Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga is the most expensive movie ever made in Australia

If you've been following the development of Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga closely, you'll probably know the road to get to actually making the prequel was full of obstacles. But it seems like, even after all the drama, Warner Bros. and Village Roadshow footed a pretty hefty bill for the movie.

Deadline's May 22, 2022, report on David Zaslav's plans for Warner Bros. Discovery explored how the company planned to both cut costs and maintain healthy relationships with filmmakers that had done great work for Warner Bros. in the past. Among all the data and interesting tidbits, the (surprisingly massive) production budget for Furiosa was shared: $233 million that were injected directly into Australia's economy. This made it the biggest Australian production in film history, a top spot once held by movies such as, you guessed it, Baz Luhrmann's Australia ($130 million).

For reference: Mad Max: Fury Road (2015), shot in both Namibia and Australia, had a $150 million production budget which was already considered a lot for the type of movie George Miller wanted to make. Whether or not it was a clean box office success is still being debated, as it grossed around $375 million globally. It did, however, become a big domestic market hit and earned the studio six Oscar wins, cementing its status as a modern cult classic.

Furiosa's budget exhibits all the signs of 'modern franchise bloat' except for the fact it's not a market-tested Marvel, DC, or Star Wars production (and we all know even those aren't guaranteed hits anymore), though we're guessing a lot of that money is going towards Anya Taylor-Joy and Chris Hemsworth's paychecks. If all the positive 'modern masterpiece' chatter surrounding Fury Road actually equals many people making a trip to the nearest cinema, and audiences keep responding to blockbusters that exist outside the usual family-friendly bubble, George Miller's latest could actually become a box office win for Warner Bros. despite that shocking price tag. Start placing your bets now.

Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga will blast into theaters on May 24, 2024, same day as Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes unless Warner Bros. or Disney scurries away.

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