Furiosa - A Mad Max Saga

[ZMOT]

he should have turned off the goofiness and played it serious, but he just couldn't do it.

probably wasn't allowed to since it would trigger someone...

 

[xXx: State of the Union]

Did so many people tell Chris Hemsworth he was so funny in the 2016 Ghostbusters film that it just messed with his brain or something? "He acts too goofy" seems to be a common complaint I hear about him now between Thor and this.

 

[std::string]

but the film itself was visually unappealing. It’s so muted and dull looking. They also upper the CGI used significantly for this film and it…stands out.

That was my first reaction to the trailer. I have no idea what they did during post processing but I certainly hope no studio ever tries this again. The camera also slightly jitters around and changes its aperture size through like every single scene.

The whole film has this weird AI art vibe to it.

 

[Mr. Zed da Robot Poon Fed]

I am not surprised to see this flopping. You have an IP that is basically built around a classic pulp hero going on adventures, you easily could have just done another Mad Max with him in it. I think the love for Furiosa as a character was VASTLY overestimated.

People always overestimate the love for female counterparts in these films. Contrary to what people may believe, women don't watch these types of women on screen. Ocean's 8, Star Wars, Charlie's Angels....women are progressively not into this shit.

I didn't even know people "loved" Furiosa when Fury Road came out. All the buzz was with regards to the visual effects. She was annoying as despite the film being called "Mad Max: Fury Road", Max didn't do nearly as much as Furiosa in the film.

 

[ShamefurDispray]

I'm gonna say about $32m

Right on the money, well done.

As for Fury Road's problems continuing into this prequel, feeling overly long and bloated is a problem I had with Fury Road. There were alot of scenes and shots that could have been condensed or removed.

From everything I'm seeing here the glowing praise Fury Road got didn't help Miller become a tighter screen writer.

And the reported budget is even higher than Fury Road despite looking much worse....

 

[Stab You in the Back]

And the reported budget is even higher than Fury Road despite looking much worse....

Yeah, it seems like they blew a load of money on special effects to make the little girl look more like Anya Taylor Joy, but in exchange the rest of the film looks like those straight-to-dvd Death Race sequels.

 

[God of Nothing]

Did so many people tell Chris Hemsworth he was so funny in the 2016 Ghostbusters film that it just messed with his brain or something? "He acts too goofy" seems to be a common complaint I hear about him now between Thor and this.

none of the fat cows could stop kissing his rich handsome ass and it went straight to his head

 

[The Nothingness]

Deadline is going through a massive copefest to explain Furiosa's poor performance.

Furiosa is still on track for $31M-$33M. For clarity purposes: The last time a film grossed in this vicinity was the 1980s with Return of the Jedi and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. However, we stand corrected: It’s the lowest No. 1 Memorial Day opening in 29 years, the last time we bottomed out was 1995’s Casper ($22M).

Oh, I guess having it be the lowest opening in 29 years instead of 41 years makes it better.

As great as anyone (including myself) might think Furiosa is, Mad Max is finite fanboy property, R-rated at that, and he’s always been. Ya know how many 13-17 year olds went to Furiosa yesterday? 2%, per PostTrak. That’s a big boy quad that’s missing. Do you know how many women went yesterday? 29%. Adults over 55? 9%. Mad Max and Furiosa aren’t everyone movies. Get with it, people.

Mad Max: Fury Road opened to $45.4M and was beaten by girls at the box office in Pitch Perfect 2, which mowed him down with a No. 1 take of $69.2M in mid-May 2015.

And Girl Mad Max is getting beaten by a fat orange cat. What's your point?

It’s all about product. Theatrical isn’t broken. Dune, Godzilla x Kong proved earlier this year that audiences have an appetite for moviegoing. Ditto for Barbie and Oppenheimer last summer, and Top Gun: Maverick and Little Mermaid last Memorial Day weekend.

One of these things is not like the others.

Furthermore, Memorial Day weekend is a place where studios can easily bury duds and make the most out of a four-day play period. There have been other conceived event films which have failed to open over Memorial Day and in recent times: How about 2015, the same year when Mad Max Fury Road was in its second weekend.

