The director of ‘Harvey Krumpet’ moulds another tale of social outcasts. By JACOB POWELL.

UTILISING the clay-mation medium to good effect – with the odd CG touch-up – Australian animator Adam Elliot’s debut feature Mary and Max takes on the odd-couple genre in a sweetly endearing way but injected with a good dose of black humour and without the saccharine coating this kind of story might usually attract.

I say ‘this kind of story’ but actually the plot framework is perhaps one of the more unique and interesting things about this production. Mary Daisy Dinkle (voiced by the increasingly popular Toni Collette) is an isolated eight-year-old girl growing up in an unpromising, if not unusual social setting. Mum likes to ‘taste’ the cooking sherry a little too often and dad retreats into his workshop to stuff the road kill birds he finds on the side of the highway. Sadly, it seems like no one has time for Mary at school either. One day Mary picks a random name from an American telephone book she finds on a visit to the local library and writes to ask a few questions about life in America. The unwitting recipient of Mary’s letter is Max Jerry Horovitz (Philip Seymour Hoffman in fine form) – an obese Jewish atheist New Yorker in his forties with an even less promising set of social skills. Mary’s unexpected parcel at first causes Max to have an anxiety attack but sharing a love of chocolate, a lack of understanding about the ways of the world, and most importantly an intense loneliness and desire for friendship, the pair embark on a charmingly awkward and enduring correspondence.

Elliot creates visual interest by contrasting the locations of the protagonists with his colour choices. Whereas Mary’s setting in a dusty Melbourne suburb is all washed out oranges and browns Max’s New York is completely in black and white thereby mirroring the characters’ life prospects and social situations. Whilst Mary’s world is in colour the fact that it is under saturated speaks to her lack of social capital; however, compared with Max’s setting hers seems positively vibrant and likewise this is the case in the difference of state of their personal lives. You might wonder whether Mary’s colour scheme could go the way of Max’s if her life follows a certain trajectory; or perhaps Elliot is commenting on the specific locations and his feelings regarding each. Elliot also employs the strategy of objects and people retaining their colour properties when they move between their respective locations: for instance all the gifts in Mary’s packages to Max remain in colour in all the scenes set in his apartment and vice versa.

Although Mary and Max feels and plays like a children’s film the humour and action is probably blacker, and in some cases more explicit, than most parents would be keen for their kids to see. This being the case the film’s style is somewhat at odds with its intended audience which does occasionally make it feel a little off. To his credit Elliot resists the temptation to make this a typical feel-good movie instead injecting cool realism into the bizarre plot outline – particularly in terms of the relationships and character arcs. Mary unconsciously ends up following a dangerously similar path to her mother whilst Max never really gets the better of his ‘condition’ – but then he doesn’t feel he needs to which is a telling social comment in itself.

I feel like I should like Mary and Max more than I did – don’t get me wrong, it is a fine and charming film with great moments of both humour and sadness – but for reasons I am finding hard to pin down I just didn’t find it as compelling as the plot outlined made me hope I would. That said I am glad to have gotten along to it.