At a first glance the Mad Max series seems innocent enough. After all here is yet another movie trilogy, much like any other; a first, groundbreaking film, a second, larger and more comprehensive sequel and a last, grand project made to surpass the others. Many film series have come and gone, leaving their temporary mark on the film world, then fading into semi-obscurity. Most of these tend to fall into a sort of film limbo, occasionally watched by fans few and far between. In this sense Mad Max ranks as one of these; any given night may pass at the local video store and the film lies waiting for an audience.

And yet Mad Max defies typical serial film categorizing. Here is a film revered by rabid fans as one of the greatest films of all time; many of these fans tend to follow automotive interests, but a good number simply like the film. One thing must be certain: Mad Max reigns as a cult film. Why can a film series which began with a low-budget action movie (which utterly flopped in North America) have gained such a following, while remaining relatively ignored by the rest of film audiences? Something about the films must play to their audiences. Mad Max seems so simple at a first glance. Here is a low budget film about a future where civilization stands ready to collapse. The main character begins as a law enforcement officer of the highways, but after encountering tragedy, turns renegade and takes law and punishment into his own hands. Overall the film seems cliché, if overly dark and strange. But for such an ordinary film, a lot of underlying work takes place. Whether or not the viewer realizes what is going on, Mad Max reads at many different and engaging levels.

The film begins on the highway. A bandit streaks down the highway in a stolen police interceptor, all the while screaming into the short wave. "I am the Nightrider!" he screams, taunting the officers in a pair of MFP police cruisers who can only keep up with the runaway bandit. The chase blazes past a highway café, where another cop, the motorcycle riding Jim Goose casually describes a recent gruesome crash to another patron. The cars flash by and the Goose joins the chase. The cars narrowly avoid pasting a toddler to their hoods, punt an unwary van off the road, and completely destroy a trailer, all within the first five minutes of the film. The chase seems to favor the Nightrider until a man in another police car appears. The camera pans into the car, to a lone officer listening to the short wave. His eyes hide behind reflector aviator sunglasses, his gaze looks off into the distance. The car starts with appropriate V8 blurble and begins to move. Across the rear flanks are the letters "MFP" and along the back is the word "INTERCEPTOR." This is no ordinary cruiser and this is no ordinary cop. The car pulls into the opposite lane and sits, engine rumbling in a fast idle. When the bandit’s car appears, the interceptor charges for it in a high speed game of chicken. At the last moment the bandit yields, his nerve shaken. The interceptor begins pursuit and soon fills the black car’s mirrors. As the interceptor taps the black car’s bumper, the Nightrider begins to cry; he knows he will either face capture or death. The chase ends with the latter. Only then does the viewer see the mysterious driver of the interceptor, a young and intensely minded man.

Several elements contribute to this spectacular opening. The scene and the movie open with a white line nightmare, an outlaw unstoppable charging through the backroads of Australia. Chasing him are police who, although armed with powerful cruisers, seem disadvantaged against the black coupe. The outlaw openly taunts the officers, seemingly secure in his own chances of escape. The cruisers are 1972 and ’73 model Ford Falcons; in 1979, the year of its release, these cars were already five and six years old in a movie set in the near future. Here may lie the first indication that the reality within the film differs from contemporary reality. All of the cars in the film tend toward older, simpler models which lack the electronic devices which make modern automobiles so unwieldy to repair. In this future cars and motorcycles must be simple to maintain; mechanics have attained real status, as they are capable of building a car out of parts. Therefore the police and bandits alike seek older cars which remain simpler to work on. (Keep in mind though that this may also reflect the film’s low budget origins. Shot entirely on a 350,000 Australian dollar budget, older cars would have been cheaper to purchase and operate.)

Another interesting element of Mad Max concerns the officers themselves. The MFP officers do not wear uniforms as such, but instead wear black leather suitable for motorcycle riders. The leather imparts a harshness to the officers, who display a callousness toward their target. In this world the officers appear far more menacing than their off screen counterparts; they seem uninhibited by such details as Miranda codes, but seem to focus only on getting the bad guy. They do not stop to ensure that citizens whom they happen to punt off the highway are uninjured, and do not seem to follow any standard procedure for high speed pursuits. Instead these leather clad enforcers of law scream across the landscape in a single minded objective of stopping the Nightrider. They are a product of a harsh version of our reality, when law is declining despite all attempts to save it. The film continues with Max and Jessie at home with their infant son Sprog. At the end of the day they watch the nightly news, which describes the fiery death of the Nightrider. "You’ve made the news again," says Jessie. The next morning, Jessie wakes up to an empty bed. Max is already awake and dressed, about to head to an early day at work. She tries to dissuade him, but Max has already promised his friend and partner that he will show. "You know the Goose," he says, trying to ease Jessie’s worries. As he leaves, Jessie signs ‘crazy about you’ to Max, who gets into his Interceptor and drives to work.

