It was “in the not-so-distant future,” a time when “civilization would disappear.”
But when Mel Gibson’s iconic antihero Max Rockatansky introduced movie audiences to director George Miller’s dark dystopian future, both actor and director began to go in different directions.
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And while Max’s world went dark, Gibson and Miller’s careers took off.
It was a time when Australian culture was brightly illuminated.
When Australia shook off its inferiority complex.
As Australian accents blare from AM radio (Skyhook sang about Toorak, not Tennessee), Australian stories, characters and landscapes – often raw, sharp, provocative, harsh and unforgiving – are heard. – filled the movie screen.
Mel Gibson as Mad Max. Credit: Provided
In the film world, the 1970s and early 1980s became known as the Australian New Wave.
Some of the creative bursts included Wake in Fleet, The Devil’s Playground, Picnic at Hanging Rock, A Sunday Too Long, Don’s Party, and My Brilliant. There were films such as “Carrier”, “Jimmy Blacksmith’s Song”, and “Adolescent Blues”.
Think filmmakers Fred Schepisi, Peter Weir, Bruce Beresford, Gillian Armstrong, and Philip Noyce.
Consider George Miller. And Mad Max.
When Max Rockatansky first took to the streets in 1979 for the first of five films in this classic series, Miller was 34 years old and Gibson, the lead actor, was unknown.
Miller told Paul Bernethin in 2006 that the first Mad Max was shot on a shoestring budget of $350,000, so cutting costs was a mandate of the times.
“Byron Kennedy (producer) and I made a gestener (copy) of the script and delivered it to the cast and crew on the back of a motorcycle,” Miller said.
“Everyone who played the biker part… we couldn’t afford to let them fly.
“They could afford to transport their bikes from Melbourne to Sydney. They rode their bikes down the mountain and rehearsed their biker gang along the way.
“That meant we had to clean the roads after car accidents. Byron and I would go back home at night and clean the roads.
“It was very much guerrilla filmmaking, which meant the film was cut in a friend’s apartment, he cut the audio in the lounge room, and I cut the footage in the kitchen,” Miller said. said.
This is a far cry from the supercharged explosion delivered in Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, which opens in theaters in Australia on May 23.
Early reviews suggest it adds more sparkle to Queensland-born Miller’s resume.
This is a list that probably came out of nowhere.
According to Britannica, Miller and his twin brother John made the short film St. Vincent Review Film (1971) while studying medicine at the University of New South Wales and won it in a local competition. It is said that he won.
“The prize was a free trip to the film workshop where Miller met Byron Kennedy. The two became frequent collaborators, making the short film ‘Violence in the Cinema, Part 1’ in 1971. , received high praise.
“After completing his medical residency in 1972, Miller continued to make short films with Kennedy while working as a doctor. The two developed the story that would eventually become Mad Max… It was produced by the production company founded by Miller and Kennedy.
Miller also told Burns how Mad Max was influenced by his childhood in rural Chinchilla, Queensland.
“Perfectly flat roads. Loamy soil. Haze. Burnt land. And there’s a very strong car culture,” Miller said.
But Miller was more than petrol, blood and thunder, branching out into other genres including The Witches of Eastwick, Lorenzo’s Oil, Babe, and the hugely successful Happy Feet.
Kennedy Miller also created ground-breaking television miniseries such as Layoff, Bodyline, Cowra Breakout and Vietnam, which dramatized some of Australia’s most important moments in history. brought to the screen.
Anya Taylor-Joy plays Furiosa in Furiosa: The Mad Max Saga. Credit: JASIN BOLAND
But of course, Max remained with Miller in Mad Max 2, Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, and Mad Max: Fury Road, which was hailed as one of the best road movies of all time and won six Oscars. I did.
Fury Road was hailed by one critic as “the Sistine Chapel of action filmmaking”, while Time Out’s David Ehrlich said it was “like a tornado tearing apart the Tea Party”.
Now comes Furiosa, which has a budget of $343 million, the most expensive film in Australian film history, and received a standing ovation after opening in Cannes this week.
And while Miller and Mad Max are known on the world stage, as Screen Australia’s Amy Lindorff reminded us, they’ve adopted some of our phrases and slang.
Some may wonder what the world made of the phrase “bare your fangs!” “That’s duck innards.” “Rebhead”; “Dinki Dee”. “Doug” and “Kick with Guts.”
But we can’t help but admire Miller for retaining some of the Australian focus we encountered way back in the old New Wave era.
