Mary and Max
Fig 1. DVD cover
Mary and max is a stop motion animated dark comedy-drama film made in 2009, Mary and Max won 4 awards in total . Written and directed by Adam Elliot, it received generally very positive reviews from critics and it earned $1.7 million on a $8.2 million budget.
Fig 2. Mary and Max
Mary and Max is about an eight-year-old friendless Australian girl and a forty-four-year old, severely obese man living in New York. Mary is being bullied at school and her mum and dad are not really involved with her. Mary wants someone to talk to so she rips out an address from the address book. Mary then sends a letter to the address she took from the book, in the letter Mary asks Max questions about life. When Max gets the letter and reads it he has a break down. When Max has pulled him self together he replies, which then starts a 20-year correspondence friendship.
Fig 3. Max having a break down
Max later in the animation finds out he has Asperger's and is put in a asylum as back in the 1976 they did not really understand much about Asperger syndrome. After being released from the asylum Max's therapist tells him to stay away from things that might set him off. It getting to a point where Max replies to Mary to let her know why he did not reply to her letters. Once Mary finds out about Max's Asperger syndrome she goes on to study psychology at university using Max as her case study but does not let him know until she writes a book on him. When Mary finally tells Max he is not happy at all and rips the "M" key out of his typewriter, he replies saying that he does not see it as a disability that needs curing and that he does not want to talk anymore. Mary pulls all the books and destroys them, she sends a "I am sorry" gift to max but he does not reply back which sends Mary into depression and then she starts drinking cooking sherry like her mum.
Max finally realises that Mary is not perfect like him, and he sends her a gift to show he forgives her. Mary starts to save up again to visit Max but by the time she gets there Max is dead on the sofa. Mary sits down next to him and looks up and see all the letters she's has sent him over the years, laminated and stuck to the ceiling. Mary smiles and realises how much her friendship really meant to Max, finishing on a glass half full or a glass half empty outlook.
Fig 4. Mary older
The design of the sets was well done and fixed into the 1976 décor and era for both New York City and Australia. The colour hues for Australia were warmish colours that you would imagine to see in Australia with oranges and reds, where as the colours hues in New York City were dark and dull representing either Max's life or how the city was at the time. These two different colours help you feel that the two different environments are different and these environments finally come together at the end when Mary visits Max and you see both the warm colours and dull colours come together.
Illustration List:
Fig 1. DVD cover
Fig 2. Mary and Max
Fig 3. Max having a break down
Fig 4. Mary older
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