This article containsFuriosa: A Mad Max Saga spoilers.
It all begins with a a peach.
That is the first thing audiences are asked to bear witness to at the start ofGeorge Millers long-awaitedFuriosa.
A girl; a red, ripe piece of fruit; and a forbidden act that invites lifelong punishment.
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So yes, Miller is playing with some very ancient imagery inFuriosa.
Yetwhen I sat down to interview him, he also noted that its an image of humanity itself.
Its a reduced future that we have here, Miller said.
In all cultures, all nooks and crannies of the world, these same stories are told.
It is indeed a familiar story.
But how Miller chooses to recontextualize it forFuriosafeels remarkably fresh and, perhaps in some circles… heretical.
Consider again the first major sequence which evokes Eve and the apple.
For millennia this story has been used as a justification for the subjugation and marginalization of women.
Eve is easily deceived, as Genesis tells us, by a serpent.
She in turn clouds Adams better judgment.
She simply fears theyre too close to the edge of the Wasteland.
Nothing Furiosa does in this opening is selfish or reproachful.
The only devils in this paradise are those who would make a wasteland of it.
Men destroyed the world.
We get a better idea of how this works inFuriosa.
Its implied the old mans dubious recitations of history likewise inform much of Dementus initial aesthetic.
Theyre variations on a theme, Miller said.
Tyrannical figures, people oppressed, people sitting on top of dominance hierarchies where they control all the resources.
Stories of salvation offered by those who seek to make themselves king.
If Furiosa taught the Immortans wives the refrain of who destroyed the world?
then its a theme she had plenty of experience with.
After all, the movie is framed by that blasted historians narration.
He even offers three possible endings to Dementus life before insisting that he alone knows the truth.
Perhaps this is even how the Many Mothers kept the Green Place so green all along in the Wasteland?
Look at where that tree has sprung from.
Perhaps they finally found a good use for all the men who would be king?
We tend to be more hopeful about Furiosas reign, but there is room to doubt.
For his part, Miller remains curiously cryptic.
Ive honestly thought a lot about what happens to Furiosa when she takes over the Citadel, he said.
But Id rather other people speculate because stories are in the eyes of the beholder.
Still, he did muse, As [Joseph] Campbell said, Often yesterdays hero becomes tomorrows tyrant.
And thats a story told over and over again, as well.
Furiosa is in theaters now.
