Film reviews
Tomorrow When The War Began
While the action fares slightly better than character development; this absorbing blockbuster deserves to be a hit.
Furry Vengeance
Full of clunky CGI and uninspired performances, this film is completely devoid of humour and heart.
Going The Distance
While occasionally opting for cheap laughs, this romantic comedy is entertaining, warm and feels surprisingly rooted in real life.
The Kids Are All Right
Driven by excellent performances, this entertaining film provides a fresh view of modern family life.
search the site
newsletter
Enter your email address below to receive the weekly Filmink newsletter
Mary And Max (Film)
Rating: PG
Running Time: 92
Country: Australia
Director: Adam Elliot
Cast: Eric Bana, Toni Collette, Philip Seymour Hoffman
Distributor: Icon
Film Worth: $15.00
Release Date: April 09, 2009
“…close to a work of genius.”
The most interesting, complex characters you will probably meet all year are puppets. Made of clay, plastic and polymer, Mary, with her off-centre mouth, and Max, with his oddly-shaped head, are comical looking. But they tell a serious, made-for-adults tale, full of compassion, humanity and wit. Written and directed by Australian Adam Elliot (the brains behind the Oscar-winning short Harvie Krumpet), the claymated Mary And Max is a classic case of an unlikely friendship between two achingly lonely outsiders.
It's 1976 in Australian suburbia. Mary Daisy Dinkle is eight-years-old. She lacks confidence, is self-conscious about a "poo-coloured" birthmark, and harbours a burning question: do American babies come from the same place as Australian babies? In Australia, of course, babies are found in the bottoms of beer glasses. Mary gets hold of a US phone book and, hoping to solve this facts-of-life mystery, writes at random to one Max Jerry Horowitz, a Jewish New Yorker with Asperger's Syndrome. Their long-distance friendship, based on Elliot's real life pen-pal, spans twenty years and follows an unpredictable course that is often humorous and will leave you genuinely moved.
Bethany Whitmore, who voices Mary as a child, and Toni Collette, who does the honours for Mary the adult, are superb. A nuanced Philip Seymour Hoffman disappears inside his character - he's almost too good as the weary, overweight Max, towering above a splendid voice cast that includes Eric Bana, Renee Geyer, Ian "Molly" Meldrum, narrator Barry Humphries, and Elliot himself in a couple of small roles.
Having previously been restricted to the short film format, here Elliot finally has a feature-length movie to stretch his wonderfully unrestrained imagination into. He's not only a gifted animator, but a master storyteller, and this is close to a work of genius.
