Mary and Max

Rating: 8/10 (27 June 2017)

The wrinkly and awkward design of the characters and settings, as well as the dry dull color palette in "Mary and Max" gives the film a gross, clunky texture, and I wouldn't want it any other way, because, like the characters themselves, the animation style's (intentional) imperfection is what makes it so charming.
The film's premise is simple, but the emotional complexity of the characters get the premise a long way. A 9 year old Australian girl sending a letter to a 44 year old obese man in New York out of curiosity, but mainly out of loneliness, and it just so happens that the very person she contacts is just as lonely and confused as she is. Almost the whole movie is done in voice over, much of it by a narrator and the rest by the main two characters, since all of their interactions are through letters and not physical dialogue, and much of what they are saying and thinking is animated to accompany the voice over. But even the narrator has a distinctive character to it, and Still, Philip Seymour Hoffman is able bring life into this idiosyncratic character of Max, fully embodying all his sincerity in every word, despite an inability to physically communicate his emotions. The effect of the visualization of the voice-over is a somewhat storybook- like tone to the film. But despite seemingly like a film intended for children on the surface, it reaches into the subjects of depression, childhood trauma, and living with a mental disability. While it treats these subjects with as much respect and seriousness as they deserve, at the core of the film is, of course, the sweet friendship between Mary and Max, and how they each serve as a solace; someone they can understand and depend on in a world filled with unpredictability. Because they each knew there would always be a friend that could appreciate them even with all their imperfections, they were both able to accept themselves for who they were, warts and all.