Akshay M

Fury Road is one of the best action movies ever made so comparing Furiosa to that and expecting it to be better or at par is quite frankly foolish. Which I think is why the movie tanked and has a lot of negative reviews. Initially I too was swayed by the reviews and thought it would be best to skip this one but watching vehicular combat on a big screen was far too appealing to ignore. The story isn't anything groundbreaking, infact it's exactly the same as another movie in which Ana Taylor Joy starred in, The Northman. But instead it's set down under and with a woman. It's a long movie but it still feels pretty fast paced, like they tried to cram as much backstory as they could in 158 something minutes. As a result you don't really develop a connection with any of the characters. Everyone played their part really well but because of the way the story is structured, it gives out a feeling that some parts are fillers when they actually aren't. Like someone forgot to proofread it before publishing. The actions scenes, while there are plenty aren't nearly at the scale of Fury Road. The thing I feared going by the trailer and reviews is that most of the action would be CGI and the movie would end up looking like a Netflix spinoff but I was genuinely surprised that it still had a lot of practical effects. The only CGI that comes to notice is the Bullet Farm sequence. It was absolutely silly and I don't know who's idea it was but Mining equipment aren't supposed to move that fast. The film score borrows a lot from Fury Road and that isn't a bad thing. Talking about borrowing, the war rig for some reason has the same bumper as that on the People Eater's W123 Benz Limo truck in Fury Road. Lazy reuse of assets or a clever way to show how everything gets salvaged and put to new use in the Mad Max universe? The Cummins in the war rig is definitely the star of show and sounds absolutely fantastic. It's a pity that there aren't as many vehicles as in Fury Road. Overall, Furiosa is a good movie which proves that despite the gasoline flavoured milk and potatoes laced with lead, humans will still eke out a living and thrive to celebrate their greatest invention, the ICE.

I was not particularly impressed with Dune. Couldn't sit through it without falling asleep, it was only after the second attempt that I somehow managed to finish it. Only to be rewarded with a "to be continued" at the end. So why did I decide to go watch the very first show of Dune 2? I'm not sure to be honest. Anyways, I went in prepared to get disappointed and I didn't have to wait long for it. The first hour felt exactly as boring as the previous movie with the plot seeming to go nowhere. It gave me plenty of time to contemplate about the purpose of life. But things started to get intersting by the halfway point and in the end, it all somehow made sense. What seemed to be poor casting choices turned out to be that way for a particular reason. Zendaya was the poorest choice but knowing she is as significant to the plot as my therapist filled me with joy. (I don't have a therapist) The only casting choice that doesn't fit the purpose is Timothy. Turns out a twink isn't the best mascot for a pro colonialist story. Overall the movie compelled me to switch sides multiple times, all within the second half of the story. Without giving away spoilers I would like say what makes this movie good is that it acknowledges some fundamental qualities that transcend the shift in societal constructs and will always continue to remain valid. The means to acquire power is different for women than it is for men, and if worked in unison rather than against each other, a great deal is achievable. And this movie is a good highlight of it. The cinematography, costumes and soundtrack are excellent. Denis Villeneuve has been making solid surrealist settings for the past several movies and this one is no exception. I went from not caring about the movie at all to wanting to see the next installment in less than three hours, so I guess I can recommend giving it a watch.

..........................Yeah

James Cameron paints a very black and white picture of what's good and what's bad in Avatar, and pretty much continues the same into the second installment which automatically kills the possibility of having any intellectual conclusions about the movie. Cameron never really addresses the flaws in his world building and just proceeds with humans bad, Navi good, therefore humans lose and Navi win. Considering how Navi are the most intelligent and apex predators of Pandora, they would have very few natural predators and with their seemingly advanced knowledge of medicine would most likely have a decent life expectancy. Plus they have a very human like tendency to stay in family units which further increases the chance of a Navi offspring reaching adulthood. With all these factors, Navi should have dominated much of Pandora's habitable land which I confess is appropriately shown in the movie. But what it doesn't show is rival clans competing for the same space. Territory is prime commodity not just for intelligent life like humans, but also for animals which needs to be fought for. But the Navi are too good to fight amongst themselves. What's stopping the forest Navi from waging war over the ocean Navi and vice versa given there is no trade amongst them and they're clearly aware of each other? Another thing is how selfish the Navi are when Sully's wife threatens to kill the Mowgli kid, ignoring the fact that he grew up with them and helped them along the way. All because he isn't one of them. Contrast this with Jake sully and the other humans who went against their own species just to save the primitive Navi. It clearly shows humans are the more compassionate amongst the two so why should I root for some selfish blue monkey clan to win? And I also love how there are no mutineers amongst the said blue monkey clan, probably because they have the same amount of brain cells Cameron expects his audience to have. I'm aware that the main theme of the movie is about colonialism but it does a very poor job of convincing why it's bad. In the first movie, the humans agree to bring technological advancements and infrastructure to the primitive Navi in return for their land but the Navi are far too holy to be needing all of that. Fast forward to the next movie and they're using wireless communication to plot ambush attacks on a weapon supplies train. All this led by an ex human Jake sully. This eerily resembles another well known movie about colonialism, the movie being Lawrence of Arabia. Jake is clearly the Lawrence in this universe. Without Jake, the primitive and dumb Navi wouldn't have stood a chance against humans which clearly shows how superior the colonialists and their technology were. But unlike Lawrence, Jake doesn't have to deal with the aftermath of the revolt and fails to see the reality in his persuit of glory. With the bulk of my gripe out of the way, there still remain some biological queries like are the Polynesian looking ocean Navi a different species from the Jungle Navi? Because they obviously have anatomical differences. Are they like Cro Magnons and Neanderthals? And do they have enough genetic similarities to produce an offspring? But again their highly adapted anatomical differences offer no advantage over the jungle Navi with a few days of swimming lessons. Only Cameron can answer these questions. On the technical side, the cinematography and film score was pretty mediocre and relied too heavily on the visuals. I don't want this review to be as long and arduous as the movie itself so to conclude, I can't wait to see Avatar 3 Way of sand with brown Navi and the same old incompetent human mercenaries.