One of the country's most acclaimed filmmakers,George Miller,is locked in a bitter court battle with Hollywood studio Warner Bros that threatens plans to make two more movies in the celebrated action series.
Fury Road revisits Oscar-winning filmmaker George Miller's post-apocalyptic Mad Max trilogy.
Three years after the fourthMad Max movie was released to widespread acclaim - nominated for 10 Oscars including best picture and director and winning six - the director's production company,Kennedy Miller Mitchell,has claimed in a document filed in the Supreme Court of NSW that the studio acted in a"high-handed,insulting or reprehensible"manner.
Philosophical:George Miller after speaking to students at NIDA this week.James Brickwood
And by"destroying"the relationship of trust by allegedly refusing to pay a bonus for delivering the movie under budget and breaching a co-financing agreement,they were unable to work together to make any further instalments.
To the delight of fans,Miller has long had scripts forMad Max 5 and6 ready to shoot.
But with his production company suing Warner Bros for unpaid earnings fromFury Road,they are now mired in litigation.
The falling out emerged in a Supreme Court of NSW ruling late last year that the dispute should be heard here rather than in California.
Brutally difficult movie to shoot:Mad Max:Fury Road
Despite all the acclaim forFury Road,documents filed in the case suggest extended conflict over the budget and what scenes should be shot,including the ending.
Both sides have different views of the"final net cost"of the movie,the key factor in whether Kennedy Miller Mitchell is eligible for a $US7 million ($9 million) bonus for making the movie under the agreed budget of $US157 million and a share of proceeds.
The production company has claimed Fury Road cost $US154.6 million;the studio claimed it blew out to $US185.1 million.
Warner Bros alleged that instead of a 120-minute movie that was rated R in the US - MA 15+ in Australia - the contract required the company to make a 100-minute movie that was rated no harder than PG-13.
And Kennedy Miller Mitchell claimed it only found out that Warner Bros had brought on the James Packer-Brett Ratner-founded Ratpac and Dune Entertainment as co-financiers when it was directed to give an executive producer credit to Steven Mnuchin,now the US Secretary of the Treasury in the Trump administration.
By any measure,Fury Road was a brutally difficult movie to shoot. After extended heavy rain around Broken Hill,Miller and producer Doug Mitchell had to take their cast,crew and vehicles to South Africa and Namibia in 2012.
In the court documents,their company has claimed:
In a cross-claim,Warner Bros alleged:
George Miller and NIDA director Kate Cherry after the filmmaker talked to students about his career this week.James Brickwood
Miller was in a philosophical mood when he spoke about his career to students at NIDA on Thursday night,reflecting on the directors who had influenced him most (Buster Keaton and Alfred Hitchcock) and what Jack Nicholson taught him about working with studios when they made The Witches of Eastwick together ("they mistake politeness for weakness;you've got to make them think you're crazy").
Afterwards,the Oscar-winning director said he had used the time sinceFury Road'srelease to get a range of scripts ready to shoot."There are a lot of options,"he said."I'm not sitting around grinding my teeth."
On whether fans would ever get to see the next twoMad Max movies,Miller said he honestly did not know. "They're there but that's all I can say,"he said."That's in the future."
Warner Bros has appealed the decision that the case should be heard in NSW and a judgment is pending.
with Michaela Whitbourn