Mad Max: Fury Road (George Miller)
I like it about as much as I like the original Mad Max, and it's definitely better than the other "sequels". I feel like Max could make for a good James Bond type character, played by different guys in various incarnations in a long running, generally episodic series — in the sense that events in one film don't really have much to do with events in another most of the time. Of course, Max isn't really the highlight here, I'm not familiar with Hardy's acting, but both he and the film itself really downplay his importance, often he is totally outshone by Furiosa, who is more than a match for his skills and a badass in general. The big bad, Immortan Joe, is played by Hugh Keays-Byrne, who was the Toecutter in the original film, and while Joe isn't anywhere near as memorable as Toecutter, he is despicable and his tyrannical regime is thoroughly rotten and disgusting, making him much more hateable than the non-character that is Lord Humungus or the affable Aunty Entity. My major issue with the film is just how synthetic a lot of it feels, owing to its hyper saturated colour palette and CGI special effects, the latter of which clashes with the brilliant vehicle designs and practical effects work in a cumbersome fashion. Overall it is solid, and I would probably watch it again.
Dead Leaves (Hiroyuki Imaishi)
Hiroyuki Imaishi, known for his work on FLCL, Gurren Lagann, and Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt, along with other wacky shit, helms this batshit insane animated tale of violence, sex, and more violence, with more hyperkinetic madness per second than you can shake a drill-penis at. To his credit, he obviously has a lot of passion for his work, and his technique is highly creative and imaginative, almost always making the most of possibilities in each scene.
Retro, a guy with a TV for a head, and Pandy, named for her distinctive panda-like facial markings, let loose on a rampage of extreme violence, eventually being captured by the police and sent to space prison, where they meet all kinds of perverted inmates and are forced to eat and shit with the aid of machines. And that's the set-up for the next forty minutes of non-stop action. The whole thing is totally amoral, giving up any sense of right and wrong in the service of pure action and comedy; everyone is crazy violent, everyone is a sex maniac, and anyone who isn't one or both of those things is probably going to end up fodder for some deranged slapstick sequence. Hell, even the ones who are those things are fodder for deranged slapstick sequences.
While highly convoluted and disorienting at times, Imaishi's direction is absolutely brilliant. The film is a work of almost perpetual motion, breathers few and far between, as the brain is left to make sense of it all. But don't fall for that reflex action, just settle down and go with it, because chances are you won't have time to parse what's going on between each explosion of crazy. The music also plays right into the high-octane sensibilities of the production, delivering fast paced dancey punk and EDM. The synergy of sight and sound is part of what propels the action so well, not just the music but also the voice acting, which is appropriately loud, unhinged, and raucous.
While it seems to aim for a kind of transcendence through its velocity and fluidity, its story elements are lacking, mainly because the lack of breathing room is in conflict with its desire to tell an essentially coherent narrative, and I find that these two elements just don't mesh all that well. Either concessions to story must be made, necessitating a longer duration or less action, or the action must reign supreme and the immediate story (i.e.: no backstory, just the story of the now) must be told entirely with action, Imaishi just can't quite seem to pick one, and the work is lesser than it could have been as a result. Having said that, I enjoyed Dead Leaves, Imaishi's imaginative style and sense of humour really shine throughout, and I feel that it is well worth watching for its great visuals and the controlled chaos of its rollercoaster-fast action sequences.