This short scene seems so oddly juxtaposed against the fiery end of the Nightrider, but it reveals the characters as human and feeling. Max, who before appeared as an unfeeling enforcer now appears as a devoted husband and father to his young family. The audience sees how Max lives at home; the dark persona carries throughout his character, but here Max seems more vulnerable, more human. Here lies the drive behind Max. He serves not only to protect society from the evils of the road, but serves to protect his family too. The odd juxtaposition of this scene with the opening car chase serves to reveal the all too human nature of Max and his family. They live in a small house by the ocean, a paradise by many standards. But in this world the house seems small and vulnerable. It sits alone and in the open, a target for all who would cause harm. Jessie’s concern does not appear so trite, as the television beams images of lawlessness and destruction from all over the continent. She feels safe when Max is home, but is vulnerable when he is at work. She bids him goodbye before he heads to work, as she must surely know that he might not come home. She tells Max she loves him in a special way, so that the point is not lost. This fleeting and surprisingly touching scene reveals the quiet desperation that marks this world, where lawlessness gains at the expense of individual lives. Jesse wants nothing more than to live quietly with her husband and her child, but she knows that the crumbling world they inhabit works against them.

From this scene the movie cuts to the Halls of Justice, the center of law and authority. In the courtyard Max awaits the Goose, who has planned a surprise and finally arrives clad in a knee brace. Goose leads Max into the garage, a weird subterranean construction of heavy concrete which looks for all the world like a cave. Goose leads Max over to the mechanic, a scruffy hermit-like figure who proceeds to show Max his latest creation. It is a black interceptor, similar to what the Nightrider drove, but with several differences, the most notable being the large supercharger poking through the hood. Max looks at the car in astonishment, then asks the mechanic where he acquired it. The mechanic replies that he built it in his spare time. "A part here, a part there." He then starts the car, which mixes V8 rumble with supercharger whine in a powerful cocktail of ground shaking power. Max fixes all attention on the car, hypnotized by the whine of the supercharger. The scene ends with a close-up of the supercharger intake, which looms larger than life on the screen.

A lot of key information passes through this scene. First, and perhaps most importantly, the initial shot of the Halls of Justice further reveals the collapsing nature of this world. The Halls are actually a complex of severe brick buildings, enclosed by a rusting iron fence. The Halls appear as a modern fortress, forcibly separated from the rest of the world and with all entry and exit controlled through a single gateway arch. Over the arch in simple lettering is the title "HALLS OF JUSTICE." The whole complex seems in a state of decay; one of the letters on the arch hangs off kilter from the others, buildings look slightly neglected and run down, and human activity appears conspicuously absent. The courtyard, seen from above, lacks any decoration or fauna. It is sharply defined by the building walls and is severely plain in appearance. Buildings surround it on three sides, leaving only a tall, relatively narrow fourth side open to the outside world. Like the exterior view of the Halls of Justice, the courtyard draws allusions to Medieval fortress architecture which has been updated to serve modern functions.

If the exterior of the Halls of Justice is Medieval then the garage area is simply bizarre. In contrast to the sharply delineated and brilliantly lit courtyard, the garage appears as a dark, underground cavern of concrete, only sporadically lit by dim fluorescent tubes. Thick, squat columns of rough concrete fuse unbroken into heavy concrete vaulting, forming a cave-like space of seemingly endless proportions which recedes into dark corners of the garage. Police cruisers in various states of disrepair lay scattered in between the columns, as if dragged into the garage to meet a gruesome fate. In the background, unseen loudspeakers brief the police of acceptable and unacceptable police procedure; at one point police are warned not to sell excess fuel to private sources. The voice from the loudspeaker seems disembodied and remote from the material. In the garage, space is confused, proportion is distorted. The garage looks as much like a natural formation than a man-made object; if Antoni Gaudi had designed a garage, this would be it.

The Halls of Justice and the garage reveal a great deal about the world of Mad Max. The Halls of Justice effectively conveys the decaying authority of law and order in an increasingly harsh world. Its courtyard reflects the growing severity of civilized existence, where individual freedoms are fast succumbing to a society dominated by cutthroat survival. In contrast, the garage reveals the dark, primitive impulses and drives which underlay surface society. Only here the values of the new world are totally revealed; survival will cease to be about money, but instead will involve industrial goods. The mechanics, the people charged with keeping the machines working, will rise to new levels of prominence, as they are the only ones with knowledge enough to construct new machines from scattered parts of the old. Existence will no longer mean lawful and lawless, but will blur into a confused struggle to survive.

To the officers, the death of the Nightrider is just another day of work. But to the Nightrider’s gang, led by the Toecutter, it is a fact of life. The first shot of the gang occurs when they arrive at a small train town to collect their mate. Their antics seem oddly humorous, yet dark and foreboding; soon enough their violent nature shows through. A young couple attempts escape and are run down, their car demolished, both raped and left to their own devices.

