Apocalypto (2006) opens with a little quiet before the storm; a tribe of Indians hunting a tapir, capturing it and having a pleasant night around the campfire. Then an evil tribe attacks and their harmonious lives soon descend into violent madness. Mad Max: Fury Road (2015) immediately throws you into the action and doesn’t give you a breather for at least 45 minutes. Both movies explore culture gone bad. The Indian tribes are working on destroying their culture from within, but their environment is still beautiful and rich with life. In Fury Road, civilization has already collapsed and all that is left is a desolate wasteland (it was filmed in the Namibian desert). They are both great settings for some of the most spectacular chase scenes ever committed to celluloid. In Apocalypto, it is a grueling foot chase through the deadly jungle (filmed in Mexico’s Catemaco rain forest) and a fight to the death. Mad Max throws in spectacular war machines and a stunningly visualized ride to mayhem. Both feature outrageous custom design, kinetic editing and ‘die hard’ violence along the way. Thematically, the films are very similar. In both stories, the men are the insane ones, and the (pregnant) women carry the greatest hope for humanity in these desperate times. But in both stories, at least one man is sane enough to take on the crazies and help the women, and their offspring, towards a better future. A connection between the two classics you may have missed at this point, is that Apocalypto is directed by none other than Mel Gibson, the original road warrior, who was too old to play Max in 2015. I must admit I enjoyed Apocalypto more than Mad Max: Fury Road. The latter features shots that are just mind boggling, but I didn’t feel much for the characters. In Apocalypto, I did. As a Double Bill, this works fantastically.