Remember, Disney’s Tomorrowland led the holiday period with an awful $42.6M. Also, let’s go back to 2010: Minus No. 1 holdover Shrek Forever After ($57M) from the chart, and you’re left with new entry bombs Prince of Persia ($37.8M) and Sex and the City 2 ($36.8M).

I don't think this is as persuasive as the author thinks it is.

It was a ballsy greenlight considering Fury Road wasn’t known to profit through the roof at the time of its release (one finance source says, “Cost too much and had high talent participations”). It was the six Oscar wins and Best Picture nom that raised its profile. Unless there’s some glorious holdover factor here –(note that Mad Max: Fury Road wound up playing into Memorial Day weekend), the unfortunate sad odds are we may not see Miller’s other prequel Mad Max: Wasteland ever.

So, it's previous movie's fault that this prequel was not successful.

Despite more movies in the marketplace, we’re still feeling the aftermath of the strikes. How is that? Many aren’t in the habit of moviegoing yet

COVID is out, the strikes are now in.
https://deadline.com/2024/05/box-office-furiosa-garfield-memorial-day-1235938017/ (archive)

 

[Bunny Wigglesworth]

IIRC, this was supposed to be filmed back to back with Fury Road but it ended up in development hell.

It seems to me that Miller *really* just wanted to make Furiosa movies but seemingly had to tie it to Mad Max in order to get them made.

Warner Bros tried to stiff him out of money & he was stuck in a longstanding lawsuit with them. WB also cut him off from the Avalanche Studios game while still using all his notes. There’s stuff in Furiosa that ties directly into the 2015 Mad Max game.

And the reported budget is even higher than Fury Road despite looking much worse....

It’s not higher when you factor in the unprecedented grants & tax rebates from both the Australian govt and the New South Wales film fund. That sort of stuff is baked into the budget figures we see. If anyone’s curious about that, these Variety & Indiewire articles go over it. Miller credits all those govt grants & rebates with getting the movie greenlit.

I’d have preferred a Tom Hardy sequel, but this movie is still pretty good & doesn’t deserve to fail. Not as tight as The Road Warrior or Fury Road, but a worthwhile cinema trip. It could be a disappointing start before it gets its legs like happened with Fury Road, but in the post-Covid landscape with this shit economy & movies going to streaming services 2 or 3 weeks after theatrical release, I’m not so sure about that.

 

[Raging Capybara]

Watching this piece of shit crashing and burning and flopping so hard like that brings an immeasurable amount of joy to my heart.

 

[namelesstacotruck]

People always overestimate the love for female counterparts in these films. Contrary to what people may believe, women don't watch these types of women on screen. Ocean's 8, Star Wars, Charlie's Angels....women are progressively not into this shit.

I didn't even know people "loved" Furiosa when Fury Road came out. All the buzz was with regards to the visual effects. She was annoying as despite the film being called "Mad Max: Fury Road", Max didn't do nearly as much as Furiosa in the film.

Fury Road was heavily touted as a feminist movie. And it is. The women defied the patriachy with the help of a foreigner who moves on and ended up killing everyone.

Women dont go action movies. Soyboys are the type to watch it on netflix. Especially agter covid made theatres yucky to them. The one woman i heard express interest is waiting for Netflix. Women only want to go see a movie in theatres if it is a certain degree of popular.

 

[Milkshake Sniffer]

Warner Bros tried to stiff him out of money & he was stuck in a longstanding lawsuit with them. WB also cut him off from the Avalanche Studios game while still using all his notes. There’s stuff in Furiosa that ties directly into the 2015 Mad Max game.



It’s not higher when you factor in the unprecedented grants & tax rebates from both the Australian govt and the New South Wales film fund. That sort of stuff is baked into the budget figures we see. If anyone’s curious about that, these Variety & Indiewire articles go over it. Miller credits all those govt grants & rebates with getting the movie greenlit.