The Toecutter gang seems for all the world like the typical motorcycle gang, hell-bent on destruction, devoid of feeling, and single-minded in their objective. They seem to follow in the "biker gang" tradition which matured with the release of The Wild One, which starred Marlon Brando as the leader of a lawless motorcycle gang. A closer look reveals that this generalization falls short. For starters, several of the gang members, far from undeveloped "filler characters," are fairly well developed, especially considering their role as minor characters. Bubba Zanetti, Toecutter’s right hand man, appears as an all business character, intolerant of mistakes and a master of the pain he inflicts on others. Johnny the Skank appears as an inconsistent, paranoid drug addict as unsure of his own motives as he is of the world around him, yet strangely loyal to Toecutter’s bidding. Two other bikers apparently practice homosexual tendencies; this deviates strongly from all other motorcycle stereotypes, in which gang members always terrorize women. In the future of Mad Max men prove just as vulnerable. Most revealing may be the handling of Toecutter, the leader of the gang. He does not appear as a completely unfeeling individual; he personally escorts the body of the Nightrider to its final resting place. In addition he seems to draw on personal relationships between himself and his gang members to achieve his ends. But contrasted with this characterization is the ruthless and lawless savage who inflicts suffering on the young couple, takes pleasure in the death by fire of Jim Goose and mercilessly mows down Jessie and Sprog. He demands loyalty and obedience from his gang, and crushes all who oppose him. His character may defy the traditional role of the biker gang leader, but his violence marks him as the film’s antagonist.

Max and the Goose respond to a call detailing highway violence and soon come upon one of the young couple, who flees into the field. They come upon the remains of the couple’s Chevy Impala, now torn into wreckage. With the wreckage is Johnny, who remained behind and proceeded to get high on drugs. Max books Johnny while Goose tries to console the girl, whom the bikers left at the wreckage. Johnny babbles random thoughts, one of which involves the Nightrider. Max and Goose recall the chase and realize that this biker gang is connected with the Nightrider. At the station Johnny is booked and held. To the cops it looks like an open and shut case, but events would prove otherwise. Two trial lawyers appear and proceed to arrange Johnny’s release, much to the chagrin of the police. The whole case involving Johnny collapsed when no one appeared at the trial to testify. "The townspeople didn’t show. The girl didn’t show. Nobody showed!" Fifi Macaffe announces to his dismayed officers. Goose reacts most violently. Both Max and Fifi have to restrain him repeatedly; when he breaks their grip he attacks both Johnny and the lawyers with ferocity. In the courtyard Fifi escorts the lawyers to their car; the whole time they complain and threaten legal action against the police. Johnny leaves on foot, accompanied by Bubba Zanetti, who had been sent against his better judgment to retrieve Johnny from the police. Johnny taunts Goose, who replies with a disparaging remark against the Nightrider. At this Johnny rails against the Goose. "We remember the Nightrider! And we know who you are!" When the lawyers are away, Fifi gives his permission to take whatever measures are necessary to preserve law and order.

This scene proves a pivotal moment in the film. Prior to Johnny’s arrest, the police operated in conjunction with the courts and the general populace. But Johnny’s arrest signifies that a change has taken place within society. Now, those wronged by the bikers are too afraid of the consequences of their actions to testify. They realize that the police are no longer able to maintain law and order in all places and they hope that if they don’t testify that they will be spared the bikers’ wrath. When this occurs the courts, operating on the old laws, have no choice but to release Johnny. The lawyers who release him appear oblivious to the realities of the world they inhabit. No longer do the laws protect the innocent, as they can neither be changed nor enforced. Provisions once aimed at protecting prisoners’ rights now serve to absolve them of wrongdoing with the absence of citizen participation. With this critical change the police are rendered even more powerless. From the beginning they have been outnumbered; only nine officers are portrayed in the entire film, with a notable absence of the police from the train town. (and presumably from other small towns off the main highways) Fifi increasingly realizes that the law no longer supports the rights of the people. In response he tells his men to disregard the law in practice. "So long as the paperwork is clean, you boys can do whatever you like out there." With this statement the entire film changes. No longer are the police the upholders of law and virtue. Instead they have become public peacekeepers, entrusted by their commander to take whatever steps are necessary to keep order. This statement reveals Fifi’s desperation as a police commander. He wants to abide by the law and uphold a standard of virtue for the world, but he realizes that his men must abandon that virtue and law if they are to maintain peace and order in a crumbling society. But with this abandonment of the written law Fifi’s officers begin to resemble the very criminals they are trying to rally against. This critical moment in the film sets the stage for a final conflict between the police and the Toecutter gang, but it serves to blur the line between the upholders of law and the lawless.

The movie then shifts to the Toecutter gang, who have taken up residence on a pristine beach. One of the gang members arrives with a female mannequin, which several others begin to molest, much to the amusement of the ranks. Toecutter himself sits apart, wrapped in blankets. Next to him sits Bubba Zanetti, who eyes the scene with cold indifference. On Toecutter’s other side sits Johnny, still wearing a button shirt and tie from his release. As the entertainment proceeds Bubba Zanetti whispers to Toecutter the possibility that the mannequin may be rigged "by the bronze." Toecutter fires a shot into the air, then directs one of the members to place the mannequin against a post. "She is more than she appears to be," he says before blasting the mannequin’s head apart with a shotgun. He then leads Johnny across the beach, at once consoling and threatening him, urging him to take his revenge against the bronze. The scene ends with Toecutter leading Johnny into the ocean.

