The inventiveness of the human mind has brought us far in different areas in life. Some of those are things you don’t even think about anymore, like how efficiently the food on your plate was transported there or how certain diseases which killed millions of people centuries ago can now be easily prevented or cured. Despite all those developments there still is a lot left to explore and when it comes to space we have only just started. The last time we were on another celestial body is already 43 years ago and although Dutch businessman Bas Lansdorp has big plans with his Mars One project (which has been receiving a lot of critique), it is something which probably won’t be realised anytime soon.
Fortunately the movies gives us an opportunity to dream about that and in The Martian the human race has come that far and the first people have landed there. Directed by science fiction specialist Ridley Scott and starring Matt Damon, Jessica Chastain, Jeff Daniels, Michael Peña and Chiwetel Ejiofor the question is whether that dream has been successfully brought to life with this film.
The movie opens on Mars, where the members of the Mars mission are executing ground research. A sudden storm forces them to abort their mission and get on the rocket to go back to earth as it’s about to be toppled over by the strong winds. During the evacuation Mark Watney (Matt Damon) is hit by flying debris. The rest of the crew is unable to locate him and as they don’t receive any signal assume he has died and leave. It turns out though that Mark is still alive, but for how long? With a serious injury, a limited supply of food and the next mission arriving in four years it looks like he will have to spend his last days on the red planet until he will die.
Although many movie fans slowly started doubting Ridley Scott’s ability to direct movies after The Counselor and Exodus: Gods and Kings he shows he has still got it. He succeeds in telling two different stories, one about a man who has to try to survive on a planet without any natural resources and another story about the specialist at NASA who will have to come up with a plan to help and save him. It is best described as a mix of Apollo 13, Cast Away and Gravity which works extremely well.
Matt Damon is fantastic in his role. His “Wilson” is the video diary he makes and because he constantly looks straight into the camera it creates a strong bond with the viewer. You laugh at his jokes and feels his pain and frustration when something doesn’t go as planned. Mars itself has been beautifully realised, with shots of impressive, empty mountain ranges. It makes the contrast with Mark Watney’s barrack even bigger. There isn’t a moment in the movie where you are doubting the realness of the world Ridley Scott has created together with his team. There are some movies which you can’t miss seeing at the cinema and The Martian definitely is one of those.
Perhaps it was a “bad” thing I read the book but I couldn’t help but thinking that The Martian, while a great film, isn’t what the book was. But rather what mainstream Hollywood has translated the book as. The book portrays a lot more just how tough it was for Watney to survive on his own. Personally, I thought the film made it look a little easy. There were more triumphs than disasters. Even on the Nasa side of things. It was painful sometimes in the book to read Watney go through what he was going through, all alone and defying death at ever chance. I wished there was more of that in the film. More of his determination against odds that were stacked far higher on him in the book than the film.
I guess reading a book first creates some expectations which a movie is never able to realize. But I can understand what you are saying.
All the rave reviews on this, I think I might toddle to the cinema this week and catch it. Nice job, man. Great review.
You should do that Rodney 🙂
Fine, fine review. I wish I was as blown away as many were. But I don’t want to dwell on the negative. There is still so much to like with this picture. Another winner from Scott, one of my favorite filmmakers.
Shame you weren’t as blown away, but it is a beautiful picture 🙂
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