Gritty vendetta hits pay dirt

THIRTY-FIVE years after Mad Max introduced the world to a distressing vision of the Aussie apocalypse, The Rover presents an updated version of the dystopian future - and it still isn't pretty. By the looks of things, the Australian Outback hasn't changed much and neither has the unrelentingly bleak approach to this particular topic.

Writer-director David Michod's contemporary Western comes complete with cold-blooded gunslingers, depraved bystanders and a banged-up, beady-eyed antihero in Guy Pearce who takes to the title role like the second coming of a poncho-wearing, cheroot-chomping Clint Eastwood.

Like Mad Max before him, he has a car instead of a trusty steed but the Wild West sensibility remains - only the tumbleweeds blowing across dusty streets and desolate landscape are missing.