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Thursday
22Oct2009

Tom Hardy, Charlize Theron Rumored for 'Mad Max 4'

DateThursday, October 22, 2009 at 2:08PM
It appears that director George Miller might be moving ahead with Mad Max 4 without Mel Gibson, the man the series helped transform into one of the world's biggest movie stars. Of course, Gibson only works when and how he wants to (he was already one of the shrewdest investors in show business before he had hundreds of millions from Passion of the Christ), so even if Miller wanted him to return, Mad Mel sure doesn't need to.

But the decision is apparently to go back to the beginning of the apocalypse, with a younger Max Rockatansky. E! Online writes that Miller is zeroing in on Tom Hardy, a British actor probably seen most by US audiences in Black Hawk Down or Band of Brothers. Charlize Theron might also sign up as the female lead.

Is going with Hardy a good move? Well, there are probably bigger names Miller could grab, and I would think if he's going for an Oscar winner in the other role that name recognition might be somewhat important. But maybe he sees something in Hardy that reminds him of a young Mel Gibson. His work in the recent Bronson earned Hardy raves, but he's not exactly the guy you expect a studio to trot out.

Nothing seems set in stone about any of this, and E! says that the script is so hush-hush actors only know the first initial of their potential characters' names. As for a fourth Mad Max movie, a prequel, it's not surprising in an environment where franchises and tentpoles seem to be the knee-jerk studio reaction, but even as it relates to the history of the character, there's room for this. It would be kind of cool to see how it all started.

One of my enduring memories of Mad Max and The Road Warrior, which I, like most Americans, actually saw first, is how unusual and kind of jarring the action looked and sounded at the time. I'm hoping Miller can reach back and find a similar aesthetic signature for this film.

AuthorColin Boyd | | in , , , | Print ArticlePrint Article | | Comment2 Comments |

Reader Comments (2)

Oh this is bigger than a new Star Wars movie. Can't wait for pictures of the new cars and such. I got the VHS of Road Warrior, you watch how they did the stunts and everything was real with people driving the bikes and cars, which I thought was pretty cool. And the Dog had one of the best buddy roles ever.

Thursday, October 22, 2009 | Unregistered CommenterKaveh

I've been wanting to see Bronson since reading about it and can't wait till its release in the States. Since the reason a lot of studios like reboots is that it allows them to find new actors instead of paying increasing fees to returning actors it makes sense to find an unknown with some foreign hype behind him - keep us posted as you dig up more news, Colin!

Thursday, October 22, 2009 | Unregistered Commentermdamien13

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