Supporting Damon are Jessica Chastain, playing the leadership-oriented Commander Lewis; Chiwetel Ejiofor as Vincent Kapoor, the man assigned to get Watney home; and Jeff Daniels, as the head of NASA.
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What happens to Watney (essayed by Damon) in The Martian may appear quite analogous to the doomed fate of castaways. This is not Cast Away, however; this is a story of ingenuity and plain old engineering, not Watney’s emotional journey. Bright, thematically can-do, fast-paced almost to a fault, and fundamentally optimistic, The Martian is science fiction of the infinitely more comforting Star Trek strain. No wonder that the author tried to keep it scientifically accurate as he studied orbital mechanics, astronomy, and the history of manned spaceflight. His latest film, “The Martian“, is quite refreshing in that it in no way, shape or form appears to be pushing any sort of ideological agenda. Weir sold the print rights to Crown in March 2013 for over a hundred thousand dollars.
The Matt Damon fueled, love-letter-to-science movie, “The Martian“, will be hitting theaters this weekend, much to the delight of sci-fi fans around the globe. In the movie, however, Astronaut Watney is shown producing water, through a chemical reaction using Hydrazine, to grow potatoes. Despite the severity of the danger throughout, Drew Goddard has kept much of Weir’s humor in his script. This is mostly saved for Watney who has no issues in delivering expletive laden rants at his bosses or exchanging friendly insults with his crew. “By the 2030s, we want a human presence in that area [Mars], perhaps a flyby like we did to the moon… or perhaps going to Phobos and Deimos, which are two moons of Mars”, Jim Green, NASA director of the planetary science division, tells Mashable. In addition, the astute choices in the soundtrack gives last year’s Guardians of the Galaxy a run for its money.
“This is Nasa trying to drum up publicity for The Martian movie”. Things on the ground are a little more mixed.
But overall, “The Martian” lacks the gravitas to create the impact of an exciting adventurous film. The movie marks Ridley Scott’s return to his most favorite genre, after a gap of three years, following Prometheus. Meanwhile, no one in this film could best Damon’s performance.
Ridley Scott has accomplished making Mark Watney a very interesting guy for over 75 minutes, alone on the screen. He is well supported by the rest of the cast.
Being trapped in space has always been a terrifying concept to me.
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Through stunning visual effects and spectacular imagery, the audience gleans a feel for what it’s like on Mars and in outer space.
