Mad Max: Fury Road, the first entry in the post-apocalyptic movie series for 30 years, has made one group of potential cinemagoers, well, furious. The reason? It dares to spotlight Charlize Theron's character Furiosa... and women in general.
The film, directed by original Mad Max creator George Miller and with Tom Hardy in the lead role, opens in the UK on 14 May. Early reactions from critics are good, with the use of real cars and stunts over CGI effects particularly praised, and the movie generally being hailed as a return to form for the action genre in cinema.
However, the fact that the plot centres on Max and Furiosa aiding a group of women known as the Five Wives, leading them to freedom from warlord King Immortan Joe has enraged "Mens Rights Activists", or MRAs. To them, the movie is a shell for feminist propaganda, and another attempt by Hollywood liberals to undermine traditional masculinity.
On Return of Kings, a website centred on the MRA "movement", contributor Aaron Clarey wonders "whether men in America and around the world are going to be duped by explosions, fire tornadoes, and desert raiders into seeing what is guaranteed to be nothing more than feminist propaganda, while at the same time being insulted AND tricked into viewing a piece of American culture ruined and rewritten right in front of their very eyes."
Undermining his position immediately is the fact that Mad Max is actually an Australian franchise, written and created by Australians, and whose original leading man, Mel Gibson, had lived in Australia since age 12. For Fury Road, Tom Hardy is British, Charlize Theron is South African, and much of the movie's remaining cast and almost the entirety of the crew are of non-American origin. It's hardly the stuff of apple pie and bald eagles.
Clarey also claims Max has been sidelined in his own movie, and "replace[d] with an impossible female character in an effort to kowtow to feminism." Because women surviving the apocalypse is impossible, and the Mad Max films have never featured powerful, intimidating women before. Unless you count people like Aunty Entity, played by Tina Turner in 1985's Beyond Thunderdome, of course.
Unsurprisingly, commenters at Return of Kings haven't let little things like the litany of errors and inaccuracies Clarey cites ruin their misogyny though, instead calling for a silent boycott of the movie. We Hunted the Mammoth, a site focused on tracking online misogyny, has a detailed (and thoroughly depressing) run down of some of the shocking responses to Clarey's anti-feminist scaremongering.
However, with Fury Road attracting near universal acclaim -- with its strong female presence regularly praised -- and George Miller having plans for at least two more modern Mad Max entries, the sad plight of the MRAs looks set to be ignored for many years yet.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
