
The differences between the two are due to budget, the era in which the films were made, and George Miller's experience as a visionary filmmaker. His deranged personality accurately represents the crumbling world of Mad Max, while the nightmarish Immortan Joe belongs on top of Fury Road's enormous skull-themed Citadel, teasing hordes of starving vagrants with massive spurts of water. Even without Immortan Joe's imposing horse-teethed mask, Toecutter is an intimidated villain on his own. Therefore, Max's muscle car fits in Mad Max as well as Furiosa's War Rig does in Fury Road.Īll of this is perfectly reflected in both of Hugh Keays-Byrne's iconic villains.

Luckily, George Miller's resourcefulness compensated for his lack of experience, and what could have made the original Mad Max an outdated version of Fury Road actually played in favor of the franchise's world-building.

Mad Max was even dubbed with American voices to prevent further cultural dissociation.
MAD MAX 2 WEZ BOYFRIEND MOVIE
At the time, such a geographical gap was a question of life or death to a movie since the success of foreign productions was fairly unproven to American audiences, whose reception mattered the most for the bottom line. On top of the financial constraints, the entirety of the first film was shot in Australia, far away from Hollywood's fountain of commercial cinema. For instance, there weren't enough resources to construct the fully-fledged wasteland that Fury Road is so admired for, so things like the mildly torn-down buildings and the pristine state of the roads had to be incorporated into the story. While Miller's intention was always to locate the story in a society on the verge of collapse, these kinds of limitations infused the plot with conveniently compatible details. This included filming without permits, hiring real-life outlaw bikers, and casting the completely unknown Mel Gibson as the lead actor.

For the 1979 indie venture, George Miller and his crew took every possible measure to ensure the measly $350,000 budget wouldn't fall short at the wrong time. Whereas the 2015 blockbuster employed an impressive variety of practical effects to achieve the highest degree of realism (and win multiple Oscars as a result), the original film had no other alternative. Related: What Really Happened To The World In Mad Max This time, Max (Tom Hardy) teams up with Imperator Furiosa (Charlize Theron) to take down the tyrant Immortan Joe (also played by Hugh Keays-Byrne), who has total control over the water supply of the full-blown Wasteland, where storm-riding chrome-spray addicts and flame-throwing guitar players are a daily occurrence.

36 years and two sequels later, Mad Max: Fury Road revisited the Australian dystopia from a different perspective. In an apocalyptic Australia where only the strongest lunatics get to keep the gasoline and the supremacy over the land, it's up to Max to take the law into his own hands. The original Mad Max tells the story of seasoned patrol officer Max Rockatansky (Mel Gibson) and his thirst for revenge after the gang leader Toecutter (Hugh Keays-Byrne) brutally attacks his best friend, his wife, and his son.
