Mad Max / Mad Max 2

Audiences might still be reeling from the fact Martin Scorsese made this year’s sweetest family film, but don’t forget the career whiplash of Australia’s own George Miller. It’s true he gave us talking pigs in Babe and dancing penguins in Happy Feet, but first he gave us Max Rockatansky – and the Astor is showing a rare double feature of Mad Max and Mad Max 2 as part of their ‘Australia on Screen’ season.

Featuring a shockingly young (and shockingly sane) Mel Gibson, 1979’s Mad Max is a revenge film with a style so stripped back it’s almost a comic book. It’s also violent enough that, as social commentator Philip Adams bemoaned, it was “doomed to make a great deal of money”. 1981’s Mad Max 2 quietly shifted its setting a few inches closer to dystopia and turned Max’s leathers into a costume suitable for the end of the world. It was, at the time, reportedly the most expensive film ever made in Australia. That final car chase sequence was worth every penny.

Clint Eastwood once argued that his iconic Man With No Name should have less dialogue for more impact in Leone’s A Fistful of Dollars, and Miller learned that lesson well. The taciturn Max became a cult hero both here and in the US, retitled as The Road Warrior. Max’s global appeal just proves it’s films like these – and not bloated tourist bait like Baz Luhrmann’s Australia – that do this country proud.