FURIOSA AND THE FEMININE MIDLIFE PASSAGE or ANOTHER TAKE ON THE STORY BEHIND THE MOVIE~ FURY ROAD 6/22/15 CAUTION….SPOILER ALERT! Every Sunday, my sons, their girlfriends, and I all go to the movies. (Yes, I do realize that I’m a bit of a fifth wheel in this group, but as long as these kind young folks will have me, I’ll continue to tag along.) While many weeks, it’s some independent film we go to see, movies like The Last Station, A Separation, and Wadjda, a couple of weeks ago we decided to hit the local Lyceum to take in the latest blockbuster, Mad Max: Fury Road. I have to admit, even though I might have seen some of the previous three Mad Max films, I can’t recall anything about them: plots, characters, sound tracks. Not a thing. I’m not sure whether this is due to something about the movies themselves or to my midlife forgetfulness—perhaps a bit of both. Either way, at first, this fourth venture into the life of Mad Max seemed to be yet another film I would do best to let slip from my memory banks, its opening scenes riddled with bizarre car chases, blinding explosions, and angry men preying ruthlessly, savagely on those they deemed less powerful. Dear God, I can remember thinking as I shifted in my seat, not two hours of this! Of course, I did find Furiosa (the main female character) and her closely-cropped hairstyle intriguing. The same goes for the control over the water supply by the apocalyptic society’s ruler, Immortan Joe; but since I hadn’t been sleeping all that well the previous few nights, to be honest I was seriously considering taking a nap. Then, just as I was starting to doze, I heard something in the film that snagged me right out of my slumber and into a state of total alertness. I heard Furiosa mention something about a place that sounded strikingly familiar to me, a place I thought might just hold the key to the meaning behind the entire movie. “Oh, my gosh,” I half gasped/half whispered as I pulled myself out of my reverie. “It’s Avalon! ‘The Green Place of the Many Mothers that Furiosa woman is talking about… it sounds just like The Isle of Avalon!” Now, to be clear, it wasn’t anything about the traditional concept of Avalon that had me making this connection between it and Furiosa’s Green Place, and neither was it anything about the King Arthur legends from which the whole idea of the place first sprang. (For any similarities between those concepts and the movie, I’m afraid you’re going to need to refer to a different blog.) For me, it was the significant role this mystical place can play in the lives of midlife women that had me suddenly wide awake and watching, or, more specifically, in lives of women undergoing the sometimes-dreaded feminine midlife rite of passage—menopause. “Why, that’s ridiculous!” I can hear many of you gasping. “Mad Max is an apocalyptic war-movie, not a movie about menopause!” Perhaps, but bear with me for a moment or two as I endeavor to sway you… Amid all of the vehicle chases and explosions in this episode of Mad Max, amid all of its cruelty and mad-men confusion, we see Furiosa (flawlessly portrayed by Charlize Theron) as a woman trying desperately, furiously to liberate the “breeders” or maidens and mothers of this lost society from the men who have enslaved and raped them. From the outset, it’s easy to see that Furiosa is not one of these women forced into sex and reproduction, and neither is she one of those who sits tied to milking machines as her breast milk is harvested for the benefit of her captors. Oh, no—with her head closely shaved and having lost her left arm to some cruel apocalyptic deed or another, Furiosa is clearly a woman living outside the demands of this type of “maiden and motherhood,” a woman endowed with a much different mission. Once Furiosa has the “breeders” tucked away inside the belly of the rig she’s hijacked to rescue them, she starts heading for the one place she feels certain will save them all…a community of women where the land is rich and fertile and where water is not kept under lock and key but flows freely—The Green Place of Many Mothers. “I was born there,” Furiosa replies when Max asks how she knows The Green Place even exists. As you might have already guessed, this strong woman of conviction and grace didn’t leave the green place of her youth, the place of abundant water, trees, and life, voluntarily. “I was taken as a child,” Furiosa goes on to tell Max. “Stolen.” Having tried many times in the past to return to The Green Place, now with war-rig and maidens and mothers in tow, Furiosa sees this current attempt as her best and perhaps last chance to reach her destination. And what a difficult journey this last attempt is, fraught with even more bizarre car chases, more explosions, and more angry men preying on those less powerful. That’s all very interesting, you may be thinking. But what on Earth could all of this rescue mission stuff possibly have to do with menopause and The Isle of Avalon? Well, believe