JEDDAH: Marvel superstar Chris Hemsworth held a panel discussion during the Red Sea International Film Festival this week — and he gave fans insight on his career choices during the talk.  

Moderated by director Baz Luhrmann, who is also the head of the jury for this year’s edition of the film festival, the pair discussed Hemsworth’s involvement in the upcoming “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga” movie. “There’s a lot of anticipation for myself and from the fanbase that has been there for the 45 years,” Hemsworth said. 

Luhrmann and Hemsworth also addressed how “Mad Max” franchise director, George Miller, was brave enough to create a fictional universe from scratch, with Hemsworth adding:  

 “Taking leap, doing something different, thinking outside the box. The fear and the anxiety that comes with that is something to face and overcoming that and choosing to tell a story from your perspective, to be influenced by other people but not to be directly mimicking anyone else … there’s courage to that.” 

Hemsworth later shared with the audience that the escapism offered by films attracted him to the art of storytelling from a young age — he also noted that the ability to shapeshift and inhabit different characters is part of the reason he got into the film industry. 

“From a very young age, whether it would be books or television films, I enjoyed the fantasy, I enjoyed the escapism, the journey that the narrative and the story would take me one,” he said.  

“I think the vivid imagination of me as young kid carried through and still does now and that was the attraction to inhabit different spaces and different worlds and be taken on a journey,” he added. 

 Hemsworth appeared at the festival as part of the In Conversation series that has already featured the likes of US actor Will Smith, Bollywood star Katrina Kaif and Arab stars Amina Khalil and Yasmine Sabri.