Best Actor for Gibson, Best Supporting Actor for Bruce Spence, Best Writing, and Best Costumes for Norma Moriceau. Mad Max 2 is widely hailed as both one of the greatest action films of all time and one of the greatest sequels ever made, and fan clubs for the film and "road warrior"-themed activities continue into the 21st century.
The film was followed by Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome in 1985.

Plot

After a global war results in widespread oil shortages and ecocide, civilisation collapses and the world descends into barbarism. Former policeman Max Rockatansky, haunted by the death of his family, drives around the desert Outback of what was once Australia, scavenging for food and petrol with his dog. He outmanoeuvres a group of marauders led by biker Wez using his driving skills and a shotgun. He steals petrol from the wrecked vehicles of one of his pursuers and inspects a wrecked semi-trailer and prime mover.
Later, Max tries collecting an apparently abandoned gyrocopter's fuel, but is ambushed by the pilot. Max overpowers the man with his dog's help, sparing his life in return for being led to a working oil refinery the pilot has discovered. They arrive during the daily attack on the facility by a motorised gang, of which Wez is a member.
The next day, Max witnesses cars leave the besieged compound and get chased down by marauders. He rescues Nathan, the sole survivor of one car, and strikes a deal to return him to the complex in exchange for fuel, but the man dies after Max gets him back, and the leader of the settlers, Pappagallo, says the deal died with Nathan. The settlers are about to confiscate Max's car and cast him out of their compound when the marauders return to negotiate. A feral child who lives in the refinery compound kills Wez's partner with a metal boomerang and Wez wants revenge, but the gang's leader, a masked man called "Lord Humungus", offers to spare the settlers' lives in exchange for their fuel supply and leaves for the day. However, the settlers are divided over whether or not they can trust Humungus.
Max offers his own deal: he will bring them the semi-truck he saw earlier so they can try to haul away their tanker full of oil, if they return his car and give him as much fuel as he can carry. The settlers agree, and that night Max sneaks past the marauders on foot carrying fuel for the truck. He encounters the Gyro Captain and forces him to fly him to the truck, which he gets started. It is somewhat damaged as Max passes through the marauders' encampment en route to the refinery, but he makes it, followed by the gyrocopter.
Max refuses Pappagallo's entreaty to accompany the settlers to a fabled northern paradise, opting instead to collect his fuel and leave. Wez catches him using Humungus's nitrous oxide-equipped vehicle and causes him to crash. A Marauder kills Max's dog and is about to kill the seriously injured Max when Marauder Toadie attempts to siphon the fuel from the tanks of Max's car, triggering the vehicle to self-destruct. Left for dead, Max is rescued by the Gyro Captain and returned to the compound.
Despite his injuries, Max insists on driving the repaired truck during the escape. His support consists of the Gyro Captain, Pappagallo in a separate vehicle, three of the settlers on the outside of the armoured tanker, and the Feral Kid, who jumps on the truck as it is leaving. The marauders pursue the tanker, allowing the remaining settlers to flee their compound in a caravan of smaller vehicles after rigging the refinery to explode.
Pappagallo and the three settlers are killed and the Gyro Captain is shot down. Max turns the truck around and, as he is fighting with Wez, Humungus collides with the truck head on, killing Wez and himself. The truck rolls off the road and the surviving marauders survey the scene, only to abandon their chase when they see the tanker leaking sand and not gas. As Max carries the Feral Kid from the wrecked tanker, he inspects the sand pouring out. The Gyro Captain drives up and the two share a grin as Max realises the tanker was a diversion the whole time. They rendezvous with the settlers, who transported the fuel in oil drums inside their vehicles.
The Gyro Captain succeeds Pappagallo as leader of the settlers and takes them north. The grown Feral Kid, "Chief of the Great Northern Tribe," reveals in voice-over that he never saw "the Road Warrior" again.

