This Time on Greenscreening

Blade Runner (1982) directed by Ridley Scott

Synopsis:

One of cinema’s most vividly realised dystopias, the Los Angeles of Blade Runner is a nightmare cityscape of towering skyscrapers, vast advertising holograms and perpetual rain. Three years after the deep-space horror of Alien (1979), Ridley Scott imagined an urban future to rival Fritz Lang’s Metropolis. The ghost of Raymond Chandler’s bygone LA haunts its story of a Marlowe-like former detective (Harrison Ford) assigned to track down escaped ‘replicants’ – biologically engineered beings employed as slaves by their human masters. - BFI

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Why Blade Runner?

The tale of Blade Runner turns out to be a curious one. No one went bankrupt, no one’s life was ruined beyond repair, no one never worked in this town again... Movie executives have always tried to change films, often destroying any artistic merit on the screen — and in the end, ironically, the mutilated films don’t make any more money than the original versions would have. So, the dispute remains contentious — even though everyone agrees that Blade Runner was so ahead of its time that it wouldn’t have been a major hit even if not a frame had been altered. - Kenneth Turan, Los Angeles Times, 1992, on the release of the Director’s Cut of Blade Runner

• There was science fiction before Blade Runner and science fiction after Blade Runner. Blade Runner did for depictions of a dystopian near future what 2001: A Space Odyssey did for depictions of space. Countless films have paid homage to the gritty noirish world of Blade Runner, and countless directors were shaped by the mood Ridley Scott created, along with its innovative special effects.

• Blade Runner deftly blended science fiction with elements of film noir, which helped the world reimagine science fiction. Blade Runner was also one of the first neo-noir films, a genre that has thrived since the 1980s. This new type of noir keeps many of the classic stylistic elements - urban landscape, moral ambiguity, antihero, anxiety and alienation, violence and sexuality - while blending with other genres and expanding the concerns. If noir questioned what it meant to be a man in postwar America, neo-noir questioned what it meant to be human as we began a new millennium.

• Blade Runner's success is a product of the home video revolution. In the 1980s, the VCR disrupted the movie industry, and changed moviegoing habits forever. Video rental stores like Blockbuster gave audiences widespread access to thousands of movies and TV shows from all eras, and the flexibility to view them from the comfort of their home, on their own schedule. Films gained new life in the home video era, as new generations rediscovered classic films, and new classics - like Blade Runner - were discovered. Eventually, home video was so popular that revenue from rentals surpassed the theatrical box office.

• With Blade Runner, we return to the issue of the Director’s Cut once again. As Kenneth Turan pointed out in the quote above, Blade Runner was so far ahead of its time that it was destined to fail in 1982. And because of disastrous test screenings, the film’s producers demanded significant changes, which dramatically altered the film’s ending, its meaning, and overall quality. Over the years since its release, Ridley Scott has returned to the film and attempted to capture his original vision. Ultimately, there are 8 known versions of the film, including what Scott labeled The Final Cut (2007), which is the one you should try to watch. This raises a few questions for us as viewers: are the films we watch finished products or are they living works that can be revised over time? Who should have the ultimate say about which version of a film is definitive, when often the monetary investment grants a studio control over the final cut of a film? And as we enter a world where AI can learn from images and can generate content, will studios and filmmakers revisit past works to make even more drastic changes?

• With its striking visuals, its disastrous production history and legacy of revisions, its blending of genres, its thought-provoking and prescient themes, and its influence on contemporary filmmakers, Blade Runner became the ultimate Film School Film. The film was covered in five of my college classes, so I’ve written countless pages about it. And so it’s inevitable that we discuss the film in this series.

• The film is ranked 52nd in Sight and Sound’s 2022 list of the Greatest Films of All Time.

The Rise of Home Video: A Cinematic Revolution

Recall from earlier in our series that as the Hollywood Studio System declined in the 1950s, television became a much-needed new stream of revenue, as the studios released their catalogs for television broadcast. Previously, we discussed how this led to ritual viewing of classic films like The Wizard of Oz and It’s a Wonderful Life, as well as increased appreciation for films like It’s a Wonderful Life and Singin’ in the Rain.

In the 1970s, new technology again entered the market and changed how people engaged with movies: Home Video.

