Spoiler-free movie review: "Mary and Max"

A few days ago I was browsing the Netflix streaming service on my Wii and I came across this claymation movie with a really unusual and unique premise:
Mary is an 8-year-old "ugly duckling" living in the boondocks of Australia. She's desperately lonely because she has neglectful parents, no siblings, and no friends at school. One day she finds a New York address book at her local post office, randomly picks a name from it, and starts writing to that person in the hopes that she can at least have a pen-pal. That person turns out to be Max Horovits; a middle-aged man with Asperger's Syndrome. Turns out he's in the same boat as her; he also desperately wants to have a real friend, but he doesn't know how to make that happen. So he writes back to her. They start off discussing simple things like their mutual love of chocolate and a cartoon called "The Nobblets". And their letters begin to tackle more complex issues once they get to know each other better and little Mary grows older.


( Review under the cut... )

Spoiler-free movie review: "Mary and Max"

A few days ago I was browsing the Netflix streaming service on my Wii and I came across this claymation movie with a really unusual and unique premise:
Mary is an 8-year-old "ugly duckling" living in the boondocks of Australia. She's desperately lonely because she has neglectful parents, no siblings, and no friends at school. One day she finds a New York address book at her local post office, randomly picks a name from it, and starts writing to that person in the hopes that she can at least have a pen-pal. That person turns out to be Max Horovits; a middle-aged man with Asperger's Syndrome. Turns out he's in the same boat as her; he also desperately wants to have a real friend, but he doesn't know how to make that happen. So he writes back to her. They start off discussing simple things like their mutual love of chocolate and a cartoon called "The Nobblets". And their letters begin to tackle more complex issues once they get to know each other better and little Mary grows older.


( Review under the cut... )