he animated Korean film My Beautiful Girl Mari first presents its protagonist, Kim Nam-woo, as a distracted, slightly spacey office worker, clumsy and distant. But when he meets an old friend, Jun-Ho, for dinner, it becomes clear that his behavior is abnormal. He hasn't seen Jun-Ho in a long time, and their reunion has stirred up childhood memories and long-forgotten emotions, leaving Nam-woo unmoored. When Jun-Ho gives him an object from their shared past, Nam-woo embarks on a flashback, recalling a magical interlude that they'd both set aside long ago.
As a schoolboy, Nam-woo is similarly distracted and spacey, though with more reason. His father is long dead, his mother has a new suitor in her life, his grandmother is dismissive and judgmental, a bullying girl has taken a possessive interest in him, and his best friend, Jun-Ho, is about to head to Seoul for school. Obsessed with the way people abandon him, Nam-woo has become distant and abrupt, hiding his feelings and rudely treating everyone in his life as if they don't matter. Even Jun-ho believes Nam-woo won't miss him, and doesn't need anyone—at least, not anyone but his adopted stray cat Yo.
Then Nam-woo sees a strange marble in a shop, one that appears to have the image of a tiny flying girl inside it. Shortly thereafter, odd things start happening—exploring an abandoned lighthouse with Yo, Nam-woo encounters a strange sort of flying, bubble-shaped, fishlike creature, and climbing to the top of the tower, he's suddenly sucked into a bizarre fantasy world of giant flowers, tethered clouds and humongous, bizarre beasts, plus a strange, furry-looking flying girl. Nam-woo is initially convinced he's dreaming, but the reality of the place impresses itself on him enough that when he abruptly returns home, he relates the story to a disbelieving Jun-ho. Returning to the lighthouse later, Nam-woo finds nothing unusual, but the flying girl, Mari, finds her way into his waking life and his sleep. And eventually, he and his friend find their way to Mari's world together, with crucial consequences for both their families.
A fantasy that's barely familiar
My Beautiful Girl Mari is animated in a distinctive and unusual style; a sequence in which Nam-woo briefly watches some anime on TV almost seems designed to show how unlike anime the film looks. The character designs are simple and iconic, looking something like a smooth-edged version of Leo Lionni's layed-construction-paper picture books, and just a little like Richard Linklater's Waking Life, though without the floating-layer effect. At the same time, finely detailed coloration, layers and shading give the moving images a far denser and more sophisticated look than any single frame would suggest. The opening sequence, in which a seagull flies over a snowy gray city, is astonishingly beautiful, and Mari's garden world is equally stunning. The rich colors often come in themes—pure whites, pastel greens and pinks in Mari's world, greys and browns at the local public baths, and deep blues during a particularly lovely scene when Nam-woo lies in bed at night, looking at the moonlight and quietly thinking about flight.
Visuals aside, My Beautiful Girl Mari is a gentle mood piece, given to long silences and muted, evocative music. The nostalgia, loneliness and melancholy are palpable in the strongest scenes; in other cases, the film just meanders fluidly with little sense of direction or intention, as the two boys swim or wander together in their last interlude before separation. It's not a film for the impatient or action-oriented.
It might, in fact, be best-suited for fans of Hayao Miyazaki's My Neighbor Totoro. Nam-woo isn't as cute and energetic as the protagonists of that classic film, and the film's tone isn't nearly as effervescent and joyous. But the unhurried plot, the sense of innocent amazement, and above all, the vision of a child-accessible kingdom of wonder that touches and affects the real world only in moments of crisis all seem pleasantly familiar. My Beautiful Girl Mari isn't quite the instant classic Totoro was, but it's just as sweet and just as sincere, and just as friendly to younger audiences and older animation buffs alike.
The extras on this DVD are nonexistent, apart from a series of ADV trailers. Pity—a project this unique-looking could use a making-of featurette more than most films out there, if only to explore the animation techniques used.
— Tasha
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