it or not, according to some researchers the menopausal woman is also on a type of “rescue mission,” a rescue mission in which she is charged to liberate her inner “maiden and mother” from the wounds and injustices of her youth. That’s right. Menopause is actually a healing journey designed to help all midlife women release the negative energies and emotions of their pasts so that they might begin the next chapter of their lives, the wise-woman crone chapter, renewed and ready to use their wisdom to help bring healing to world. For some women, this journey is a rather easy one, with only a few inner “disturbances” to let them know their day of reckoning has come—a couple of hot flashes and maybe a mood swing or two. For women who come to midlife carrying an especially heavy load of injustices, however, injustices like past episodes of rape and sexual abuse, the midlife journey may not be quite so simple. Hot flashes, cold flashes, feelings of electricity, waves of terror, anxiety so severe as to make insanity the only explanation, heart palpitations, skyrocketing blood pressure, constant trembling, insomnia for nights on end—as research has shown, for women who are carrying unprocessed episodes of trauma in their psyches, the releasing of long held energies and emotions related to their abuse through these types of mind/body “disturbances” can become painfully challenging, requiring the same type of dedication we see in Furiosa in order to make sense of their experiences and heal. And, since this is the final of the three feminine rites of passage (menstruation and motherhood being the earlier two), as with Furiosa, this time of midlife transformation is also often seen as a woman’s last chance to use her hormonal gateways as a vehicle for her inner healing. According to some women’s mystery stories, the only way a woman will be able to make it through this challenging midlife journey safely is to return to the place from which she first came, the place that some legends, and even a few recent authors, tell us all women first came, an inner realm known as the Isle of Avalon. Ah, Avalon. Based on what ancient legends tell us, Avalon is a place of magic and priestesses where the land is always rich with abundance and growth, yielding fruit even where no field has been plowed or planted. Based on women’s mystery stories, it’s a place to which all midlife women must return in order to unite their inner maiden, mother, and elder woman and be made whole again, an inner place of beauty and wisdom that, at least to this newly awakened crone, sounds much like Furiosa’s Green Place of Many Mothers. And, from what I can see, there seem to be plenty of other interesting feminine/menopausal symbols throughout this Mad Max film as well-- For instance, there’s the whole "scarcity of water" thing, or rather, the withholding of water from the rest of the people by Immortan Joe. Seeing how water is considered to be a feminine element, in addition to the biological need, this king patriarch may also be working to withhold the whole of feminine power from the people, the power it holds for creating and nurturing life. There seems to be plenty of water being held inside the Earth (another feminine symbol; ie, Mother Earth), but fearing that access to it will empower the masses and dethrone him, like the chastity belts used to control the “breeders” and the wealth of feminine power they hold, Joe keeps the water under lock and key. Then there’s the old tree we see in the desert, wasting away and dying. “…that thing…” one of the men calls it, obviously never having seen one. “It’s a tree,” one of the women replies, trying to enlighten the man. “A tree.” Image from pdpics.com In Jungian psychology, a tree represents both the masculine and feminine elements—the feminine in the protective and sheltering aspects of the branches and the masculine in the phallic nature of the trunk. In all of its beauty, gracefulness and strength, a tree is believed to represent the integration of the masculine and feminine, a place where the two are balanced and equal…yin and yang…light and dark…Adam and Eve…The Tree of Life. Funny how the man in the film, awash in the rules and regulations of the patriarchy, is unable to even recognize the tree, unable to recognize that the possibility for any sort of balance and equality between the masculine and feminine even exists. Then, there are the two men who become the women’s unlikely allies in the film, Max and Nux. Or, should I say, the animus of the women’s journey? According to Jungian psychology, the animus represents the masculine essence that resides within each woman and the anima the feminine essence that dwells within each man. During menopause, it is the woman’s animus that rises up to help guide her on her journey and give her the strength she needs to do the work of her inner healing. In women’s mystery stories, the vessel by which the midlife woman is able to make the journey to Avalon