Justin Kurzel wants to pitch a Mad Max prequel

The box office failure of the Mad Max: Fury Road prequel Furiosa would seem to prove that movie-goers aren’t particularly interested in seeing entries in the “Mad Max Saga” that don’t give Max Rockatansky himself a prominent role – but that isn’t stopping Australian filmmaker Justin Kurzel from daydreaming about making his own, potentially Max-lite contribution to the franchise. During an interview with Collider, Kurzel even said that’s considering pitching the idea to Mad Max franchise creator George Miller!

Kurzel is currently doing the press rounds for his thriller The Order, and his directing credits also include The True History of the Kelly Gang and Nitram. While speaking with Collider, he said, “I’ve always been curious about what happened before the first Mad Max – what was that world with the Nightrider, pre-Mad Max? I’ve always been very curious about that and very tempted to talk to George about the possibility of a world that is pre-Mad Max 1 and what that is. That’s been one that I’ve always been really curious about because it was such an influential film in my time. It’s an amazing franchise, but I’ve always been curious about those moments before that first one because it’s set up so richly. And it’s such a great time in Australia, too, that period.“

There could be room for some Max in such a story, and it could show more of his days as a police officer before society completely crumbled… or Kurzel could be talking about something that’s focused on the sort of road-terrorizing villains we saw in that first movie, the biker gang with members like Toecutter and Nightrider.

We’ll have to wait and see if Kurzel’s Mad Max pitch goes anywhere, if he does actually take it to Miller at all. In the meantime, we’re also waiting to see if Miller will get the chance to make the Mad Max movie he has been talking about getting around to for years, Mad Max: The Wasteland. Miller turned 79 this year, which increases the difficulty level of taking on such a project, but he handled Furiosa just fine and might still have plenty of time left to do Mad Max: The Wasteland without issue. But if making these movies becomes too much of a burden, Miller has let it be known that he has three different directors in mind that he would like to see make movies set in the wasteland he created. It’s not known if Justin Kurzel would be one of those filmmakers, but he has indicated to IGN that Guillermo del Toro is a director he would welcome into the Mad Max franchise.

What do you think of what Justin Kurzel had to say about his Mad Max prequel idea? Let us know by leaving a comment below.