George Miller Says ‘The Irishman' Turned Him Off From Using De-Aging for ‘Furiosa'

It’s going to be five years since Martin Scorsese’s “The Irishman” was, briefly, released in theaters by Netflix. There’s still heated debate over Scorsese’s decision to de-age Robert De Niro, Al Pacino and Joe Pesci in the film.

There’s been a variety of opinions about the de-aging process used in the film. Last year, actor Gabriel Byrne believed it was a failed attempt at the technology (“it didn’t work”) and that the “de-aging process is [still] at a very exploratory stage,”

Now, George Miller is adding his opinion to the ‘Irishman’ de-aging debate. The filmmaker says watching “The Irishman,” and Ang Lee’s “Gemini Man,” turned him off from using the technology on his upcoming “Furiosa.”

It definitely would have been Charlize [had Furiosa been filmed before Fury Road]. I began thinking, ‘Oh, maybe we could do de-aging.’ Then I watched really masterful filmmakers like Ang Lee and Martin Scorsese, doing Gemini Man and The Irishman, and I saw that it hadn’t been licked. All you’d be watching is, ‘Look how well the technology works?’ It would not have been persuasive.“

There’s no doubting that de-aging technology will get better, which means it’ll most likely make the de-aging done in “The Irishman” look more ridiculous in the years to come. It’s a real shame because, although it suffers from overlength, the story in “The Irishman” is absorbing, especially the scenes between Pacino and De Niro.

So, what went wrong with the de-aging in “The Irishman”? Well, for one, de-aging De Niro by 50 years, having him play a 28-year-old, was misguided — you could still tell that it was an old man by the stiff walking. The body language did it in for me.

Scorsese casting younger actors in the roles would have made more sense. ‘Irishman’ Makeup Artist Bill Corso discussed this on the Dan Gould Hour podcast and did mention how Scorsese refused to have his actors wear markers on their face, and didn't even want to use body doubles for the younger versions.

At the end of the day, “The Irishman” was a film that Scorsese and De Niro wanted to make for a long time, decades. Scorsese had mentioned that they considered casting a younger character, but then it wouldn’t have been the two of them making a film together, and that defeated their purpose for the project.

When I saw “The Irishman” at its NYFF premiere, I stated that it was Scorsese’s “eulogy to gangster cinema.” The film has this beautifully melancholic feel to it. I wrote —

Think “Goodfellas”, but directed by the man who gave us “Silence”. A culmination, meditation and tribute to every Scorsese/De Niro/Pesci collaboration. And yet, Al Pacino towers over all of them with a funny, sad and haunting performance as Jimmy Hoffa.”

Hoffa’s final moments still haunt me. They encapsulate, and complete, a great performance from Pacino, he’s both comedic and darkly dramatic here. De Niro’s Frank is at Hoffa’s side, during his final moments of life, and I loved his last nugget of brilliant life advice to him, “Never put a fish in your car, you’ll never get rid of the smell”.

So, almost five years later, how does “The Irishman” hold up for everyone? I’ve always seen it as a master reckoning with his own past and the inevitability of death. I don’t believe Scorsese will ever make another straight-up mob movie again in his career because this one plays like a final statement on the genre.