Mary and Max both have feet of clay and are in need of a friend. Max is a lonely, overweight New Yorker whose only positive relationship is his new penpal Mary Daisy Dinkle, an eight-year-old with a sad home life. The film follows twenty years of this melancholy long-distance friendship.
Mary and Max is the feature length debut for Adam Elliot, who won an Oscar for his claymation short Harvey Krumpet. Elliot's handcrafted talent and cinematic voice is utterly unique in world cinema, demonstrated when this film opened the Sundance Film Festival to a rapturous reception.
Critics have fallen in love with his obsessive detail and quirky observational humour. Could Elliot be the Gen X Leunig?
An eclectic cast of voices include Toni Colette, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Barry Humphries and Eric Bana.
"The film is sublime," Margaret Pomeratz said. "It's funny and insightful... it was five years in the making and worth every minute."
"You really care about these characters, even though you know they're made of plasticine," said David Stratton.
Mary and Max screens this Friday 21st August at 7.30pm at Port Fairy Cinema in Bank Street. Memberships available at the door with free tea and coffee provided.
Persepolis is Port Fairy Film Society’s February screening. Review by Damien Becker.
Animation grew up long ago thanks largely to Japanese anime and Pixar, but audiences for ‘cartoons’, no matter how worthy the subject matter, can still be tricky to find. Some people just can’t seem to bond with drawings.
If this sounds like you, Persepolis might change your mind. The film looks at the Iranian revolution of the seventies through the voice of Marjane, a teenage girl with a dangerous love of punk rock. Marjane, like the film itself, is smart and endearingly straightforward. The revolution brings oppression and regression, especially for wisecracking rebellious teenage girls. This is a painful memory, but she doesn’t flinch in the telling of it with bite and humour.
Persepolis is a film of an autobiographic comic about an Iranian girl fleeing to France while speaking mostly in English. It sounds confusing, but it’s easy to watch and enjoy. It also chronicles a forgotten story, when Iran was open and tolerant until change came both insidiously and frighteningly swiftly.
The more sophisticated cinema effects technology and the fancier the editing gets, the clearer it is whether the people involved know what they’re doing as old fashioned filmmakers. A good story well told visually is still the foundation of the best films, as it always was.
Two recent animations, Persepolis and Waltz With Bashir have wowed audiences and critics even as they tackled difficult aspects of Middle East history. Persepolis beat all conventional films to win the Jury Prize at Cannes. Waltz With Bashir has even been nominated for an Oscar in a general film category, Best Foreign Language Picture.
The animation of Persepolis is hand-drawn but sharp and magical, and what it lacks in effects trickery it replaces with heartfelt, clever writing and clear visual style.
“An uplifting, funny, moving fable about the difference between the ideal of freedom and the real thing,” wrote Jim Schembri of The Age.
“A unique insight into life in Iran from the point of view of a young girl, this observant cinematic impression sears itself into our consciousness by its simplicity,” said Louise Keller from Urban Cinefiles.
“Four stars… this is a hymn to the human spirit, to a young woman who refused to let fundamentalism destroy her love of life,” said David Stratton, of ABC-TV’s At the Movies.
Screening starts at 7.30pm. Memberships available at the door, tea and coffee provided.
