CANNES, May 16 — Director George Miller said there are more stories to be told within the Mad Max universe, a day after the fifth film in the franchise, Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, had its world premiere at the Cannes Film Festival.

"There’s certainly other stories there. Mainly because we wrote, in order to tell the story of ‘Fury Road,’ we had to know the back story of Furiosa and Max in the year before,” he told journalists today.

"But I’ll definitely wait to see how this goes before we even think about that,” he added.

Furiosa comes 45 years after Miller first introduced audiences to his dystopian film universe and bears little resemblance to the first 1979 film starring Mel Gibson.

The new film focuses on the origins of Furiosa, the one-armed big rig driver played to great acclaim by Charlize Theron in the preceding film, 2015’s Mad Max: Fury Road.

That film was met with resounding success, netting six Oscars and raking in some US$380 million (RM1.8 billion) for global box office.

Miller told Reuters that for the new film, too much time had passed to work with Theron and he needed a new actor for the titular role. He decided on Anya Taylor-Joy, best known for The Queen’s Gambit, praising her athleticism and discipline.

Critics were mostly positive, with Variety and The Hollywood Reporter praising its impressive action scenes and Taylor-Joy’s performance, but said it fell short of its predecessor.

Audiences will have their chance to see the Warner Bros. film when it is released in theatres later this month. It is set to hit international theatres on May 22 and open in the United States on May 24. — Reuters