Although this scene seems confusing, particularly with its surreal ending, it contains several interesting points which contribute to the film. The setting of the scene on a beautiful white sand beach may reflect the mindset of the gang. For the first time they are shown apart from their motorcycles, reveling in the sun without worry or care. As with the train town their actions seem spontaneous, unrestrained and oddly humorous. They seem to create a sort of thieves’ paradise, free of interlopers and police resistance. Contrasted against this expression of lawless freedom is the restrained poise taken by the three important gang members. Toecutter appears draped in a fur blanket, his head status visually reinforced by an allusion to robes of kingship. He watches his men but does not participate in their revelry. Bubba Zanetti also sits aside from the revelry, but for different reasons. Unlike the boisterous Toecutter he has no room for play. For him the very idea of reveling on the beach smacks of improvidence. Johnny also sits aside, watching Toecutter and waiting for his move. Johnny appears as Toecutter’s protégé, the one chosen by Toecutter to one day lead the gang. Unlike Toecutter and Bubba Zanetti he appears unsure of his actions. Johnny wants to fit into the gang but knows that his insecurity and indecision separate him from his peers. Their actions are also telling. While the majority of the gang members participate in the revelry, either by acting or applauding, Bubba Zanetti begins to suspect that the mannequin may be connected with the police, perhaps wired or even booby trapped. His suggestion gives further evidence that the police are now using drastic measures to keep the peace. Toecutter reveals his trust in Bubba Zanetti by immediately destroying the mannequin. The viewer comes to see that Toecutter relies on Bubba Zanetti as his advisor and confidant, as he is the only one capable of fulfilling such responsibility. Finally, Toecutter drags Johnny along the beach. He consoles Johnny and tells him what to do. When Johnny protests Toecutter puts the shotgun in Johnny’s mouth, threatening him to shape up. This moment seems surreal, an extension of Johnny’s drug induced hallucinations, and ends with the two figures walking waist-deep in the ocean.

In the next scene, the police are shown at the end of the day. Jim Goose, Max, Big Bopper and March Hare sip drinks in a local bar and watch a performance by a local singer. After her number, she and Goose make eye contact. Outside, a shadowy figure tampers with Goose’s motorcycle, which sits in the parking lot outside the bar. The next morning, Goose leaves the singer asleep while he puts on his gear, goes outside and gets on his motorcycle. He starts the motorcycle, slowly rides it onto the street, then proceeds to peel away in a swirl of tire burnout. The camara pans to a nearby car, in which Johnny is revealed as the shadowy figure from the night before. He awakens and places a burning lighter against his skin to quickly come to.

The scene shifts to Jim Goose and his motorcycle, barreling down a two lane road at high speed. He takes the straight-aways at full tilt, while corners are taken leaning the motorcycle at steep angles to negotiate the curves. Suddenly the bike begins to shudder and the Goose loses control, flying off the motorcycle and into the side grass. After a bit he comes to, apparently unhurt, tries his radio, then sets off on foot to find help. Later he retrieves his motorcycle by borrowing a friend’s truck and begins the long drive back to the Halls of Justice.

Unfortunately Jim Goose never makes it back. The Toecutter gang intercepts him on the way. From a hill beside the road Johnny hurls a brake drum at the truck. It shatters the windshield and causes Goose to drive off the road and down the other side. The truck overturns and rolls several times, knocking Goose unconscious, and finally comes to rest on its roof. As Johnny and Toecutter approach Goose regains consciousness as gasoline begins to collect inside the roof and tries vainly to free himself of the restraining belts. Toecutter has Johnny light his cigarette. "Light another," he says, indicating that Johnny is to ignite the wreckage. When Johnny protests Toecutter angrily scolds him. "This isn’t what I want," pleads Johnny, but to no avail. At Toecutter’s pressure Johnny throws the match, which lands in the grass. The gasoline erupts into flames, and the scene ends with Goose writhing and screaming in agony as he is burned alive.

This sequence both draws on earlier events in the film and sets the stage for subsequent actions. At Johnny’s release Jim Goose strongly objected, citing what he and his gang had done to the young couple. Johnny had vowed that they would seek revenge against Goose. At Toecutter’s insistence Johnny tampered with Goose’s motorcycle, causing the accident and setting Goose up for the fatal crash and burn. At that moment Johnny ceased to be a middling hoodlum and became, like the Nightrider, Toecutter and Bubba Zanetti a cold blooded killer. Johnny now stood as a cop killer, one who would be shown no mercy by Fifi’s officers. Goose’s death would start a chain of events which would be the Toecutter gang’s ultimate unraveling.

When Max hears of Jim Goose’s accident he rushes to the hospital. Against his fellow officers Max charges into the hospital room and is confronted with a tented bed, lit from inside by an ultraviolet sanitation light. He slowly moves toward the bed when a charred arm and hand slip from the tent. Max slowly lifts the cover for the tent and reels in horror. He exits the room, holding back vomit, and charges past his officers. Fifi attempts to console him but Max refuses. "That THING in there, that isn’t the Goose," Max exclaims. He refuses to believe that his friend and partner has met such a gruesome end.