I’d have preferred a Tom Hardy sequel, but this movie is still pretty good & doesn’t deserve to fail. Not as tight as The Road Warrior or Fury Road, but a worthwhile cinema trip. It could be a disappointing start before it gets its legs like happened with Fury Road, but in the post-Covid landscape with this shit economy & movies going to streaming services 2 or 3 weeks after theatrical release, I’m not so sure about that.

OK. Let's play this game.

Fury Road supposedly (I'm using wiki figures but there's no particular reason to doubt them) cost $154-185m to make (i.e. production budget). They are not in the public domain in any verifiable way so we'll probably never know if they are accurate though, where real figures have to be provided (UK tax credit corporate vehicles being the usual) they tend to be understated, usually significantly. It took $380m at the box office globally and, according to the Hollywood Reporter, lost between $20-40m. THR has long history of fluffing for Hollywood as do the rest of the Hollywood trades, inc Variety, and sources like Indiewire which are no better than Screenrant or Collider. That being said we don't appear to have access to more reliable figures. So, despite the claims of success for Fury Road, even with the best of Hollywood propagandising; it failed.

Furiosa is stated to have a budget of $168m (Screenrant FWIW though Box Office Mojo and The Numbers use the same figure). Now here's where things get really strange. The New South Wales press release relied upon states "The NSW government’s A$175 million ($135 million) Made in NSW fund and PDV Rebate and the Federal Government’s 40% producer offset helped to secure the production for NSW". This film did not get Gov't funding/credits of $135m (80% of the $168m budget).

That $135m is the entirety of the Made in NSW fund from 2020 to 2025. How much a film gets is decided case by case. I've seen nothing specific to this film. "The NSW Post, Digital and Visual effects (PDV) rebate offers eligible productions a 10 per cent rebate on qualifying NSW PDV expenditure related to PDV work carried out in NSW." (https://www.ausfilm.com.au/why-film...l-state-local-government-agencies/screen-nsw/) . "The Producer Offset is a refundable tax offset (rebate) for producers of Australian feature films, television and other projects. Because it's underpinned by income tax legislation, it represents a source of funds for producers of eligible Australian projects." (https://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/funding-and-support/producer-offset) .

For another example of the deceptive nature of this press release (and the Variety article) the press release also states."Furiosa is expected to support more than 850 local jobs and bring in around A$350 million ($285 million) into the NSW economy". i.e. a film for which the production budget is $168m will bring in $285m - $117m more than the total production cost! They are probably talking in money circulation terms - person A spends $100 with person B who spends $80 of that with person C and that gets counted as $180 of economic activity. What it is not is an injection of $180. This is double counting at best but it's a pretty good example of deliberately misleading languange.

So, again as far as I am aware, we have an unverified production budget figure, we have no reliable information on the marketing spend and we have no figures at all concerning Gov't subsidies. Those Variety and Indiewire articles provide no substantive information in this regard.

As an aside; a film that gets a tax rebate/credit doesn't cost any less to make. It just has the taxpayers of a state/country funding part of that cost.

The only conclusion we can draw at this point is that it has underperformed so far at the box office and appears likely to fail at least as hard as Fury Road, probably far harder.

And here's the kicker for this and all the othe IP mining vampires. Why should I spend time and money on a spin off character's prequel when I know that I'd be sitting there thinking "this is nowhere near as good as Mad Max 1 or 2"?

 

[ShamefurDispray]

The only conclusion we can draw at this point is that it has underperformed so far at the box office and appears likely to fail at least as hard as Fury Road, probably far harder

It's already failed harder than Fury Road even with skewed numbers.

https://www.the-numbers.com/movies/custom-comparisons/Furiosa-A-Mad-Max-Saga-(2024)/Mad-Max-Fury-Road#tab=day_by_day_comparison

I don't know if "The Numbers" is worth a damn on hard numbers but for comparisons sake this is pretty handy.

Opening Weekends Rounded Down:
Furiosa: $26 Mil*
Fury Road: $45 Mil

* Furiosa opened on more screens and on a Three Day Weekend

 

[Chris Redfield]

I preferred Fury Road to this, more action in that one and I generally prefer it's story. Road Warrior will always be the best one. This one was fun and the world of Mad Max is always a riot (lol Australia), and I always like the style of the films but something just didn't entirely engross me with this. I don't find Furiosa very interesting. The villain was cool and the Mad Max style guy she meets like half way through was neat, too but otherwise, I'd place it second from bottom in the films for me. Not terrible by any means but not great either.

