Dialogue “tends to slow things down” and films are “best enjoyed at high speed,” according to director George Miller
Expect George Miller’s upcoming Mad Max: Fury Road prequel, Furiosa, to be heavy on action and short on dialogue as Anya Taylor-Joy’s eponymous character only speaks 30 lines of dialogue over the course of the film’s two-and-a-half hours.
In an interview with The Telegraph, the director cited inspiration from the “pure cinema” of Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin’s silent comedy, which “Hitchcock defined as movies where they don’t have to read the subtitles when they’re screened in Japan.”
Miller then explained his belief that dialogue “tends to slow things down, and film is a medium that’s often best enjoyed at high speed.” As a result, Furiosa barrels ahead with car chases across the Australian Outback, with one 15-minute sequence taking 78 days and 200 stunt performers to shoot.
Taylor-Joy recently spoke to Total Film about that particular setpiece, telling the magazine it was pivotal in unlocking her character. “You see an accumulation of skills over the course of a battle, and that’s very important for understanding how resourceful Furiosa is, but also her grit,” she said.
Chris Hemsworth stars opposite Taylor-Joy in Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga as the Warlord Dementus. The film, a prequel to 2015’s Mad Max: Fury Road, arrives in US theaters on May 24th. Revisit the trailer here, if you’d like.