day eleven: mad max: beyond thunderdome. [another day, another movie – post-apocalypse.]

Mad Max: Part III. I’d watched two Mad Max movies for this ‘ADAM’ already, why not a third? Sure, Tina Turner gave me pause, but at the very least I’d finally know what Pac was referencing in the ‘California Love’ video.

I’m assuming it’s due to the fact that they’ve most probably nearly run out of gas altogether now, but Mad Max doesn’t have a car anymore, he rides around with a camel-drawn wagon instead. His shit gets stolen by our friend, the pilot with the terrible teeth, from The Road Warrior. Somewhere in the post-apocalyptic landscape of Australia, the pilot has managed to find an orthodontist and now has pearly whites.

Max follows the trail of his wagon to Bartertown, a small city that runs off of methane (in this case, it comes from pig shit). Tina Turner tells Maxwell that if he kills her primary political rival in single combat, she’ll make sure he’s made whole from his recent losses.

So, Aunty Entity’s (Tina Turner) chief rival is actually two people who function as one, they’re called Master Blaster. They consist of a little person, Master, who functions as the brains; and a giant, Blaster, who acts as the muscle. Aunty wants to keep the brains around, while crippling him without his muscle. All Master, no Blaster. That’s the setup, and the action stems from there.

There are certainly some glaring weaknesses. For one: Tina Turner was teeeeerrrrrrible, godawful even. Ugh. Two: why, in the name of all that is reasonable and logical in the world, does the “genius,” Master, have the vocabulary of the Incredible Hulk? I mean, sure, I’ll suspend disbelief all you want, but there has to be some reason why. “Me order. Me Master. Me run Bartertown.” What the fuck?

As far as the cheesiness factor goes, it really wasn’t so bad. I mean, cheesy, sure, but no worse than, say, Willow or other similar movies. With the introduction of a Lost Boys-esque tribe of kids, and a PG-13 rating, they basically made the third movie a family film. I know, I know, it’s sacrilege, but I liked the movie anyway. I thought the tribe of kids was actually really well executed and entertaining. They never pushed the kids over the edge into annoying territory, I found them likable and emotionally engaging throughout.

Go ahead, call me a lame-ass, but as long as Tina Turner wasn’t talking, I really liked this movie.