At his next shift Max arrives at the Halls of Justice and climbs the stairs to Fifi Macaffee’s office, which resonates with patriotic music and some potted plants which Fifi waters. He hands a disbelieving Fifi his resignation and turns to leave. Fifi pleads with Max to stay, saying that the Goose had been overdue for tragedy to happen. Max wants nothing to do with it. "I’m scared, Fifi. Any longer out there and I’m one of them. A terminal crazy!" he exclaims. Fifi tries to get Max to stay. "Do you want me on my knees? Do you want me to beg?" he asks. In desperation Fifi whips out his tried and true hero speech. "They say people don’t believe in heroes anymore. Well damn them! You and me Max, we’re gonna give them back their heroes!" He convinces Max to take a vacation to think it over. When Max states that he will still quit when he returns, Fifi replies, "You’ll be back Rockatansky! You’re hooked, and you know it!"

This scene serves to show Max and his growing apprehension about being a cop in a world gone mad. What began as a routine assignment has now culminated in the death of an officer. Max reacts first with disbelief, then with apprehension. He has a hard time accepting the death of such a close friend, especially one so full of life and vitality. For the first time Max is revealed as fearful for the future. Whereas previous appearances showed a controlled and unshakable officer of the law, Max now shows genuine concern regarding his job and his future. He openly states the fears which Jessie must surely have felt earlier in the film. The tragedy of Jim Goose and the years spent cheating death have shaken Max; he now wants to retreat to the safety of his family.

In addition, the scene serves to place the film squarely in modern society, albeit one which has gone terribly wrong. Jim Goose does not die in a primitive shelter, but in a modern hospital. Later, Max and Fifi are shown in the Halls of Justice. Fifi listens to music from a radio, which amidst the turmoil broadcasts music to its listeners. In spite of his consuming role of police commander Fifi still has the luxury to raise a few potted plants. Against a background of decay and collapse the old system still functions in some limited functions. The viewer thus sees that despite the disorder and chaos the movie is still set in a modern reality. It is still recognizable as the world we live in.

Max takes Fifi’s advice and takes his family on a vacation. They drive northward along the coast, stopping at picturesque spots for picnics, rest and frolics in the woods. They buy a puppy from an old gentleman and keep driving. In a rare moment of peace Max tells Jessie how he feels about her; it comes across as awkward and its up to Jessie to understand. A flat tire forces them to stop at a roadside mechanic, who comments on their wagon. "Don’t see many of these anymore, ‘cept to scrape ‘em off the highway." While Max stays with the mechanic Jessie and Sprog drive into town to get some ice cream.

But as the wagon pulls in front of the store, familiar figures begin to stir and awaken. Max and Jessie have unwittingly crossed paths with the Toecutter gang. They spy Jessie entering the store and are waiting for her when she exits. As she puts Sprog in the back of the wagon the gang harasses her. Toecutter himself looms before her, taunting her with coy gestures. Jessie gives Toecutter a swift knee to the groin, then starts the wagon and drives off. Several gang members try to stop her, including one who wraps a chain around the luggage rack and has the chain ripped away from him. She arrives at the mechanic’s shop and orders Max to get in the car. Leaving their tire behind they speed off down the road. A few minutes later the Toecutter gang arrives in chase. Toecutter asks if he saw the wagon and asks where it is going, then ride off to follow Max and Jessie.

Like many of the previous scenes a sense of collapsing society pervades. Even on vacation the family cannot escape the signs of decay. The mechanics words bode ominous; family vehicles such as Max and Jessie’s are easy target for the marauding gang members. His words seem to remember a more peaceful time. Even in rural Australia the collapse has begun. The local town seems little more than a ghost town. No cars move about and no people venture out of doors. When Jessie is accosted she fends for herself, for like the train town no authority appears to stop the Toecutter gang. The collapse of Australian society occurs throughout the country and no place seems immune from impending disaster.

When they believe they have evaded the motorcycle gang, Max and Jessie stop for a rest. As Max tries to calm Jessie the puppy climbs out of the wagon and runs to the rear. Jessie gets out to see what the puppy has found and discovers a human hand at the end of the chain used to try and stop the wagon. She reels in horror from the grisly site. They call Ziggy, the local sheriff, who comes out and assesses the situation. After taking the hand for evidence Ziggy offers to let them stay at his farm, where they will be safer. (The film does not make clear whether Ziggy is a relative, a colleague of Max or merely a fellow officer who wants to see them safe) He assures them that there will be no more biker trouble there.

At Ziggy and May’s farm Max and Jessie feel safe. Max takes time to fix a broken fanbelt on the wagon, while Sprog plays on a blanket nearby. Jessie takes the puppy and heads for the beach, which lies beyond a thicket of trees. She plays in the ocean for a bit then lays on the sand to relax and falls asleep. But the camera pans to the rocks above the beach, where two motorcycles sit, their riders quietly watching Jessie from a distance. While Jessie sleeps the puppy, distracted by some noise runs off behind an outcropping of rock. When she wakes, she calls the puppy and begins to walk back to the farm. At first the walk seems uneventful, but figures soon begin to move in the shadows. Jessie becomes terrified, drops her things and runs. As figures track her from the shadows she comes upon her puppy, which has been cut open and hung from a tree. She runs into May’s retarded son, who serves to frighten her further. Max hears her screams and runs toward the woods, from which Jessie emerges, stumbling and breathless. Max takes his rifle and takes to the woods, while May takes Jessie into the house and calls Ziggy. Jessie collapses into a sofa, but she suddenly remembers Sprog is still out near the wagon and runs to find him. She finds him with the biker gang, who taunt her when she pleads for her child. At that moment May appears with a rifle. When the gang taunts her May shoots, barely missing the gang, whom she ushers into the barn and locks the door. She and Jessie take Sprog and flee in the wagon.