It's impossible to overstate how big a deal home video was. Moviegoing as we know it today started with the creation of the video cassette. Consider how much more difficult it would be to watch and study films if they were only available in a film print. For several decades, that's how film scholars studied films. Now they're a click away via a streaming service, or a short trip to the library to rent a copy, or a few hours away if you want to purchase on Amazon.

The rest of our series begins here, with the advent of home video.

The Video Cassette Recorder (VCR) emerged as the catalyst for the home video revolution. Video cassette technology used magnetic tape to store analog audio and video signals, which was significantly less expensive and more durable than celluloid film stock and open-reel consumer film projectors.

Almost immediately, studios moved to capitalize on the new technology and started selling copies of their movies on video cassette. Home video became a significant revenue stream for the film industry, as consumers began collecting copies of their favorite films.

The VHS and Betamax formats competed fiercely for market dominance. It wasn’t a long battle, though. Despite Betamax’s superior technical quality, VHS secured a broader range of content, and by the mid-1980s captured 90% of the market.

As with the introduction of television, the home video phenomenon disrupted theatrical moviegoing. Theater attendance remained relatively flat during the 1980s and early 1990s.

For audiences, home video offered convenience, flexibility, and control. Consumers had a real alternative to rigid schedules, inconvenient locations, and crowded, noisy theaters. Home video also enabled consumers to own movies (and of course to pirate them), to rewatch as well as rewind and pause at will. For the first time, the viewer was in direct control of the viewing experience, and viewing was no longer linear.

Developments in home theater technology, including big screen televisions, high definition displays, and surround sound stereos continued improving the in-home viewing experience. It wouldn't be long before many consumers preferred the home viewing experience to seeing films in the theater.

Home video technology also gave rise to a new kind of business: the video rental store.

Video rental transformed how people engaged with movies. For much cheaper than a movie ticket or buying a VHS, audiences could keep a movie (or two or three) for a few days. They could watch it once, watch it multiple times, rewatch scenes, or turn off a film midway through. Or they might not even watch the movie at all before returning it.

Video stores had vast libraries, giving consumers unprecedented access to a wide array of movies, ranging from new releases to classics to foreign films to direct-to-video movies (often horror, often low-budget). The act of going to the video store and searching for something to watch became a ritual, and often a trial of indecision.

Home video rentals grew exponentially during the 1980s and 1990s. The video rental chain Blockbuster became a household name and industry juggernaut, opening thousands of stores in the US during the home video era.

By 1987, the home video rental market's revenue matched the U.S. box office revenue, and for the next few years surpassed the theatrical box office.

Hollywood began a steady shift towards the type of movies we typically see in theaters. With the rise in home video, big-budget spectacle films like action and superhero movies, and star-driven comedies thrived in theaters, while smaller, arthouse, and independent films found a niche in the home video market.

Two entrepreneurs helped fill the arthouse home video niche. Robert Gehr, a film scholar and teacher, and Charles Plymell, who had a background in publishing and organizing music festivals, founded the Criterion Collection in the early 1980s. They focused on works of artistic merit and historical significance, spanning diverse genres and eras. Each Criterion release was carefully chosen by film scholars and critics, ensuring a consistently high standard of quality.

Criterion painstakingly restored and remastered their releases, often working directly with original negatives and archival materials. The resulting picture and sound quality were far superior to anything readily available at the time, setting a new standard for home video presentation.

Beyond the films themselves, Criterion offered a wealth of bonus features that deepened the viewing experience. In-depth essays, filmmaker interviews, archival footage, and historical context contributed to a richer understanding of the films and their cultural significance. This helped give rise to a Special Edition DVD phenomenon starting in the late 1990s, where nearly every DVD release included some special features alongside the film itself.

Blade Runner was an example of a film that gained new life on video, after a tepid box office performance. The increased access, the lower risk of renting, and the ability to watch in chunks or rewatch helped the film find new audiences and a greater appreciation for it.

The Next Leap Forward in Science Fiction

Recall from earlier in the series how two films defined Science Fiction cinema for years: Metropolis (1927) and 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968).

Metropolis set the gold standard for how to depict the cities of tomorrow, influencing countless films and filmmakers. The narrative also introduced a cinematic anxiety about the threat of technology - specifically robots and artificial intelligence.

