Mary and Max
This is an Australian "claymation" effort, and a funny but also moving movie. The story is of Mary, an 8 year old girl with no friends living in Melbourne, and her pen friend, a 40something male in New York - also with no friends. Their trials and tribulations over 20+ years and their enduring friendship through the mail. I saw this movie today and really loved it. Not sure that it will get wide release outside of oz, but look for it!
http://www.maryandmax.comHere's a review from the ABC:
She says:
Sometimes the most unlikely friendships are the ones that sustain us and so it is with Mary and Max.
Mary Daisy Dinkle (voiced as a child by Bethany Whitmore and as an adult by Toni Collette), is a lonely nine-year-old living in Melbourne who loves chocolate, a cartoon called The Noblettes.
Mary has no friends.
Max Jerry Horovitz (voiced by Phillip Seymour Hoffman) is an obese Jewish New Yorker with Asperger's syndrome who loves chocolate, The Noblettes and also has no friends.
By a strange twist of fate, Mary chooses Max's name from the phone book and decides to write him a letter, and so begins a 20 year pen pal friendship.
Mary's letter at first throws Max's ordered life into an anxiety filled state.
For him, the world is a strange and confusing place.
Their letters fly thick and fast as they face the trials and tribulations of life.
Mary asking questions, Max trying the answer them - it's delightful.
Narrated by Barry Humphries, the film explores many themes; life, death, loneliness, and mental illness.
Tough stuff for characters that look like misshapen blobs of plasticine.
This is the first feature of Australian writer director Adam Elliot.
He's the man who brought us the delightful Harvie Krumpet and won himself an Oscar for best short film.
The story is based on a real life pen pal relationship that he has with a New Yorker with Asperger's syndrome.
The type of films he makes are painstaking.
It's called Claymation or stop motion filming, and it takes forever to make a movie, at the rate of just a few seconds a day.
But Mary and Max is worth the wait.
It's witty, clever, beautiful and ultimately incredibly moving.
I'll admit to a few tears.
You really care about Mary and Max and their tumultuous and complicated friendship over 20 years.
Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Toni Collette and also Eric Bana as Mary's love interest Damien, perfectly voice their clay characters.
Adam Elliot is a unique voice in Australian film making and it's a voice worth listening to.
He says:
As astounding as the recent technical advances in computer generated 3D animation have been, nothing compares to claymation, where you can literally see the fingerprints of the animators on their work.
Of the three forms - cell, 3D and stop-go - 3D is by far the dominant, with 2D limited to Japanese anime and stop-go almost exclusively the preserve of Aardman Studios (the Wallace and Gromit series, amongst others), children's TV and artsy-fartsy shorts made for the festival audience.
It was in this final category that Adam Elliot fit until his 22 minute short Harvey Krumpet won the Oscar for best animated short in 2003.
$8 million and six years later, Mary and Max, his debut feature hits the screens, and the result is a work of near genius.
The story is loosely based on Elliot's long-term pen-pal relationship with an overweight New Yorker with Asperger's (Philip Seymour Hoffman).
Max the New Yorker begins writing to a lonely eight-year-old Melbourne girl, Mary (Bethany Whitmore, then Toni Collette), after she randomly chooses him from the phone book as the recipient of a letter.
The pair share a love for chocolate and a kids' cartoon called The Noblets, and, less happily, a deep and abiding loneliness.
As beautiful as the animation is - and it's genuinely stunning - the key to the film's success lies in its screenplay.
Somehow Elliot manages to make the story simultaneously hilarious, heart-warming and heart-breaking, which is no mean feat.
The voice talent is top notch, with Barry Humphries' dead-pan narration carrying the piece, and an excellent performance from Phillip Semour Hoffman in an exceptionally difficult role.
There's perhaps an over-reliance on scatological humour now and then, and the story sometimes meanders, particularly during the final act.
But these are small criticisms for what is close to a masterpiece, providing confirmation that Adam Elliot is one of Australian film industry's greatest talents.
Let us hope that this labour of love receives the hugs from the audience it deserves.
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