Director of the 2015 Oscar-winning film, Mad Max: Fury Road, George Miller confirmed that Mad Max 5 would be a Furiosa prequel and won’t star Charlize Theron in the lead role. Miller confirmed he’s working on the prequel based on the script he and Fury Road co-writer Nick Lathouris put together years ago.
Reportedly, Miller has been looking for a young actress to play the role of Furiosa and the auditions are already taking place. Though Miller did consider using anti-ageing technology to keep Charlize Theron in the role, he said the technology just wasn’t good enough to keep up with the requirement.
“For the longest time, I thought we could just use CG de-ageing on Charlize, but I don’t think we’re nearly there yet. Despite the valiant attempts on ‘The Irishman,’ I think there’s still an uncanny valley. Everyone is on the verge of solving it, particular Japanese video-game designers, but there’s still a pretty wide valley, I believe.” – George Miller
The shooting and selection of the film and the final cast have been left hanging due to the coronavirus. “After we finish it, and hopefully, everything settles down with the pandemic, we’ll see what the world allows us to do with Furiosa,” Miller said.
Mad Max: Fury Road saw Theron’s Furiosa leading an audacious attempt to free five women from the clutches of evil warlord Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-Byrne), by helping them escape in her War Rig. The prequel is set on a younger Furiosa somewhere in her 20’s. The only disappointment it brings with itself is not starring Charlize Theron. Otherwise, the movie is set for a blast.
The working title of the film has been confirmed to be Mad Max: The Wasteland and will change as the movie hits the theatres worldwide. Different from the popular belief, throughout the film, Furiosa has been the protagonist and Max is just a side character. According to reports the setting of this instalment would be more of dull, grim and bleak, unlike Fury Road.
The film will be interesting to watch as Miller has a motive behind the extended instalment. The story of people’s favourite character, Furiosa, is the vision this movie is being made with. It’s not a storyless sequel made with the intent to grab money.
John Seale, who worked as a cinematographer in Mad Max: Fury Road was on a semi-retirement but the making of this instalment persuaded him to get back on task.
“I’ve had wonderful opportunities to work after ‘Fury Road,’ as you can imagine, and I’ve passed on all of them.” But on ‘Fury Road,’ I told George, ‘If anybody else rings, I’m retired. If you ring, we’ll have lunch.’ And seven years later, he rang.” Seale said.
Fans are looking forward to the release and production of this film and to know Furiosa from the start.