The Martian 2015
I heard some good reviews about this movie and finally got a chance to see it before it left theaters. It sounded very similar to Gravity, but set on Mars, and there are some parallels. It is also kind of a Robinson Crusoe or Cast Away type of story as Matt Damon’s character has to live on Mars for quite a while before there can be any rescue attempt. Damon does a good job though the material isn’t quite as gripping as Cast Away or Gravity. Other casting choices seem a little odd, with Kristen Wiig in a serious role, Jeff Daniels as the NASA director, and Sean Bean as one of the NASA scientists. It seems weird they would all be in a movie together.
The movie is long, but I felt like they could have added any number of setbacks and problems at almost any point that would have really stretched things out, but not to worry since they were plenty of setbacks and things move along pretty well towards the end. Still, I didn’t feel like there was a ton of suspense and some of the science seemed lacking or very forced that they would overlook a solution until the last possible minute.
It is still a good movie and it is always fun to see a setup like this of a guy trying to live on his own (really, really on his own), and then read later to see how much of it makes sense scientifically. So that leaves me somewhere around a B.
Written: 28 Nov 2015
Owned on: Digital