Cast

  • Mel Gibson as "Mad Max" Rockatansky, a former member of the Australian highway patrol who, after a biker gang killed his family, left the force and hunted down and killed all of the gang members. The trauma of the events of Mad Max transformed him into an embittered "shell of a man", but in this film, he still elects to assist the settlers with their plan.
  • Bruce Spence as The Gyro Captain, a wanderer who searches for fuel and supplies using a ramshackle old gyrocopter. He, too, decides to throw in his lot with the settlers and help defend their compound. Writing for Time, Richard Corliss called the Captain "a deranged parody of the World War I aerial ace: scarecrow skinny, gaily clad, sporting a James Coburn smile with advanced caries".
  • Mike Preston as Pappagallo, the idealistic leader of a group of settlers barricaded in an oil refinery. Even though the settlers' compound is besieged by a violent gang, Pappagallo "carries the weight of his predicament with swaggering dignity." The novelization of the film expanded on Pappagallo's history, describing him as a top executive for one of the "7 Sisters" major petroleum firms who lost his family in the war and escaped to the wastelands, where he would join up with other refugees and become a leader of their efforts to establish a new civilization.
  • Max Phipps as The Toadie, the crier of Humungus's gang and a classic sycophant.
  • Vernon Wells as Wez, a mohawked, leather-clad biker who serves as Humungus's lieutenant. Vincent Canby, writing for The New York Times, called Wez the "most evil of The Humungus's followers... huge brute who rides around on his bike, snarling psychotically." In a 1985 interview with Danny Peary, Miller said the characters of Wez and Max are near mirror images of each other. In 2011, Empire magazine listed Wez as the greatest movie henchman of all time.
  • Kjell Nilsson as Lord Humungus, the violent, yet charismatic and articulate, leader of a "vicious gang of post-holocaust, motorcycle-riding vandals" who loot, rape, and kill the few remaining wasteland-dwellers. In the interview with Danny Peary, Miller posited that he thought the character "was a former military officer who suffered severe facial burns", and that he "might have served in the same outfit as his counterpart, Pappagallo."
  • Emil Minty as The Feral Kid, an eight-year-old boy who lives in the wasteland near the oil refinery. He speaks only in growls and grunts, wears shorts and boots made from hide, and defends himself with a metal boomerang that he can catch using an improvised mail glove.
  • Virginia Hey as Warrior Woman, a settler who initially distrusts Max.
  • William Zappa as Zetta, a settler.
  • Arkie Whiteley as The Captain's Girl, a beautiful young settler who chooses to stay with her compatriots rather than escape with the Gyro Captain, prompting him to stay as well.
  • Steven J. Spears as The Mechanic, a settler who is paraplegic.
  • Syd Heylen as Curmudgeon, an elderly settler who wears a military helmet and decorations.
  • Moira Claux as "Big" Rebecca, a settler who wields a bow and arrow and initially wants to take Humungus's offer of safe passage if they abandon their compound.
  • David Downer as Nathan, one of the settlers who leaves the compound to look for a truck to tow the oil tanker. He is wounded by some of Humungus's bikers and dies shortly after Max brings him back to the refinery.
  • David Slingsby as Quiet Man, a settler.
  • Kristoffer Greaves as Mechanic's Assistant, a settler.
  • Max Fairchild as Broken Victim, a settler who is caught and tied to the front of Humungus's car. Gibson and Fairchild are the only two actors who appear in both Mad Max and Mad Max 2, though Fairchild portrays a different character in each film.
  • Tyler Coppin as Defiant Victim, a settler who is caught and tied to the front of Humungus's car.
  • Jerry O'Sullivan as The Golden Youth, Wez's companion, who is killed by the Feral Kid's boomerang.

    Production

Development

Following the release of Mad Max, director George Miller tried to develop a rock and roll movie, the working title of which was Roxanne. After working together on the novelization of Mad Max, Miller and Terry Hayes teamed up in Los Angeles to write Roxanne, but the script was ultimately shelved. Miller then became intrigued with the idea of returning to the world of Mad Max, as a larger budget would allow him to be more ambitious. He said: "Making Mad Max was a very unhappy experience for me. I had absolutely no control over the final product", but "There was strong pressure to make a sequel, and I felt we could do a better job with a second movie." Inspired by Joseph Campbell's The Hero with a Thousand Faces and the work of Carl Jung, as well as the films of Akira Kurosawa, Miller recruited Hayes to join the production as a scriptwriter. Brian Hannant also came on board as co-writer, first assistant director, and second unit director.