George Miller’s Mad Max is a classic of the action genre along with its title character who barely speaks, and this is perfectly explained by Miller’s original plan. After a couple of short films in the early 1970s, George Miller made his feature directorial debut in 1979 with Mad Max. This action movie took viewers to a dystopian near-future Australia in the middle of a societal collapse due to oil shortages and ecocide. On top of that, a berserker motorcycle gang member kills a rookie officer, becoming the target of the Main Force Patrol’s top man, Max Rockatansky (Mel Gibson).

When the gang’s leader, Toecutter, targets Max’s family, he goes on a revenge mission against them and shows no mercy. Mad Max was a huge box office hit and is now a classic of the action genre, and spawned a franchise with three sequels and a spinoff film, all of them directed by George Miller. Max Rockatansky is now one of the most popular antiheroes in film history, who stands out for his combat and firearms skills, but also because he barely speaks, which is explained by Miller’s original Mad Max plan.

George Miller's "Silent Movie" Vision For Mad Max Explains Why The Character Says So Little

George Miller Had A Very Specific Idea For Mad Max

Speaking to Australian Screen about Mad Max and the process of making the movie, Miller shared that he wanted to make a movie that he saw as “pure cinema.” What he wanted to do with Mad Max was a silent movie but with sound, a movie that “played like a silent movie” because silent movies were his first interest in movies. The point of making Mad Max as a silent movie with sound was that the audience could be able to understand the story and characters without being led by dialogue, subtitles, or cards, thus relying on visual narrative.

This explains why Max has few lines in Mad Max, as he wasn’t supposed to say much from the beginning. This resulted in an action-packed, emotionally intense, and dramatic story that is not just easy to follow but also exciting, and Gibson’s performance was key to selling the character and movie. A mostly silent Max Rockatansky was repeated in Mad Max: Fury Road with Tom Hardy, and his lack of dialogue became an essential part of the character.

Mad Max Works Better As A Near-Silent Character

Max Doesn’t Need To Say Much

As mentioned above, Max’s lack of dialogue has become a defining characteristic of this character, and it’s quite fitting with his personality, story, and actions. Max has a lot going on inside, with his fear of becoming as cold and heartless as the criminals in town taking over him, but he reaches a breaking point with the horrible death of Goose and the murder of his wife and son. Unlike other antiheroes, Max is more about action than words, being an example of the “show, don’t tell” rule in cinema.

Max barely speaking is also telling of the pain and trauma he carries. It’s not just the deaths of his family and Goose, but also all the horrible things he has witnessed in town as part of the MFP and the struggles of living in this chaotic dystopian world. Max wouldn’t have had the same impact and legacy had he been more talkative, and Mad Max wouldn’t have met George Miller’s idea of a silent movie with sound – which, as strange as the concept sounds, he perfectly achieved and then replicated decades later in Mad Max: Fury Road.

Source: Australian Screen.