Unfortunately they don’t get far. Max had not finished installing a new fanbelt when he ran to help Jessie. Although he turned and ran toward the farm he could not reach Jessie in time to prevent her from fleeing in the wagon. Shortly after driving through the gate to the farm the wagon overheats and seizes. Jessie, unable to restart it takes Sprog and runs on foot. But the bikers soon catch up to the car. Although May fires a shot into the gang they charge past and set their sites on Jessie. Without even slowing down Toecutter himself mows down Jessie and Sprog and leads the gang into the distance. All that is left is one shoe and Sprog’s ball bouncing down the lonely road. A moment later Max arrives on foot, but he is too late. He runs to Jessie and Sprog, who lie unmoving on the highway. He stops, drops the rifle, collapses to his knees and cries out.

This scene illustrates once and for all that enforced law can no longer protect Australia’s citizens. Even on vacation and away from the interior Max, now out of uniform, encounters trouble from the Toecutter gang and seeks refuge with a local lawman. Ziggy assures Max that he and his family will be safe at his farm but his words ultimately ring hollow. He cannot stop the gang from killing Max’s wife and child. Ziggy only appears once in the film, when he responds to Max and Jessie’s initial attack. His later absence mirrors that of the train town and the beach town, in which no enforcers of law appear. Outside of the MFP Ziggy is the only police officer to appear in the film. His absence, and the absence of any other local police authority reinforces the themes of social decay and disorder which pervade the film. What little law is left seems too thinly spread to effectively stem the tide of social collapse.

Although an ambulance arrives and takes Jessie and Sprog to a local hospital the viewer becomes aware that they will not survive the attack. Jessie appears, sustained by life support machines while two doctors and a nurse read the list of injuries she has sustained. The list becomes longer and longer; the doctor exclaims "this reads like a grocery list!" The nurse informs the doctor that the baby was dead on arrival and asked the doctors what she should tell Max. The doctor tells her to inform Max that everything will be all right, to which the nurse replies that Max most likely won’t want to speak to anyone and has been standing like a zombie for most of the day. The camera pans to Max, who stands with his back to the scene, eyes glazed and covered in a cold sweat.

Oddly, this scene contrasts the struggling remnants of culture with Max’s own private turmoil. The ambulance and the hospital, as with the earlier tragedy of Jim Goose, suggest that the world has not entirely collapsed. Some limited elements of civilization work to avert the collapse, but they appear to fight a losing battle. The hospital seems run down in the same way as the Halls of Justice, slowly withering away from lack of care and funding. Ultimately the citizens, represented by Max suffer the most loss. Without adequate police protection and health facilities Jessie and Sprog have succumbed to the collapsing world they inhabited. In a cruel twist of fate Jessie’s fears came to be realized, only this time Max lived and his family died, a reversal of a perhaps more expected outcome.

Following the accident Max returns home, alone and miserable. No one comes to visit him and no one calls on the phone. He spends long hours brooding over Jessie and Sprog’s deaths; for him objects formerly associated with joy have become objects of torment. Finally he snaps. Max opens a chest and takes out his leather police uniform and walks out the door. At the Halls of Justice he walks through the subterranean garage, which echoes with eerie silence and into the shadows, from which soon emerges the supercharged black interceptor. He drives the car out of the Halls of Justice and onto the roads.

Max drives the car to the beach town and parks in front of the mechanic’s shop. The mechanic, working under a car and hearing someone approach, assumes it is one of his best customers. "Bubba Zanetti, is that you? I had a time on that bike of yours. Those front forks are a pain!" At that point Max drags him out from under the car and proceeds to interrogate him. The mechanic tells him that he has never heard of anyone and snaps at Max for disturbing him. Without a word Max pushes him back under the car and lets the floor jack down, crushing the mechanic’s chest and breaking his ribs. He raises the car again and withdraws the mechanic from underneath. "I’ll say the names, you nod your head." Max learns that the Toecutter gang is out searching for gas. Afterwards he leaves the mechanic to fend for himself.

This sequence proves to be the greatest pivotal moment of the film, marking a change in two key elements of the film: the presence of law and order and the character of Max himself. After his loss Max returns home and broods over his loss, but unlike the death of Jim Goose no one else appears. None of his comrades from the MFP console him, nor apparently do any friends or relatives. When Max does return to the Halls of Justice he finds no one there; the garage, previously a hub of activity lays vacant and silent. Max encounters no resistance from above when he takes the black interceptor from the garage. This absence of the other MFP officers is notable; before either the officers or the retainer staff were usually present in the facility. Now only Max walked through the silent garage. Even Fifi, a seemingly perennial presence at the Halls of Justice proved no where to be found. This absence seems to compound the absence of law enforcement at the train town and the beach town, for now police presence was absent in the very place where it should always be found. At this moment in the film all police presence disappears entirely, both in the characters of the other MFP cops and in Max.

