Year: 2009
The time, 5:27 p.m. Thursday, September 1, 2011. Instead of doing what I am paid to do at work, I am trying to come up with the right words to describe this sweet, sad, wonderful gem of a movie. I think out of all the movies that I have written about so far in this little project of mine, this one had the most profound affect on me. And I think it's because I could relate to both characters, Mary Daisy Dinkle and Max Jerry Horowitz. There's a part of me in each of them and I felt what they were feeling as the movie unfolded. When they made this one, it's almost like they were walking around in my head. Scary right? Well, not really. You just need patience to understand some people and I am one of them.
Our setting is Australia, 1976. Mary (voiced by Bethany Whitmore as a youngster and Toni Collette as an adult) is an 8-year-old girl. She is a sad figure--plain-Jane, chubby and the frequent target of schoolyard teasing because of a "poo-colored" birthmark right in the middle of her forehead. Mary's father is emotionally unavailable (he spends all his spare time in the basement practicing taxidermy) and her mother is an alcoholic with a penchant for shoplifting. Mary is sad, but not without dignity. She makes her own toys (her favorite show is 'The Noblets') and is able to find some semblance of pleasure amid the wreck that is her homelife. What she doesn't have (save for her rooster, Ethel) is a true friend.
While at the post office with her mom one day (they are chased out when she's caught pilfering a box of envelopes), Mary decides to write--at random--to a person she picks out of the New York City phone directory. And what a person that is! Max (voiced in world-weary fashion by Phillip Seymour Hoffman) is a real piece of work. Fueled by a steady stream of chocolate hot dogs (his own culinary creation, of which there are many), he tops the 350-pound mark. He goes to Overeaters Anonymous meetings but struggles with both his diet and people in general. We later learn Max suffers from Asperger's Syndrome (he's an 'Aspie'). Asperger's is an autism spectrum disorder that is characterized by significant difficulties in social interaction, along with restricted and repetitive patterns of behavior and interests. And Max has all these in spades. What he doesn't have (except for an invisible fellow called Mr. Ravioli) is a true friend.
A friendship ensues between these long-distance penpals. Max gives Mary some good advice on how to deal with her tormentor at school. Mary tries to help Max come up with ways to lose weight. Chocolate products of every imaginable stripe cross the ocean between the two. It's not always smooth sailing--at one point, a letter from Mary throws Max into a anxiety-induced meltdown that causes him to be institutionalized for eight months. Mary loses faith in her friend but only briefly; Max is able to rally himself and resume communication once he gets out of the mental hospital.
Mary grows up both of her parents die and she enrolls in university, where she immerses herself in the study of mental disorders. She also gets married to her childhood crush, but that ends disastrously for Mary. As does the book she writes on Max; his response to being the subject of her thesis is fury and rage and sends Mary into a downward spiral. But through it all--which is the ups and downs of life on this planet--the friendship perseveres. Sometimes the bond is strong, sometimes it's very fragile, but it's always there and for that Mary and Max are grateful. Will they ever meet face-to-face, though. That's the key question and something that is settled in a way that is very satisfying and emotionally resonant.
This is a Claymation production--the first one I have ever seen and the look of the movie just rules. The amount of time that went into making the film was Herculean--according to the Wikipedia entry principal photography lasted over 57 weeks, using 133 separate sets, 212 puppets, and 475 miniature props, including a fully functioning Underwood typewriter which apparently took nine weeks to design and build. The writing--also from Elliott--is tremendous. Yes, there are dark, depressing undertones throughout but that's life. Life isn't always candy cane skies and lemon drop trees. Sometimes you get picked on. Sometimes your parents suck. Sometimes you can't control your appetite and your buttcrack shows when you bend over. Stuff happens! But Elliott is able to find humor in the depressing ordinariness most of us have to deal with day in and day out.
I can't say enough good things about this film; I'd give it 1,000 stars and 20 thumbs-up.
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