Mad Max: Fury Road is making waves as a must-see “feminist” film, largely in reaction to calls for a boycott by so-called men’s rights activists (MRAs) based on analyses such as “[Charlize] Theron sure talked a lot… Nobody barks orders to Mad Max.” In a desire to protect and invest in anything MRAs don’t like, many women and male feminist allies raced to theaters.

As Eileen Jones notes, when you actually look for the feminist plot elements in Fury Road, there’s not much there. However, there’s another thing missing in Fury Road: people of color. Despite being set in Australia—historically an Aboriginal country—and filmed in Namibia, the world of Fury Road is eerily white. Out of 15 characters listed in the opening credits, only two are visibly people of color: Toast the Knowing, played by Zoe Kravitz (who is biracial, Black and Ashkenazi Jew), and Cheedo the Fragile, played by Courtney Eaton (who, according to Australian tabloid The Sunday Times, “credits her father with her Caucasian looks,” but has Maori, Pacific Islander and Chinese lineage). Neither held a lead role, and some audiences seem to have missed that Eaton was non-white, citing Kravitz as the only identifiable woman of color.

By contrast, Fury Road offers variety of white men, some tall, some thin, some not so thin, and a posse of beautiful cisgender white women who serve as “breeders”—sexual and reproductive slaves—for the cult leader of this corner of the post-apocalyptic world, Immortan Joe. The effect is the aesthetic of a Chanel runway, with one or two women of color for flavor. Many have claimed the film put women ahead—but which women? Certainly not women who are very visibly racialized through curves and features. “Ethnically ambiguous” seems to be the only type of racialized woman who makes it to the end of the world.

Kravitz and Eaton’s characters do survive the film, and having a person of color standing at the end makes Fury Road a rare unicorn within the post-apocalyptic genre. But that’s a very low bar.

Yeah but the movie had a cool guy playing a flaming guitar

Quote from: PQ9 on June 22, 2015, 08:53:50 AM

Quote from: Big Boss on June 22, 2015, 08:46:17 AM

Yeah but the movie had a cool guy playing a flaming guitar

Pretty sure that actor is both gay and mixed race and the article mentions none of that

Lol, fo real? How do you know this?

Quote from: Elegiac on June 22, 2015, 09:01:38 AM

Quote from: PQ9 on June 22, 2015, 08:53:50 AM

Quote from: Big Boss on June 22, 2015, 08:46:17 AM

Yeah but the movie had a cool guy playing a flaming guitar

Pretty sure that actor is both gay and mixed race and the article mentions none of that

Lol, fo real? How do you know this?

He's a musician based in Australia named iOTA if I'm not mistaken

Quote from: SuperIrish on June 22, 2015, 09:07:29 AM

I'm having a difficult time with this... why does it matter, specifically?

I'm still thinking it over, and I'll look up more info online. I know that it bothers me; I'll get back to you on the reasoning when I have a complete statement that satisfies me.

Quote from: Elegiac on June 22, 2015, 09:17:01 AM

Quote from: SuperIrish on June 22, 2015, 09:07:29 AM

I'm having a difficult time with this... why does it matter, specifically?

I'm still thinking it over, and I'll look up more info online. I know that it bothers me; I'll get back to you on the reasoning when I have a complete statement that satisfies me.

It's nothing against you or this thread, more the article itself; it's trying to generate serious discussion about race and gender when really it's just a fucking film about a post-apocalyptic world (and even then it's a bit on the crazy side).

It's trying to stir shit when there isn't any shit to stir.

Quote from: Elegiac on June 22, 2015, 10:49:22 AM

Quote from: SuperIrish on June 22, 2015, 09:20:00 AM

Quote from: Elegiac on June 22, 2015, 09:17:01 AM

Quote from: SuperIrish on June 22, 2015, 09:07:29 AM

I'm having a difficult time with this... why does it matter, specifically?

I'm still thinking it over, and I'll look up more info online. I know that it bothers me; I'll get back to you on the reasoning when I have a complete statement that satisfies me.

It's nothing against you or this thread, more the article itself; it's trying to generate serious discussion about race and gender when really it's just a fucking film about a post-apocalyptic world (and even then it's a bit on the crazy side).

It's trying to stir shit when there isn't any shit to stir.

I feel it contributes to a normalised reality of perpetual marginalisation for racial minorities, and here I'm talking specifically about Australian Aboriginals. For a film full of aussie accents seemingly set in some sort of outback-australia-like locale to be devoid of any Aborigines to me feels like a big racial faux pas. Australian Aborigines deal with a lot of racial prejudice and hardship. We massacred them, stole their country, and then marginalised them to their on-going detriment.

why would they still be around in the world of mad max? I mean they could have easily all been slaughtered for what little they have or just died off.

and why do they need to be included into a movie that revolves around guns and cars anyway