Here at this critical moment Max undergoes a permanent change in character. Where he once cared for others, worked to better society and listened to his fears Max changed into a single-minded and ruthless human being. All that had previously mattered to Max disappeared with the death of his family, replaced with an overwhelming desire to take revenge on those who had killed that which he held dearest. Max ceased to function as a police officer while maintaining the outward appearance of law and order. In this way the initial abandonment of police procedure suggested by Fifi’s pivotal remark and Max’s fears is taken to a logical conclusion; Max (and by extension the other MFP officers) operate without any law or code but carry a badge which denote them as upholders of virtue. The institution of law and law enforcement has become nothing more than a facade. Max freely tortures the beach town mechanic without fear of official inquiry or reproach, for he no longer stands for law and order, though he carries the badge which marks him as a cop. He now acts in any manner he wishes.

As the mechanic foretold, the Toecutter gang is shown gathering gasoline from a moving tanker. While one biker slows the truck to a crawl by obstructing the road the others jump on board the trailer and proceed to empty its contents into small gas cans. The trucker either does not see the bikers or does not care to stop and the bikers get their fill. But it becomes apparent that they are being watched. A solitary figure watches from a vantage point and sees the whole theft in action.

This short scene further tells of the declining state of society. The gang robs the truck of precious gasoline, but the driver does not stop or waver in any way. No police show up to assist the trucker, and the bikers take whatever they can carry. Like the citizens of the train town the driver does not dare take action against the bikers for fear of violent retribution. He seems to hope that if he doesn’t make any trouble they will leave him alone. Like the people of train town he knows that the police cannot protect him and that he may be safer letting the gang steal from the truck. Unfortunately events like this one serve only to further the decline of civilization everywhere.

At this stage however the hunters become the hunted. Max tracks the Toecutter gang and begins to follow them. He gives them chase and drives through the center of the gang. In a scene eerily reminiscent of the film’s beginning Max turns the car hard and charges straight at the gang, knocking several members off the road. The rest of the gang accelerate hard in an attempt to outrun the interceptor. But Max’s car is too fast for them to evade. At a river valley he runs through the gang and drives several of them off the bridge or into the siderails. In one motion he eliminates much of the gang. After Max drives off Johnny, who was knocked off the road earlier, rides up and inspects the damage. He attempts to make a call through a call-box but finds the phone is broken. All he can do is get back on his bike and rides away.

Toecutter and Bubba Zanetti were not among the rest of the gang at the bridge. They ride together through the landscape, but the viewer soon sees that they are being followed. The black interceptor passes them on one road, awaits their passing from an overpass on another. They no longer head a gang but run across the landscape, followed by their relentless pursuer. They flee into the Forbidden Zone, the Australian interior declared by the crumbling government too dangerous for all save the land trains, and draw Max into following them. Toecutter and Bubba pass a slow-moving truck on an upgrade, while the interceptor sits behind, losing ground. When it is safe the driver waves Max around, where he picks up the chase.

With this sequence the film grows ever darker. The bikers who once dominated the roads now fell prey to an outside threat. Earlier in the film the Toecutter gang had easily run down a fleeing car and destroyed it, but now they could not outrun the black interceptor which ultimately drove them to their deaths. This reversal of fortune seems disturbing enough to the viewer, but perhaps more disturbing is the knowledge that the interceptor is driven by Max, a former cop and family man. By now Max has wholly transformed. He no longer cares about law and order, driven wholly by the vendetta he owes for his family’s blood. As a reminder he places a cutout of Jessie and Sprog in the middle of the horn button on the steering wheel, which is visible when he turns the car to attack the gang head on. To the viewers the thought of Max disregarding all procedure and taking law into his own hands seems frightening. The ruthless way in which he takes revenge seems even more disturbing.

After passing the slow-moving truck Max comes upon Johnny, seemingly fallen from his motorcycle and lying on the side of the road. He slows the car to the side of the road and gets out. As he walks toward the fallen motorcycle he takes his shotgun from his holster; suddenly a shot rings out and Max falls, hit near the knee from an aimed bullet. As Max flounders in the road Bubba Zanetti and Toecutter emerge from hiding and take to their motorcycles. Max crawls toward his shotgun but as he reaches for it Bubba runs over his arm at high speed. Bubba stops and turns around near Toecutter, who repremends him for his indulgance. "I know what I’m doing!" Bubba replies before charging Max a second and final time. But this time Max is faster than Bubba. He picks up the shotgun and takes aim at Bubba’s chest. The resulting shot kills him and knocks him off of his motorcycle, which careens and crashes to Max’s left. Toecutter hisses at Max and peels off into the distance. At the same time Johnny gets up and on his machine, then proceeds off through the grass in a different direction.