2001: A Space Odyssey utilized innovative special effects and a hard science narrative to create a much more immersive, experiential science fiction film than the low-budget outer space and alien invasion films of the 1950s. Kubrick’s film was open-ended and highly symbolic, but also depicted space exploration more realistically and made a sophisticated artificial intelligence character central to the narrative. The film turned science fiction into the balance of spectacle, social commentary, and seriousness that we know today.

In the 1970s, Hollywood shifted toward dystopian narratives reflecting environmental concerns and societal fears. Films like Soylent Green (1973) examined overpopulation and resource depletion in a dystopian future, and the Planet of the Apes series explored the perils of genetic engineering and climate change. These films were also action-oriented.

At the same time, there were massively successful optimistic science fiction films in the 1970s. Steven Spielberg's Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) flipped the 1950s alien invasion film on its head, exhibiting a fascination with space and with alien encounters. And of course, Star Wars (1977, George Lucas) took audiences to galaxies far, far away and made them feel weathered, tacticle, lived-in, and full of vibrant characters and mythology.

There were also three major filmmakers from around the world creating unique art house science fiction films during the 1970s: Andrei Tarkovsky, David Cronenberg, and George Miller. Their work was significant and influential, but nowhere nearly as influential as Ridley Scott's Blade Runner. (See the appendix at the end of this note for more discussion of these directors. Consider it a Special Feature.)

The British director Ridley Scott came on the scene in 1979 with a dystopian sci-fi horror mashup, Alien. The film sent a crew to explore an abandoned ship, whose only living occupant is an aggressive, hyper-intelligent, killer alien. Scott’s film was a box office hit that won numerous science fiction awards and an Oscar for Best Visual Effects, and launched Scott’s directing career into full gear.

With Blade Runner, Scott built upon science fiction traditions and trends, and advanced them tremendously. Scott made significant advances in special effects and used practical authentic set design to create a visually immersive experience. The world of Blade Runner feels as fully-realized as those of Star Wars and 2001: A Space Odyssey, yet feels closer to a logical extension of our current time than any other dystopian film set in the near future. Blade Runner also continued the trend of tackling ethical questions related to technology - in this case, artificial intelligence and robotics.

But Blade Runner also challenged traditions. Screenwriter Hampton Fancher injected noir narrative features into Philip K. Dick's original story, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, and Scott went deep on the noir aesthetics to redefine the visual and thematic landscape of sci-fi.

These thematic and visual elements are Blade Runner's strongest legacy. Very few films have looked as incredible as Blade Runner. Scott started his career as an art director and director of commercials, and his visual sensibilities are outstanding. He paid close attention to every detail of the film, down to the authenticity of props and pictures on the walls in characters' apartments.

The film also changed how artificial intelligence was depicted in cinema, moving from in a much more empathetic way. And the film's introspective and philosophical tone differs from the action-oriented sci-fi prevalent in earlier decades.

The film follows a grizzled ex-cop, Rick Deckard, as he takes an assignment to hunt down and "retire" some highly advanced androids - replicants - who have gone rogue. Along the way, Deckard falls for Rachel, an even more advanced replicant who is almost indistinguishable from humans. He carries out his mission, but as the film progresses, we spend more time with the replicants and learn about the way humans treat them in this world. By the end of the film, it's hard not to feel empathy for the replicants, and it's hard to distinguish replicants from the humans in the story.

By building on traditional science fiction film conventions while challenging the genre's traditional narratives and aesthetics, Blade Runner set a new standard for the complexity and depth achievable within science fiction cinema. Blade Runner’s influence is all over the next four decades of science fiction.

The film's iconic cyberpunk and neo-noir visuals have influenced countless sci-fi films, particularly those exploring dystopian urban environments. Two of the quintessential science fiction series of the last 40 years, The Terminator and The Matrix, owe much of their visual and thematic style to Blade Runner.

Blade Runner also set a precedent for delving into the ethical implications of creating artificial intelligence, a theme echoed in films like The Terminator (1984), The Matrix (1999), Gattaca (1997), Ex Machina (2014) and Her (2013). And the film's layered narrative structure and philosophical undertones influenced later sci-fi films that sought to engage audiences intellectually.

Blade Runner and Neo-Noir

The Neo-Noir subgenre emerged in the 1970s as a revival of classic film noir themes and elements, with New Hollywood sensibilities and genres.

In Blade Runner the Neo-Noir genre intertwines with the futuristic setting, creating a visually stunning and thematically rich cinematic experience.

