The film would wind up winning six of those Oscars including Best Production Design and Best Film Editing.įury Road was in fact a stunning visual masterpiece. Fury Road would go on to be nominated for a whopping 10 Academy Awards including Best Director and Best Film. On paper, the movie sounded like it had all the makings of a massive bomb yet it went on to become one of the most important and critically acclaimed films of the 2010s. The sequel no longer had the original star that made Mad Max famous to begin with, the stars of the film were fighting on set, and the film would wait nearly two years before finally being released in 2015. The odds were as stacked up against Fury Road as they could possibly be. Reshoots and a less than stellar working relationship between Hardy and Theron muddled the production. After adding Oscar winner Charlize Theron, Miller finally began production on the fourth film in the franchise.

The preproduction of the film was so dragged out that Gibson would end up being replaced by the younger Tom Hardy. Miller's continuation of the franchise that made him famous was in development hell for years. There was seemingly no real chance that Mad Max: Fury Road would work. That paired with cinematographer, Dean Semler's widescreen view of the vast Australian desert and Miller's knack for shooting an epic car chase proved to be the perfect recipe for this iconic entry into the Mad Max canon. One of the most enduring images of the film continues to be the leather-clad aesthetic of the roving marauders. Miller's vision alongside his collaborators went on to create a specific image of the post-apocalyptic film that would go on to be utilized by filmmakers for years to come. Now wandering the desert after the chaos that ensued in the first film, The Road Warrior found Max acting as a sort of lone gunman tasked with helping a group of settlers at the mercy of a group of marauders. Gibson came into his own as the silent protagonist that Max would become to be known as.

Now working with a budget under $5 million, Miller expertly crafted a post-apocalyptic landscape that would become a template for the rest of the series. The second film in the series, Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior took everything from Mad Max and expanded on it in an explosive way.

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