Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Blu-ray from down under!


Today’s Blu-ray will probably be a movie that you’ve never heard of before, but it was my favorite film from 2009. If you don’t remember 2009, it was the year that Slumdog Millionare won best picture; Heath Ledger won the award for best actor for The Dark Knight, and Wall-E won best animated film. So when I say that this movie is my favorite film from that year, it means a lot. The movie is called Mary and Max and it is the first foreign Blu-ray of my collection! Err well it was made in Australia and written and directed by Adam Elliot so it’s not that exotic, but it's foreign to me lol! It’s a clay-animated movie about the relationship between two pen pals and how they become friends. There is an eight year old girl named Mary Daisy Dinkle (voiced by Toni Collette) from Melbourne,Australia who is teased by kids at school, has an alcoholic mother, and is too poor to afford toys so she has to make her own. She decides to make a friend by picking someone randomly out of the phone book and writing a letter to them. She ends up picking the other main character of the film Max Horowitz (voiced by Philip Seymour Hoffman), who lives in a crappy apartment in New York City and suffers from Asperger syndrome. 



The film follows their lives and their friendship and it is one of the most endearing movies I have ever seen. I laughed, cried and got angry all because you become so involved with the characters. If there is one favor that you do for me ever, it is that you watch this movie.

Now on to the important stuff, the Blu-ray part. Simply put this movie looks perfect in high definition. You can see every ounce of detail in the hand crafted sets and the monochrome colors look amazing with perfect highlight and dark levels. 

 The special features are pretty standard. There is an audio commentary with writer/director Adam Elliot, there is a behind-the-scenes documentary, alternate scenes, and a short film made by Harvie Krumpet. The most interesting feature is a “making of” video which is a mockumentary that has the characters talking in a The Office style interview about the production process. It’s pretty funny actually.


This is the most expensive Blu-ray I have bought so far at $17.99 on Amazon and it still is the same price now.  I recommend that you rent it, torrent it, or stream it as long as you see it! This movie is on my top 10 list of favorite movies and it was a must have for my collection. If you made it this far, then thanks for reading!

43 comments:

  1. Looks really good, never saw or even heard about it I must confess, I might pick it up if I see it in a store, thanks for the advice!

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  2. I would have never known about this movie. Frakkin love stop motion movies. Thanks bunches!

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  3. Never heard of it before but ill watch it now thanks.

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  4. never heard of this one before

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  5. "Today’s Blu-ray will probably be a movie that you’ve never heard of before"

    Confirmed.

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  6. trailer is looking good, i'll give it a try. thanks

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  7. Wow, those images look really sharp!

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  8. Wallace and Grommit style is awesome

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  9. Loved this animation!! It's really worth it

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  10. Wait, wait, wait... you can high definition claymation? That shocks me, for some reason. After watching the trailer, I will have to watch it. Heh, take a seat...

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  11. Saw this and loved it!

    Great to see someone else found this ;)

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  12. Never heard of that movie before, looks really awesome, so as the animation. Gonna check it out.

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  13. Seems like a really dark movie with a bright light at the end of the figurative tunnel. Seems like an interesting movie and the medium in which it's made seems to give it a bit more depth than if it was made live action. I'm definitely going to have to use my friends netflix account to watch this.

    Or see if it's somehow down at the local store.

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  14. Never heard of it before indeed, but jeez, that is some smooth stop motion. Definitely gonna look more into this.

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  15. 18 bucks, but this is effordable...

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  16. Beautiful. I needed something to watch with my lil cousin that i have to babysit tomorrow.

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  17. i really like the style, this is pretty neat :D

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  18. never heard bout that movie, but it seems quite cool ^^

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  19. This looks awesome, claymation + heart warming storyline = me watching this tonight.

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  20. May have to check this out :)

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  21. wow i'm definitely gonna watch it. never heard of it before and the trailer looks really adorable! thanks

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  22. Looks like such a f-ed up movie maby thats why nobody knew about it.

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  23. Wow very interesting movie. Will look out for it

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  24. Never actually heard of this movie before. I'll give it a look and if I like it as much as you say I should, I might make it my first foreign blu-ray too.

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  25. Oh wow, the animation in this looks terrific!

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  26. never heard of, animations look really good

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  27. Love this movie. More animation! :)

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  28. dude stop frame animation is incredible..i loved this post...keep em coming!

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  29. I loved the movie, nice review. :D

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  30. This looks cool, It reminds me of Wallace and Gromit!

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  31. This movie sounds really interesting, going to see if I can't get it myself! And by the way, over here (well, not with amazon) I have to pay the double of what you paid for one Blu-Ray usually..

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  32. You're right I'd never heard of it, but films with figures like this creep me out a bit..

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  33. never heard of it, but sounds good.

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  34. I really enjoyed this movie when I saw it.

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  35. It looks like that Wallace and Grommit and thats something I don't like.
    But I did like Wall-E though

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