George Miller began his post-apocalyptic Mad Max franchise back in 1979 and it has endured over the years. By 2015, Mad Max: Fury Road left Oscar night with six Academy Award wins and the film even secured a Best Picture nomination. Miller is currently in pre-production on Furiosa, the fifth installment of the series, but he’s looking back at the 1979 film that started it all and he’s expressing that he was a bit disappointed with how it turned out.
During a chat with Deadline at the Cannes Film Festival about his upcoming fantasy release Three Thousand Years of Longing, Miller brought up his time making the first Mad Max film. He admitted that he found the filming process “way too hard” and said the end result was far from what he “wanted it to be.” He also says that, even though he was incredibly well-prepared, the project went “in so many different directions.” You can check out his full quote below!
“With my first film, the first Mad Max, I really thought I didn’t have the makings of a filmmaker. I found the process way too hard, and the film was nothing like I wanted it to be. I had a film in my head, I thought we were highly prepared and had figured everything out, but it all just went off in so many different directions. But after, on films with more resources, I realized that was just how it happened. I’m someone who, on the one hand, I like things to be calm and go smoothly. But on the other hand, I realize that’s never going to happen.”
Miller made his feature film directorial debut on Mad Max and it’s clear that a lack of experience and a limited budget prevented the director from truly making the film he really wanted to make. The film reportedly went through various production issues and delays which probably added to his frustration.
Despite the various problems surrounding the production, Mad Max was a success, and it even held the Guinness record for the most profitable film for a bit of time after grossing US$100 million worldwide in gross revenue. His experience on Mad Max gave him the necessary tools to make a superior sequel and, even with that first release, it set itself up to be one of the most influential action movies of all time.
What are YOUR thoughts on 1979’s Mad Max?