“I Was Taken as a Child. Stolen”: Narrating Automobility, the Stolen Generations and Environmental Justice in Mad Max: Fury Road

Abstract

In George Miller’s post-apocalyptic film, Mad Max: Fury Road (2015), issues concerning automobility, Indigeneity and environmental justice are inextricably intertwined. The depiction of vehicles and mobilities needs to be understood in the cultural and historical context the film draws on, such as the history of the Stolen Generations. This article aims at addressing the representation of the Stolen Generations in Fury Road in order to add another layer to previous readings of the film. Although the representation of Indigeneity in the film is problematic in several respects, the implications of such a reading of the female protagonist Furiosa and the elderly women called Vuvalini as Indigenous are intriguing, particularly when taking into account that Immortan Joe and his War Boys stand for a white masculinity. So far, readings of Indigeneity in current scholarship on the film are limited to criticising shortcomings. I want to suggest that paying attention to Fury Road’s Indigenous coding allows for two significant (re)interpretations of the film: firstly, it is possible to read the upending of Immortan Joe’s regime as Indigenous and feminist resistance to colonial and patriarchal legacies; and secondly, Furiosa’s and the Vuvalini’s participation in automobility balances their stereotypical proximity to the land. Indeed, neither Furiosa nor the elderly women are victimised; instead, they oscillate between being the harbingers of hope and the perpetrators of violence.