Dan and I were eager to try the new "Dolby Cinema Prime Seating" at AMC Theatres and Mad Max: Fury Road seemed like the ultimate movie to test drive this new experience. The theatre features enormous, leather recliners, enhanced sound and imaging. The seats were super comfy and the quality of the sound and picture was noticeably better. The sound was so good, that it felt like it was vibrating through the seats. It's definitely worth upgrading to prime, especially for a big, blockbuster film.

PLOT - The movie starts with Max (Tom Hardy) alone in the desert, when a he is pursued and kidnapped by a group of men. They take him back to their compound, which is controlled by a warlord named Immortan Joe ( Hugh Keays-Byrne). Joe controls the people by controlling the water supply and crops. Max is used as a universal blood donor assigned to Nux (Nicholas Hoult) who is a warrior boy in Joe's army. 

Imperator Furiosa (Charlize Theron) is a driver in Joe's army. When she is tasked with a routine run outside of the compound, she deviates from the plan in an effort to smuggle out five of Joe's beautiful wives, women that are being held against their will to breed with Joe. Furiosa plans to take them to the "green place" an area many miles across the desert that is run by women. 

When he discovers Furiosa's plan, Joe sends his army after her, which includes Nix, who straps his blood doner to the front of his vehicle. In the scuffle, Max and Nix find themselves with the women, all trying to survive in the dangerous desert.

LIKE - This film had a lot of failings, but it was never actually dull. There are many spectacular action sequences. I laughed quite a bit. Mad Max: Fury Road doesn't intend to be a comedy, but it is. Trust me.

I got a kick out of seeing Elvis' granddaughter, Riley Keogh and Zoe Kravitz ( Lenny's and Lisa Bonet's daughter) as Joe's wives. Model, Rosie Huntington- Whiteley, plays Joe's favorite wife and she was a good actress. It's impressive when Charlize Theron isn't the most beautiful woman in a movie...although, she still looked gorgeous; bald, missing limbs and beat up. 

DISLIKE- Mad Max: Fury Road is a style over substance mess. It reminded me of Cirque Du Soleil's KA in style, but with far more gore and action. The story was lacking and often didn't make even sense.

SPOILER ALERT!!!! SPOILER ALERT!!! SPOILER ALERT!!!

Why is Max haunted by a little girl? How did Furiosa lose her arm? Why are these army boys white and why do they need to drink blood? Will they really be reborn when they die? Why the heck do they need to spray their mouths silver before they die? What's the deal with the mother's milk and why are they transporting it across the desert? How does this group of women survive in the desert? Why does Joe sound like the teacher from Charlie Brown? Why does the army have overly complicated vehicles and a cheesy band? What's with all of the dumb names? Why were Joe and his other warlord buddies waiting for them in the canyon? How did they know that the women would turn around? It makes no sense that they would just wait around.

It's just very ridiculous, all of it. 

The dialogue is sparse, but that's a blessing, because it's overly dramatic and doesn't usually clarify the story. You know a movie is lacking when it has to turn up the volume of the score to punctuate dramatic moments. 

The ending is an odd, anticlimactic moment for such a high intensity movie. 

Last thought...why didn't they have a Jeep? Seriously, our Jeep does better rock crawling than any of the modified vehicles in the film. We made it over more intense rocks in a tighter canyon, just a few weeks ago. 

RECOMMEND - Eh. If you need to see Mad Max: Fury Road, this is a big-screen, 3D worthy film. If you like spectacle, you might enjoy it. If you value story, this completely misses the mark. It's not my cup of tea.

I can't believe that a follow up is in the works.