Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga debuts at Cannes Film Festival

Anya Taylor-Joy plays the young Imperator Furiosa, the titular character of the latest instalment in director George Miller's Mad Max franchise. Photo / Instagram

Furiosa became the biggest megawatt Hollywood event of the Cannes Film Festival, giving Anya Taylor-Joy a full-circle moment on the carpet.

Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga rolled into the Cannes Film Festival on Wednesday, returning George Miller’s dystopia-on-wheels to the French Riviera festival and lending Anya Taylor-Joy a fairy tale moment on the Cannes red carpet.

Taylor-Joy, with her first film at Cannes, brought classical movie-star glamour to one of the most anticipated premieres of the festival. Wearing a cream-coloured custom Dior gown, Taylor-Joy playfully posed for photographers while walking into the Palais des Festivals and offering mock salutes to her director.

For Anya Taylor-Joy, Furiosa at Cannes was a full-circle moment. Photo / Getty Images

The latest Mad Max film, starring Chris Hemsworth and Taylor-Joy as a young Furiosa, premiered in Cannes almost exactly nine years after Mad Max: Fury Road debuted at the French festival. Miller, who has served on the Cannes jury several times, also premiered his Three Thousand Years of Longing here in 2022.

Australian actor Chris Hemsworth plays Dr Dementus in Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga. Photo / Instagram

“To show it in that cinema with about 2000 people with impeccable sound and screening is a big thing. It’s kind of optimal cinema, really,” Miller said in advance of the premiere. “The moment that they said, ‘Okay, we’re happy to show this film here’, I jumped at it.”

For the 28-year-old Taylor-Joy, Furiosa in Cannes was a full-circle moment. The first time she came to the festival was to receive a Chopard trophy as an emerging actor in 2017. It was presented by the original Furiosa, Charlize Theron, the star of Fury Road.

This image released by Warner Bros Pictures shows a sstill from a scene from Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga. Image / Warner Bros Pictures via AP

While this year’s Cannes boasts many prominent upcoming premieres, including Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis and Yorgos Lanthimos’ Kinds of Kindness with Emma Stone, the Furiosa debut was easily the huge Hollywood event of the festival. Among the attendees were jury head Greta Gerwig, Eva Green, Naomi Campbell and Baz Luhrmann.

Furiosa opens in New Zealand theaters on May 23.