The Road Warrior (1981)
Max and the Gyro Captain help a group of post-apocalyptic survivors transfer oil past a gang lead by Lord Humungus.
Genre
Characters/Groups
The Gyro Captain - Bruce Spence
The Captain's Girl - Arkie Whiteley
Mechanic's Assistant - Kristoffer Greaves
Grinning Mohawker - Tony Deary
Tent Lovers - Anne Jones and James McCardell
Voice of Narrator - Harold Baigent
Character thumbnails with links to profiles
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Detailed Synopsis
"My life fades...the vision dims. All that remains are memories. I remember a time of chaos...ruined dreams, this wasted land. But most of all, I remember the Road Warrior...the man we called Max. To understand who he was, you have to go back to another time...when the world was powered by the black fuel...and the deserts sprouted great cities of pipe and steel. Gone now, swept away. For reasons long forgotten, two mighty warrior tribes went to war...and touched off a blaze which engulfed them all. Without fuel they were nothing. They'd built a house of straw. The thundering machines sputtered and stopped. Their leaders talked and talked and talked. But nothing could stem the avalanche. Their world crumbled...the cities exploded. A whirlwind of looting...a firestorm of fear. Men began to feed on men. On the roads, it was a white-line nightmare. Only those mobile enough to scavenge...brutal enough to pillage, would survive. The gangs took over the highways...ready to wage war for a tank of juice. And in this maelstrom of decay...ordinary men were battered and smashed. Men like Max (Mad Max)|Max. The warrior Max. In the roar of an engine he lost everything...and became a shell of a man. A burnt-out, desolate man. A man haunted by the demons of his past. A man who wandered out into the wasteland. And it was here...in this blighted place...that he learned to live again."
Near Mundi Mundi Look Out, Max and Dog are being chased by Wez and members of The Humungus' Gang. Max starts to run low on fuel and Dog goes to the back of the vehicle. As a member of Humungus' Gang fires a bolt at Max, Max hits the breaks and the bolt hits Wez, who was pulling up on the other side of Max's vehicle, in the arm. Max then rams the one vehicle causing it to crash into another vehicle being driven by a member of Humungus' Gang. Max stops his vehicle and begins to collect fuel from the destroyed vehicle. Wez rides up and pulls the dart out of his arm, screams at Max and rides away. max searches a semi with trailer attached and finds the driver dead and a music box that plays Happy Birthday to You, which he keeps. As he is driving, Max comes across a gyrocopter parked in a clearing. He pulls over and sees a snake coiled on the gyrocopter. As Max grabs the snake, The Gyro Captain climbs out of a hiding spot and points a crossbow at Max. The Gyro Captain taunts Max about stealing his gas, and Max warns him the tanks on his vehicle are booby trapped. The Gyro Captain makes Max turn off the explosives trigger on the bottom of his vehicle, but is then attacked by Dog. Max pulls a knife on The Gyro Captain who makes a deal to spare his life in exchange of telling Max the location of a working oil refinery. They drive to a hill near the refinery and park before climbing towards the top of the hill. As Max is using his binoculars to spy on The Refinery Settlers, he sees them being attacked by The Humungus' Gang, and sees Wez ride up and yell something to The Humungus. Max chains The Gyro Captain to a dead tree and continues to monitor the refinery. One evening, The Humungus and his Gang drive away from the refinery. In the morning, a group of vehicles leave the refinery and drive in different directions. They are quickly followed and overtaken by The Humungus' Gang. He watches the progress of one vehicle and sees it crash. He sees Victim being raped and Nathan (The Road Warrior)|Nathan being pulled out and shot with a crossbow bolt by Wez. Wez and Golden Youth leave and most of the other Gang follow. Max leaves and The Gyro Captain continues to watch what is happening and sees Grinning Mohawker kill Victim with a crossbow bolt. Max walks up to Grinning Mohawker and kills him by hitting him in the head with bolt cutters. He then goes to Nathan, who is still alive and makes an agreement with him to take Nathan back to the refinery in exchange for all of the fuel he can take.