Victoria Government
Victoria's Adam Elliot tells stories using models made out of clay. His latest film called Mary and Max was just released on DVD. The story is about two lonely people who become good friends by writing letters to each other. Elliot wants to make films that help people understand that everyone is different. His characters are based on real people.
Posted by: Ben Moore, on 01/12/09
Mary sends a letter to her friend Max in Adam Elliott's latest delight
Academy-award winning filmmaker Adam Elliot has a simple goal.
What I really want for people is to leave the cinema feeling nourished,
the famous Victorian says. My films are like a multi-vitamin for the soul!
Elliot spoke to DiVine following the recent release of Mary and Max on DVD. He told of his passion for embracing imperfection and his determination to help audiences feel empathy for his diverse characters.
Mary and Max is a dark, comic story, evocatively told through claymation. It’s about two unusual people whose struggle for friendship unites and ultimately transforms their lives. Young Mary is lonely in 70's suburban Melbourne. Max is old, overweight and autistic in New York. They become pen friends and try to overcome their differences.
Elliot is the film's writer, director and designer. It is his first feature-length film and was funded on the strength of Elliot’s Oscar-winning animated short, Harvie Krumpet from 2003.
The first striking thing about Mary and Max is the depth of the characters and the range of real human experience they display. It has been described as a journey that explores friendship, autism, taxidermy, psychiatry, alcoholism, obesity, kleptomania, sexual difference, agoraphobia and more
.
The 37-year-old says he is fascinated by human nature. I'm also fascinated by the crazy idea that we are all striving for perfection... Everyone has a flaw that they may not want, that some people embrace, some people ignore, some people try and cure it, some people label it as a disability, some people label it as an advantage.
Elliot says he gets annoyed when people say I make films about disability
. I just make films about people around me. Basically what I'm saying is that everybody is unusual and that everybody is unique and everybody has imperfection. It's all about perception and how you can forgive yourself and others.
Mary and Max is inspired by the true story of Elliot's own pen-pal friendship of 20 years. I've been quite fascinated by him for a long time and I said:
well, I wonder if I could piece these letters together and create some sort of a story?
An important part of Mary and Max’s relationship is communication and understanding each other’s unique challenges. We witness the way in which personal problems, once shared, can cease to be troubles. This is perhaps the essence of friendship, and it's also what Elliot wants his work to do with its audiences.What I try and do with my films is develop a sense of empathy between the audience and my characters so that by the end of the film they have put themselves in my characters’ shoes and know what it's like (to be) lonely and misunderstood,
he says.
Elliot acknowledges that some people find the films very challenging and confronting and dark,
but this doesn't worry him.I love that, at least I'm getting a reaction. I couldn't stand it if there was just a sense of indifference or apathy. I want them to react, and I want them to react positively. And the majority of people do.
However, Elliot has been frustrated by some American audiences who are perhaps too familiar with Disney-style animation. He says many people seem to believe that there's a rule that animated films are not allowed to have dark moments
.I just write about everyday people who just happen to have Asperger's syndrome or just happen to be asthmatics or happen to have Tourettes. These are based on very real people that I am related to and that I'm friends with.
It is strange considering the same audiences don't seem to mind gratuitous violence.Oh yeah, that's the irony, they are quite happy to promote and market a film like Transformers to eight year olds, you know, when there is plenty of death, violence and sex and all the rest. But when they're shown a plasticine film where there is an attempted suicide scene, well that's just challenging.
Another important component of what makes Mary and Max special is the claymation, but it’s a choice that Elliot freely describes as madness
.For me to make one (film), I need five years, I need $8 million, and I need 120 people to help me. And even with all that an animator produces five seconds per day, so it's incredibly slow, expensive, pain-staking and at times, incredibly tedious.
But Elliot still enjoys the creative control and power of expression that comes with using clay. You play God really, your characters can look however you like, if they give a bad performance, you screw them up in a ball! (But) I think the biggest advantage about animation is the benefit of exaggeration.
Mary and Max is more real than real
in the best cartoon tradition of magnifying features and expressions. It is accompanied by brilliant character voicing by Philip Seymour Hoffman, Toni Collette and Eric Bana (with Barry Humphries' ever dead-pan but pregnant narration).
Elliot is justifiably proud of his work, but still struggles to cope with the fame of being an Oscar winner.Well, you know, I still battle with my shyness,
he admits. I think I'm a lot better than I used to be, although I don't consider shyness to be a disadvantage at all. Having to go on stage in front of a billion people live, you know (laughs) you deal with it or have a nervous breakdown!
When he’s not on set, Elliot is in demand as a corporate speaker. I get on stage and do a 45-minute presentation about my life, and I've done that now over 300 times and I'm still as nervous today as I was the first time. I don't know why, but I think I wouldn't ever want to lose my shyness.
So where does a shy filmmaker get $8 million dollars to tell a story?Well, it came from you!
Elliot says. The majority of it is taxpayer’s money through Screen Australia, SBS, and Film Victoria.
Fortunately, Mary and Max is money, time, talent and plasticine well invested.
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