 

[Drag-on Knight 91873]

I really don't understand why Miller would find Furiosa so compelling she needs two movies. She was a competent enough deuteragonist for an action movie, but charismatic performances come from the villains in these movies. We know enough about her in Fury Road to understand who she is, so there's no point making what is essentially Solo: A Mad Max Story.

 

[Commander X]

Furiosa was evidently in development for awhile, so Warner was stuck with another turkey that couldn't really be saved even with more reshoots. It's a franchise-killing embarrassment, so Warner will probably come back five years from now with a reboot directed by some nobody who has mostly helmed music videos, someone the studio execs see as pliable and starring a "diverse" actress with a jawline like that of a steam shovel as Mad "Maxine".

 

[The Hardest R]

It’s a shame yet another franchise gets irreparably ruined by modern Hollywood, in this case making Mad Max into some grrl power shit. I’m glad this movie failed so Hollyjew struggles that much further. Oh well, I can just pretend Mad Max ended 40 years ago and that’ll be that.

In case anyone claims Fury Road wasn’t grrl power shit, they paid Eve Ensler $100k to ensure the movie was properly wymynyst: https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2015/05/mad-max-fury-road-eve-ensler-feminist-triumph

In fact, Mad Maxdirector George Miller enlisted the help of activist, feminist icon, and Vagina Monologuesauthor Eve Ensler in order to ensure that Fury Road wasn’t just another story about helpless female victims; it’s a story about empowered survivors.

 

[blablabla]

It’s a shame yet another franchise gets irreparably ruined by modern Hollywood, in this case making Mad Max into some grrl power shit. I’m glad this movie failed so Hollyjew struggles that much further. Oh well, I can just pretend Mad Max ended 40 years ago and that’ll be that.

In case anyone claims Fury Road wasn’t grrl power shit, they paid Eve Ensler $100k to ensure the movie was properly wymynyst: https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2015/05/mad-max-fury-road-eve-ensler-feminist-triumph

i hope george miller doesnt make any movie ever again

 

[Bunny Wigglesworth]

The New South Wales press release relied upon states "The NSW government’s A$175 million ($135 million) Made in NSW fund and PDV Rebate and the Federal Government’s 40% producer offset helped to secure the production for NSW". This film did not get Gov't funding/credits of $135m (80% of the $168m budget).

If a director is saying contributions from those helped get the film greenlit and he doesn’t have a history of lying I’m inclined to believe him.

Do profits from 4K/Blu/DVD sales, merch, etc play no part in if a movie is considered profitable? Or is this just an entirely different pie chart. It all seems very nebulous, on purpose.

For another example of the deceptive nature of this press release (and the Variety article) the press release also states."Furiosa is expected to support more than 850 local jobs and bring in around A$350 million ($285 million) into the NSW economy". i.e. a film for which the production budget is $168m will bring in $285m - $117m more than the total production cost!

If you think that’s bad, go down the rabbit hole of stadium subsidies.

this is nowhere near as good as Mad Max 1 or 2"

Mad Max 1 is great for a $350,000 indie film but enjoyment wise I find it the worst Mad Max movie. Farts around in the second act and doesn’t utilize that time well for what it’s intended to do, then the vengeance climax is over in like 5 minutes, with more than half of Toecutter’s gang just vanishing. There were so many of those bastards at the beginning, by the end there’s like 7. As if the real motorcycle club they used took off before filming was finished. In its favor it at least had a sensible running time. Movie’s are too fucking long now, something else which hurts box office.

 

[Professor G. Raff]

It's been awhile since I've seen people doing it for free so hard on Twitter. They are blaming every possible thing you can think of on the movie not doing well besides Furiosa being a bland, pointless character who did not deserve to carry a movie. I can't even remember any definable trait about her from Fury Road.