Max, now wounded in the leg struggles back to his interceptor. He collapses into the seat exhausted and fires the engine. Although wounded he speeds off to persue Toecutter through the Forbidden Zone. He soon catches Toecutter, who opens his throttle wide to escape the black interceptor which so forcefully chases him. He pulls ahead of Max and appears to gain distance when he crests a hill. His eyes go wide with fear as he sees the cab of a high speed land train approaching quickly. Toecutter slams into the front of the truck, unable to turn. As the land train slows to a stop Max speeds by and skids to a halt. He turns around and drives past the land train as the bewildered driver looks helplessly on.

In this scene signs of ultimate collapse begin to appear. By now few vehicles and people inhabit the roads; the Forbidden Zone stands as testimony to the collapse of civilization in the interior; only the outlaws and the land trains roam here. Only the coastline can be travelled by citizens now; Australia’s interior, lacking any major centers of governmental power has succumbed to lawlessness and dispair. Here the outlaws rule the highway by force. It is this force which is reflected in Toecutter and Bubba’s ambush of Max. They lure Max into the Forbidden Zone and attempt to kill him. Because police authority seldom extends into the interior they know the land better than Max. Only Max’s cunning and speed save him from certain death.

With this sequence the film darkens further. In an absence of order the characters are increasingly forced to rely on their wits to survive. In the Forbidden Zone police presence seems to have disappeared entirely, as it has in the train town and the beach town. Max’s transformation has come around full circle. The only difference between Max and Toecutter lies with Max’s motives of personal revenge, for his outlaw acts of murder mirror those committed by the Toecutter gang throughout the film. At this point almost all signs of former civilization have fallen by the wayside. Max and the outlaws act freely and without fear of official recourse. The manufacture of new items seems to have nearly ceased to exist and both lawmen and outlaws increasingly rely on whatever they can find or repair; Bubba Zanetti uses a World War I-era repeating pistol while Max utilizes a two-barrel shotgun of dubious origin. This trend had been evolving throughout the film, from the use of early ‘70s Fords and Holdens as police interceptors to the repaired forks on Bubba Zanetti’s motircycle, both of which might otherwise have been replaced.

In the closing scenes of the film Max is shown driving the interceptor through the interior. He drives both day and night in a seemingly endless stretch. After an indeterminate amount of time Max comes upon the wreckage of a car which has driven off the road. The driver lays dead while a familiar figure sits trying to get the boots off the dead man’s feet. Johnny sits up when he feels the end of Max’s shotgun against the back of his head. He tries to talk his way out of the situation when he sees that the figure at the business end of the gun wears a badge. Max tosses Johnny his handcuffs and orders him to clasp one end around his bare ankle, then drags him to the wreckage. He cuffs the loose end to the chassis and begins to set up a crude timing device with Johnny’s lighter and a broken headlight. Johnny pleads with Max not to kill him, insisting that as a cop Max cannot kill him for stealing the dead man’s boots. He forgets that the cop he speaks to was Jim Goose’s partner and that the motorcycle gang he associated with killed his wife and son. Max hands Johnny a hacksaw and tells him "The links on those are high-tinsel steel. It’ll take you ten minutes to cut through it with this. You might be able to cut through your ankle in five." With that Max begins his ascent to his car. Johnny pleads with him, then begins cutting furiously at the handcuffs. As Max drives away from the wreckage the tank explodes. The last seconds of the film show Max driving down an indeterminate stretch of highway, heading into nowhere.

Here at the end the film reaches into new depths of darkness. Having killed Toecutter and Bubba Zanetti Max strikes out into the interior, searching for the last surviving member of the gang. Through clever use of day and night driving scenes the viewer’s impression is one of a significant amount of time passing between Toecutter’s death and Max’s discovery of Johnny. Like Max Johnny has changed from his former self to a newer, lower form. Deprived of his support network Johnny has become a scavenger, living off of whatever he can salvage from the dead. He claims that he did not cause the accident which killed the driver; ironically this may in fact be true. To Max it is of little consequence. He chains Johnny to the wreckage and sets it to blow. His two options to Johnny are harsh ones: if he attempts to cut the chains of the handcuffs he may run out of time and if he cuts his own foot off he will be left crippled and unable to fend for himself. As disturbing as this pair of choices is, the darkest revelation of Max’s character comes when the wreckage explodes. By judging the distance Max has driven when the wreck explodes the viewer can determine that only two or three minutes actually passed between his choice to Johnny and the explosion. The choice Max gave to Johnny was little more than a sadistic way to torture him. In the end Max de-evolved into the very creature he fought so hard against. Thus the film closes as it started, on the highway, with an unstoppable outlaw streaking through the landscape in a stolen interceptor. Only this time no patrolmen are left to stop him.

When it opened in Australia, Mad Max swept screen audiences by storm, as it did in every market it was exported to save the United States and Canada, where advertising mishaps caused it to be pulled by most theaters within two weeks of release. The film set a record of profitability versus cost of production which remained unbroken until the release of Jurassic Park some fifteen years later. Perhaps Mad Max happened to be released at just the right time, when audiences happened to crave disaster films. It seems more likely that the film succeeded because of its many levels of interpretation and meaning, many of which challenge even the most intellectually acute critic. It appears certain that such levels of interpretation and meaning have served to make Mad Max a modern cult classic which will remain fresh and innovative for many years to come.