A Road Warrior’s Driving Lessons in the Thrilling, Sprawling “Furiosa”

Why, then, did Max’s exit in “Fury Road” trigger such an onrush of emotion? The answer is Furiosa. For once, Max had met his match in road warriorship—an equally skilled driver, a better sniper, and a fellow avatar of taciturn grit. There were differences, too: Furiosa had lost her left arm in unexplained circumstances, and did her driving and fighting with the aid of a robotic limb. Crucially, unlike Max, she was invested in something more than personal survival. The plot of “Fury Road” was set in motion by her decision to free Immortan Joe’s five young “wives” from sexual bondage, a gesture that turned out to be anything but casual or blandly altruistic. Furiosa, we learned, had been born into—and kidnapped from—a matriarchal society called the Vuvalini, a lost sisterhood to which she desperately wished to return. For all her battle-hardened toughness, she was, in Theron’s fiercely felt performance, very much a child longing for home.