If you watched Mary and Max and then watched Memoir of a Snail (2024), I wonder if you would know everything you need to know about the creative force behind these films, Adam Elliot.
I like both films, and they're both quite similar -- the visual world, the characters, the humor. If Snail was a "brown" film, then so is this one.
It's obviously a sad film. Mary and Max do have more people to call friends than just one another. They each have neighbors. Mary even marries her neighbor. Does he leave her? Sure, but he's not depicted as being a bad guy for it. Max's neighbor, too, comes off as a real friend, but if Max and Mary "dream" about each other and ignore other examples of human contact, maybe Elliot is commenting on the nature of distance, and how distance sometimes helps people open up in ways they don't to those around them.
What a fun experiment, to just pick a name at random and develop a friendship with a total stranger who lives thousands of miles away. If you're in your 50s or older, maybe you can remember having a "pen pal." In the modern world of instant communication, it's hard to remember that this was a thing. The whole way people live in solitude and loneliness has changed. For Mary and Max, they kind of were each other's worlds, in a sense. They were at least someone to share their thoughts with, and they never had to worry about what the other might be thinking.
The breach of trust, of course, happens. Mary turns Max's friendship into a case study. But, and maybe a little bit unbelievably, she's willing to give up her academic research for the sake of his friendship.
Rating: 5/5 stars
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