is a barge she summons from the depths of her subconscious, her inner masculine or animus at the helm. For Furiosa, it’s an apocalyptic war-rig that carries her, with Max, in true animus form, ultimately offering the blood, sweat, and tears, indeed, the very life force that enables her to continue on her journey. If we stop and take a good look at our own world, it is easy to see the many ways in which Mother Earth appears to be going through her own challenging midlife transformation. All around us, the effects of climate change and man-made destruction are taking their toll: a disappearing icecap, more flooding in Texas, oceans so polluted that we must limit our intake of seafood, another earthquake, another oil spill, record breaking cold waves and heat waves in dozens of states (think hot flashes and cold flashes), and droughts and wildfires so severe that they have left thousands of people out of work and homeless. Might some of these severe global “disturbances” we’re experiencing actually be signs of a midlife Mother Earth trying to purge herself of the effects of the patriarchy and heal? In Mad Max, we see Furiosa’s Green Place similarly devastated, so much so that when she finally arrives she can no longer even recognize it, the stuff of its youthful beauty and bounty lost forever. It’s the wise crones, The Vulvalini, who advise Furiosa of the sanctuary’s fall and then sign on to assist her and the “breeders” on the second half of their journey. Thankfully, a new place of growth and healing lies just ahead. “They’re looking for hope,” Furiosa tells Max of the maidens and mothers. “What about you?” Max counters. Furiosa’s reply is simple and clear-- “Redemption.” Ah, yes, redemption... As the writing on the walls of the caves from which Furiosa first rescues the “breeders” proclaims, “We are not things.” Did you see that? Did you hear it? We are NOT things. While all of the messages in this Mad Max adventure reach out of the film and straight into the heart of our culture, this one does so without even the slightest hint of metaphor or archetypal camouflage. The message is clear and unyielding. “We are not things.” The “breeders” are not things. Women are not things. Children are not things, and neither are men or any people. We are not things to be bought and sold into lives of slavery and used as objects, sexual or otherwise. And yet this type of heinous crime continues in countries across the globe. Must it take our own apocalyptic ride down Fury Road for us to finally realize what we’re doing and stop the madness? At the conclusion of this Mad Max film, we see Furiosa and her kins-women rising high above the masses, the water flowing freely once again as Max withdraws silently into the crowd. At least to this movie-goer, this scene comes through as a clear symbol for the rising of the Sacred Feminine and the receding of the patriarchy, the patriarchy not disappearing completely, mind you, but receding only enough to achieve a sense of long needed balance and equality between the two—between man and woman…the masculine and the feminine…The Tree of Life. Furiosa, a woman entering her rightful place of midlife power, standing side by side with the maidens, mothers, and crones who helped her find her way—the three faces of The Sacred Feminine united and poised to help lead both man and womankind into a new place of understanding, wisdom, and grace. I see the movie Mad Max: Fury Road as a story about feminine spirituality, transformation, and empowerment, about women and the Earth itself fighting to reclaim what has been stolen from them during the thousands of years of patriarchy’s rule; patriarchy pertaining not so much to gender as to a certain mindset, an attitude which so many of us seem to have, men and even some women, that overemphasizes masculine power to the point of disavowing and even destroying that of the feminine. It’s a story about a culture desperate for the rejuvenating, life-giving waters of a transformed Mother Earth, about the men and women who struggle to coexist there, and the wisdom that the Divine Feminine holds for all of us…a wisdom that might well be the very thing we need to save us from our own apocalyptic end. Furiosa and The Redemption of The Feminine Midlife Passage. This is what I saw in this Mad Max film. With all of its symbols and hidden meanings, I’d love to hear…what did you see? **For more information about The Isle of Avalon and the menopausal journey, please see The Seven Sacred Rites of Menopause by Kristi Meisenbach-Boylan and Avalon Within by Jhenah Telyndru.
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AuthorLynda holds an MA degree in Transpersonal Studies/Spiritual Mentoring as well as certifications in Tarot, Yoga, Spiritual Hypnosis, and Reiki. Her goal is to offer support to women undergoing various feminine transitions through a variety of mind/body practices. Archives
March 2023
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