Mary and Max

The scenes focused on Malcolm's house and the scenes focused on Malcolm's relationship (or lack thereof) with Jenny reminded me a bit of Mary and Max (which I'm saying that way because I saw Mary and Max a couple years ago. I just watched Malcolm this past week.)

Obviously, Mary and Max is quite different in a lot of respects--I'm really just talking about some superficial, more abstract relationship aspects and the feel of the suburban neighborhood and scenes, but I wonder if Malcolm was at all an influence on Mary and Max . . . or maybe the similarities in the feel of the neighborhood, etc. are more simply due to the fact that both are Australian?