Key Neo-Noir Elements in "Blade Runner:"

1. Moral Ambiguity: The characters navigate a morally murky world, blurring the lines between right and wrong. The protagonist, Deckard, is a quintessential noir detective with a questionable moral compass.
2. Urban Landscapes: Neo-Noir often features urban settings with dark alleys and imposing architecture. Blade Runner captures this essence, portraying a dystopian Los Angeles with towering skyscrapers and perpetual rain.
3. Genre-blending. Neo-Noir typically involves a blend of genres. Filmmakers discovered that noir sensibilities complemented and even enhanced genre films. This came to the forefront with neo-noir in the 1990s, but Blade Runner was one of the first. Some examples of neo-noir genre blending include Thelma & Louise (1992, also Ridley Scott) as a noir-Western with the titular heroines as outlaws, The Silence of the Lambs (1991, Jonathan Demme) and Se7en (1995, David Fincher) as noir-horror films within the serial killer subgenre, and The Full Monty (1997, David Cattaneo) and The Big Lebowski (1998, Joel and Ethan Coen) as noir-comedy hybrids.

- Questions of humanity & technology. Transhumanism. While the key anxiety in noir was “someone’s out to get me,” the pervasive anxiety in neo-noir is often “something’s out to get me.” If noir was concerned about being a man in modern society, neo-noir is anxious about being human in contemporary or near-future society, surrounded by technology that's fundamentally changing our lives and our nature. Blade Runner puts this anxiety right at the center of the film, as in the Director’s Cut and the Final Cut version of the film, it's strongly suggested that Deckard is a replicant, a suspicion that even he starts to consider. - Violence and sex. Neo-noir films were unconstrained by the Production Code Administration, and so tended to depict much more graphic violence and sexuality. This led to the prevalence of a new subgenre, the erotic thriller, with films like Body Heat (1981, Lawrence Kasdan), Fatal Attraction (1987, Adrian Lyne), and Basic Instinct (1992, Paul Verhoeven) as key entries in the genre. Additionally, the neo-noir made room for depicting sexualities and sexual identity, with films like Boys Don’t Cry (1999), Crash (1996, David Cronenberg), Bound (1999) and the original screenplay for Basic Instinct all containing characters with fluid sexualities, reflecting contemporary changing ideas of sexuality after the 1960s and 70s.

Ridley Scott skillfully weaves these genres together, creating a unique cinematic experience. The film's exploration of advanced technology and its impact on society aligns with Sci-Fi, while its noir aesthetics and moral complexities resonate with the Neo-Noir tradition.

A Bit More About the Relationship at the Center of Blade Runner

Deckard’s romantic relationship with the replicant Rachel is one of the more striking aspects of the film.

Rachel at first resists Deckard’s advances (more about this shortly) but over the course of the film, she uses Deckard’s romantic feelings to her advantage, to earn his protection. The fact that Rachel is a replicant and Deckard might be human (more about this shortly) makes his desire fairly complicated. He’s in love with a machine. This puts him in a unique position within neo-noir - he falls for something, not someone.

Additionally, their relationship is doomed (replicants have an expiration date) and by running away with her, Deckard commits a crime and seals his own fate for the sake of love. This is the classic film noir l’amour fou (crazy love), where desire drives men to do crazy, self-destructive things.

You could read Rachel's role in the film as the classic film noir femme fatale, as Deckard's desire for Rachel leads to his doom.

The relationship is also problematic. The “love scene” is nonconsensual - Rachel resists his advances, tries to leave, and Deckard physically blocks her from leaving. It’s an uncomfortable viewing experience - particularly 40+ years after the film’s release. Parse reviews on Letterbox'd, and you're likely to see contemporary viewers questioning Scott's judgment in directing the scene this way.

It's worth considering the relationship in the context of the film's world, not necessarily as a product of its time.

In the world of Blade Runner, replicants are a servile class of robots without rights. They're essentially enslaved in an off-planet colony, and Deckard’s job is to retire the ones that have resisted and fled their slavery.

Ridley Scott and Hampton Fancher seem to be interested in questioning what rights androids have.

As for Scott's direction of that scene, and the romantic music that accompanies an assault, remember the film is essentially told from Deckard's perspective, and as he sees it, it's love (as disturbing as that is). It's another example of behavior that makes us question Deckard's humanity.

