Australian taxpayers have been revealed to have forked out an estimated $183million to ensure the Hollywood movie Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga was filmed Down Under - only for the expensive film to bomb at the box office.
Furiosa stars Chris Hemsworth and Anya Taylor-Joy and was filmed in regional New South Wales and was expected to become the biggest movie ever to be made in Australia.
Although the exact sum spent on ensuring the production was filmed in Australia has not been disclosed by Screen New South Wales and Screen Australia, news.com.au have reported the amount to be close to $200million.
'It's incredibly expensive. What value the Australian public got for that cost is questionable,' Professor Kevin Sanson, head of the School of Communication at QUT told the outlet.
Australian taxpayers forked out an estimated $183million to ensure the Hollywood movie Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga was filmed Down Under - amid reports it has bombed at the box office. Pictured: Lead star Chris Hemsworth
'Taxpayers should absolutely question the money spent, not just on this particular production, but the value returned from generous offsets,' Sanson added.
Sanson's colleague Professor Amanda Lotz added Australian Parliament should be questioning whether this investment was 'a good use of taxpayer money'.
She added that the government offers attractive tax rebates for international productions to film here, and in return hope to both support the Australian film industry and boost the economy.
Furiosa stars Chris Hemsworth and Anya Taylor-Joy (pictured) and was filmed in regional New South Wales and was expected to become the biggest movie ever to be made in Australia - It wrapped up in September 2022
Unfortunately, the worse-than-expected performance of Furiosa has failed to do either, with the production failing to break even, only grossing $160m (AU$240m) to date.
Australian audiences have failed to show up to see the apocalyptic thriller, with box office website Numero reporting that it earned just $3.3million on its opening weekend.
The film suffered a similar fate in the USA where it was released last month - the four-day Memorial Day holiday weekend is typically one of the biggest box office events of the year, though that was not the case this year.
Although Furiosa topped the box office with an estimated USD $25.5 million, via Deadline, it was the lowest Memorial Day weekend at the box office in 29 years.
Furiosa's total budget was $AU333million, and it has been revealed that more than half of that sum was funded by the Australian taxpayers. Unfortunately, the film has failed to break even at the box office
Furiosa screened in 3,804 theatres over the holiday weekend, earning a USD $6,703 (AU$10,000) per-screen average.
The soft debut means there is a long road ahead for the film, which has a lofty production budget of USD $168 million, not counting publicity and advertising.
Many box office analysts had projected a debut for Furiosa in the USD $40 million to USD $50 million range, but, much like competing movie The Fall Guy, it fell well under expectations.
