Eight years ago, George Miller’s Mad Max: Fury Road screened at the Cannes Film Festival, and his upcoming prequel Furiosa may do so as well.
The news was first reported by World of Reel and backed up by Variety. According to an insider, Warner Bros. is planning for Furiosa to have a world premiere at the Cannes Film Festival, but the studio has dispelled those notions as a rumour. The studio would obviously want the actors available to promote the movie at the festival, but that isn’t an option until the SAG-AFTRA strike is concluded.
“We kept an extraordinary memory of the world premiere of ‘Fury Road’ at Cannes,” Cannes chief Thierry Fremaux told Variety. “It would be wonderful to welcome them again with ‘Furiosa,’ especially since George Miller was a marvelous jury president in 2016. I know he’s working on the film and I hope it will be at Cannes.“
Furiosa features Anya Taylor-Joy taking over the role of Imperator Furiosa from Charlize Theron, who played the character in Fury Road. Chris Hemsworth also stars as biker warlord Dementus, and it was a role that he’s called the best experience of his career.
“I came into that film exhausted. I thought, ‘How am I going to get through this?’” Hemsworth said. “Week one of rehearsals with [Miller], all of a sudden it was this reigniting of my creative energy.” The actor said the production of Furiosa was “by far the best experience of my career, and something I feel the most proud of. It made me think, the work isn’t what’s exhausting it’s what kind of work it is, and how invested I am in it and if it is challenging in the right way.”
“As the world fell, young Furiosa is snatched from the Green Place of Many Mothers and falls into the hands of a great Biker Horde led by the Warlord Dementus,” reads the Furiosa synopsis. “Sweeping through the Wasteland they come across the Citadel presided over by the Immortan Joe. While the two Tyrants war for dominance, Furiosa must survive many trials as she puts together the means to find her way home.” Furiosa is expected to hit theaters on May 24, 2024.