So while it's an uncomfortable aspect of the film, it's part of how Blade Runner forces us to think about how we in 2024 will relate to artificial intelligence, especially as it becomes more sophisticated, human-like, and sentient. What responsibilities do we have in relation to artificial intelligence? What rights, if any, does a robot have?

Blade Runner's Journey to Classic Status

During production, Blade Runner went significantly over budget, which put pressure on the film's financiers.

After a few disastrous test screenings, the producers demanded cuts and significant changes to the film. The result was a compromised version that included a studio-mandated voiceover and a more optimistic ending.

According to legend, Harrison Ford was less than thrilled about providing a voiceover, and tried to sabotage the studio's efforts with a strange, stilted reading. But the studio went with it. (I highly recommend avoiding watching the theatrical version of the film - it’s inferior in just about every way. If you hear a voiceover, turn it off immediately.)

The film's box office struggle can be attributed to several factors. Its slow pacing and nuanced storytelling defied the expectations of mainstream audiences craving more traditional sci-fi narratives. Fans of Alien weren't going to like Blade Runner's more philosophical bent. Also, casting Harrison Ford as the lead attracted fans from Star Wars and Raiders of the Lost Ark, about as mainstream as films get.

Moreover, the studio's insistence on a voiceover and a more optimistic ending diluted the film's intended atmospheric intensity. Even if fans were open to something different, what they got was deeply flawed.

Turan's article (linked below) covers a lot of interesting details of the film's production and initial tepid reception, as well as the turnaround.

Essentially, the film flourished on home video. Like other cult films, Blade Runner benefitted from word of mouth, and the home video market gave people an easier way to see the film, and for film enthusiasts to study it in depth and appreciate its complexities.

Over time, critical perspectives shifted, and the film gained a reputation as a groundbreaking work in both sci-fi and neo-noir genres. It was regarded as a flawed masterpiece for years - like other lost classics like Metropolis - and some theaters occasionally ran the film for limited engagements.

In 1992, when a theater requested a print of the film for a 10 year anniversary screening, Warner Bros. accidentally sent the workprint edition - the one that had only been shown to test audiences in 1982, without the modified ending or the Harrison Ford voiceover.

Buzz quickly spread that Ridley Scott's original version of the film had been discovered, and that it was much better.

Warner Bros. was just as surprised as fans. The studio didn't even know they had kept this cut of the film.

The Criterion Collection secured the rights to the workprint edition, remastered it, and released it on Laserdisc as a 10th Anniversary Edition. It became one of their biggest releases of the 1990s.

Ridley Scott returned to work on the film later as well. These versions, particularly The Final Cut (2007), more closely aligned with Scott's original vision - and his ongoing feelings about the film. For the Final Cut version, Scott also updated some of the film's special effects, to make the film feel more timeless and relevant for contemporary audiences.

One of the interesting elements of Blade Runner's many versions is that it complicates studying the film. Since different versions of the film contain or leave out incredibly meaningful single shots (e.g. the unicorn dream), questions remain about the film's ultimate message and meaning. Is Deckard a replicant? Depends on which version you've seen, as different versions are more ambiguous or explicit about that question than others. Fans, critics, and scholars have to debate about which version is the canonical or definitive version of the film.

The Director's Cut

Part of Blade Runner's legacy is the prevalence of the Director's Cut.

The 1990s and 2000s saw a flurry of re-releases of films for the home video market. Blade Runner demonstrated that cult film fans were passionate consumers, and they were willing to spend on home video releases.

Many high-profile director-studio disputes were revisited, with Heaven's Gate (1981, Michael Cimino) and Brazil (1985, Terry Gilliam) getting restored home video releases in the 1990s.

Gradually, the Director's Cut moniker was liberally applied to many special releases, often just restoring a few edits made for the theatrical release without adding much substance to the film.

But the Director's Cut trend, the home video re-release, and continued improvements in technology have given filmmakers the ability to revisit their past work. Earlier in the series, we saw Coppola's decades-long dedication to creating a definitive Apocalypse Now. George Lucas also revisited the original three Star Wars films in the 1990s to update special effects, using the occasion to change a scene that altered the Han Solo character (Han shot first!).

Many of us are probably most familiar with Peter Jackson's Extended Editions of The Lord of the Rings series, in which Jackson added over two hours to the series for the special edition. Jackson's subsequent prediliction for extending films into multiple parts (The Hobbit and Get Back) almost feels like he's making the films with the home video / streaming market in mind, with an eye towards revisiting and extending them later on.

