Furiosa Director George Miller Never Forgot Peter Weir’s Filmmaking Advice

Note that in 1979, Weir had only made four features, but two of them were doozies. Weir had helmed a dark comedy called “Homesdale,” the horror flick “The Cars that Ate Paris,” and the international sensations “Picnic at Hanging Rock” and “The Last Wave,” two movies that put Weir on the map and cemented his reputation as a new talent in cinema. Miller didn’t say where he met Weir but recalled complaining to the filmmaker about how difficult it was to make “Mad Max”:

“When I made the first ‘Mad Max,’ I had never been on a set before. We had such a low budget. And even though the film worked, I really thought I could never make it on movie, it was too bewildering. And I remember I spoke to Peter Weir, who had done his third feature, the second or third feature. And I explained to him how difficult it was. He said, ‘George, don’t you realize it’s like that for every movie?'”

Miller recalled that the Vietnam War had ended only a few years before, leading Weir to make a harrowing comparison. Filmmaking, Weir said, was like fighting in Vietnam. It’s always violence and chaos. Miller never forgot the comparison:

“[He said] ‘Think about it as if you are on patrol in Vietnam. You’ve got your platoon, you’ve got to finish, and get through it. You’ve got your mission.’ He said, ‘But you don’t know where the snipers are. You don’t know where the landmines are. You don’t know what’s going to happen, but you’ve got to be agile enough to go with the flow and still get the end result.'”

That advice taught Miller to accept the struggle.