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johnentwistlespout wrote:I wonder when the Max Voice over was decided upon and for what reasons. The comics are voiced by the Historymen and it's clear from the original Fury Road 'word burgers' press release that this concept was being used in the film too. The voiceover annoys me less and less but totally agree that no voiceover or a non-max mythical one would have been far better.

Perhaps the narration by the History Man wouldn't make an impact like in RW or MMBT because that character wasn't a pivotal part of the story. They would have to build around that character for us to care, forget about the plot twist - that was already done in RW. So maybe in that sense it was better for Max to throw out a few lines and grunt for the rest of the movie while leaving the History Man for comic books.

I'm not sure what you could really say at the end of Fury Road that wouldn't be out of place or cheesy. The Road Warrior had a very ?dark? ending with Max watching them drive away and we hear the Feral Child speak for the first time. "He lives now only in my memories" was an incredible line to finish the film. The musical score at the end of Fury Road and the lift going up would only distract from a narrated ending.

"The Citadel free from the tyrannical rule of Immortan Joe became a beacon of hope for anyone wandering the wasteland. Unforunatly Gastown and the Bullet Farm were quickly seized by either Buzzards and Joe's remaining forces a few weeks later. Also Max died of thirst soon after he walked away from the only source of food and water for miles around. Oh what a lovely day"

I agree Taipan on the most part , however we don't know the narrator is the feral kid until the last 30 seconds of mad max 2 and yet his opening monologue has ten times the impact as Max's in Fury Road. Perhaps it is because we are obviously listening to an old man reminiscing a long dead warrior that instantly elevates the story to legend status , perhaps it is just better script writing .
You make an interesting point though in " if not max , then who ? "for the narration of Fury Road . I too feel the wordburgers or historymen/women are far too detached from Fury Road to be the narrator and to use an elderly rescued "wife "would be just be a repeat of MM2 . War-boy' s don't live to be old and the drifters/ wretched don't seem like stories around the campfire types . with all the main villains Max meets winding up dead , it leaves very few to tell poor old Max's story except , well..... Max .

mahenoguy wrote:I agree Taipan on the most part , however we don't know the narrator is the feral kid until the last 30 seconds of mad max 2 and yet his opening monologue has ten times the impact as Max's in Fury Road. Perhaps it is because we are obviously listening to an old man reminiscing a long dead warrior that instantly elevates the story to legend status , perhaps it is just better script writing .

It works so well because it builds so much character motivation and builds a compelling world. It basically lays out a dog eat dog world and presents a character so burnt out he's become a wolf. Good stories tend to come from good fundamentals. You grow to empathise with this man because he was one of the few remaining law officers, but he lost his best friend, wife, and baby to scavengers. It's also in no way self aggrandizing. Max isn't built up to be strong, he's torn down to be ruthless. What makes him a hero is he's still going with his humanity nearly empty - that's something very easy for most people to empathise with. Then you've just got that blower intake sucking the air out the room and Max staring ahead to nowhere with a V8 soundtrack. It makes your hair stand on end and you know you're watching the one dude in this world you really need to. The twist in the end with the narrator becoming the tribe leader is fantastic, and bookends what Max helped him achieve.

In Fury Road he just grunts some film noir superlatives about himself, bits some innocent lizard's head off, and gets his ass handed to him by a bunch of guys in their underwear. Although it does set the manic tone that's to come.

I'm honestly okay with Max narration, but it would have been better if there is no narration, but then other casual moviegoers will complaint about not understanding the story (i recall lots of my friends asking me who is Max, even after the goddamn narration), or have the Dag narrates it.

A bit off topic. But does anybody have the B&W version ? I missed it and haven't seen it yet. Did the movir made it's way to torrents ?

A full length fan made version was available for a day on Vimeo at the end of September (https://blackandchrome.wordpress.com) but was take down by Warner Brothers within a few hours. Within that time it managed to garner several superb reviews. Missed it myself which was annoying and haven't seen much news of a torrent. Obviously the home versions had only just been released by WB so you can understand their reaction, but I'm also kind of hopeful this also means we will get Millers official version soon.

Just gonna cut and paste what I had to say about it:

I'd say I enjoyed this far more than I thought possible. It's thrilling how well it works without any dialog whatsoever and at times, I felt like I was watching some weird lost silent movie. Loved it. Won't be for everyone but a very unique and beautiful version of the movie. The opening without any narration is far more powerful than what's in the finished movie. That opening shot of Max standing beside the Interceptor in complete silence beyond some sinister whispering voices of the victims is beyond haunting. What struck me was how much clearer some of the visuals are when you've nothing else to focus on. The final chase in particular benefits from having no distractions. For some reason, it's much clearer how Furiosa hooks Joe's mouthpiece at the end. Great stuff.

found the torrent

just watched the black and chrome version. I don't know if this is THE real fan made one from Vimeo but the soundtrack is still there. All the dialogues are muted so in some scenes it feels weird (maybe it's because i never see a silent movie before) but man oh man, the action scenes are so awesome and i can somehow see more details about what happened.

edit : okay, i really understand how beautiful the movie is in Black and Chrome version. The soundtrack and the visual told the story very well without the dialogues. like blackmocco said, this feels like a weird silent movie and i too, love it.