Another interesting example in recent years was Zack Snyder's Justice League (2021), which was a dramatic reimagining and re-editing of a film that Snyder started directing in the mid-2010s, but left midway through production for personal reasons. After the completed Justice League (2017) bombed at the box office, fans began campaigning online to demand that the studio "release the Snyder cut." Snyder returned to the film during the COVID-19 pandemic and the Snyder Cut was released to somewhat better reviews.

All of this shows that cinema is much less of a static medium than it was previously. And it invites us to consider the future of cinema and some interesting questions.

Which directors are worthy of having their original vision restored? Should directors continue to revisit films years after their release? As technology, especially artificial intelligence, continues to advance in capability, who or what should be able to revisit a film and edit it? Imagine a film created (co-directed) with generative AI - if the AI model continues to improve over time, what might a Director's Cut of such a film look like?

What to Watch For

• A. Influence of Film Noir Aesthetics
  1. Use of shadow and light
  2. Urban landscapes and atmospheric visuals
  3. Antihero
  4. Alienation
  5. Neo-noir aesthetics vs. noir
• B. Iconic Soundtrack by Vangelis
  1. Contribution to the film's atmosphere
  2. The soundtrack had tremendous influence on subsequent sci-fi scores
• C. Recurring Images
  1. Eyes
  2. Vehicles
  3. Color temperatures - blues vs. oranges, and lots of neon
  4. Reflective surfaces
• D. Dystopian Futures
  1. How does Scott establish the film's bleak, futuristic setting?
  2. What do we know about the world of 2019 Los Angeles? What are the social and environmental implications depicted in the narrative?
• E. Acting
  1. Harrison Ford’s performance. He's playing against type as the noir protagonist. Unlike Indiana Jones and Han Solo, he's not very cool, he’s not actually good at his job. What do you think of this performance coming near the peak of his nascent stardom?
  2. The replicants, tasked with playing more human than human. Rutger Hauer’s performance as the replicant Roy Batty, where he transforms from a ruthless killing machine to something closer to a human. Sean Young as Rachel - femme fatale but also quite human-seeming as the film progresses. Daryl Hannah as Pris, another replicant.

Learn More About Blade Runner

Explore Roger Ebert's evolving perspective on the film across its multiple versions:

• 3-star Review of Blade Runner (1982)
• 3-star Review of Blade Runner: The Director's Cut (1992)
• Great Movies Essay on Blade Runner: The Final Cut by Roger Ebert

Kenneth Turan of the LA Times on the journey of Blade Runner from flop to classic

Special Feature: More / Related Viewing

Earlier I mentioned the additional influential arthouse science fiction directors: Tarkovsky, Cronenberg, and Miller. Each of these directors left a tremendous influence on contemporary science fiction (and in Cronenberg's case, horror).

Russian director Andrei Tarkovsky crafted thought-provoking, slow-moving science fiction films like Solaris (1972) and Stalker (1979). Like Kubrick's 2001, but wholly original, Tarkovsky's films are about beautiful imagery and ideas and questions that linger in your mind long after the credits roll. I very nearly included Stalker in this series, but it’s an acquired taste - very slow moving, with some strange acting, but a highly cerebral experience and unforgettable. If you liked Alex Garland's Annihilation, you might like Stalker, because Garland's film is essentially an homage to Tarkovsky.

Second, Canadian director David Cronenberg made a series of body-horror films in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Films like The Brood (1979), Scanners (1981), and Videodrome (1983) were gory and violent, expressing anxiety about the frailty of the human body and the potentially disastrous and destructive impact of technology. They’re low to medium budget but highly effective films, also very much an acquired taste. But Cronenberg eventually crossed over to mainstream filmmaking in the 1980s and 1990s, with his most notable films The Fly (1986), Dead Ringers (1987), A History of Violence (2005) and Eastern Promises (2007).

Third, Australian director George Miller created the Mad Max series in the late 1970s and early 1980s, depicting a near-future dystopia after the collapse of society, where violent gangs roam the desolate wilderness in souped-up muscle cars and fight over control of what fuel remains. These films also introduced the world to Mel Gibson, and 40+ years later, Miller has rebooted the Mad Max world with a more feminist dystopia.