Back before Mad Mel started liking casual drunken anti-semitism and using the back of his hand, he also liked to act. You can pretty much link his rise to stardom to this classic low-budget revenge thriller set in an apocalyptic future.
Gibson plays Mad Max Rockatansky, a cop who upholds the law in a dystopian future terrorised by very Eighties looking biker gangs. When a certain group of bikers lead by the psychotic Toecutter (Keays-Byrne) kills the lawman’s family, he flips a switch and goes on rampage looking to avenge them. And that is the pretty minimal but very engaging story running through George Miller’s movie.
The movie that shot Mel Gibson to stardom really is good, unclean fun. The plot, the special effects and the dialogue are all nicely minimalist and move the story along at a lightning pace at times with only the essentials. This builds up a tense atmosphere in a pretty cool future Australia with plenty of memorable scenes (the one with a hacksaw stands out for me) and impressive stunts to boot. Max is the classic empathetic character who’s easy to root for as over a pedestrianly-paced opening his character is well introduced and fleshed out as Miller bothers to show his motivation for his vengeance mission.
It does look a bit dated (funny how the future always looks like a rubbish version of the past) but that’s part of it’s charm as the bucketloads of leather, suped-up motorbikes and over-the-top baddies both seem outrageous and terrifying at the same time.