Movie Review: The Martian

The Martian (2015)

PG-13

3.5 Stars out of 5

Director                              Ridley Scott
Writer                                 Drew Goddard, Andy Weir (book)
Cinematography               Dariusz Wolski
Music                                  Harry Gregson-Williams

Matt Damon                      Mark Watney
Jessica Chastain                 Melissa Lewis
Kristen Wiig                        Annie Montrose
Jeff Daniels                         Teddy Sanders
Michael Pena                     Rick Martinez
Sean Bean                           Mitch Henderson
Kate Mara                           Beth Johanssen
Chiwetel Ejiofor                 Vincent Kapoor

 

Like similar tales that have come before (“Gravity” – 2013, “Cast Away” - 2000, “Apollo 13” - 1995, even “Robinson Crusoe on Mars” – 1964, and many more), Hollywood loves a good survival story. What could be more compelling than a resilient hero pushed to his or her limits fighting the environment and their own personal demons in order to survive? Combine this cinematic trope with some spectacular cinematography illustrating Martian landscapes, sprinkle in some reasonable acting from Matt Damon and the under-used Jessica Chastain; borrow some scenes from “Apollo 13” and “Gravity” (apparently when all else fails in space, you simply have to jump really, really hard in order to save yourself), and some (let’s say) irritating music from the Disco era, and you have the recipe for “The Martian”. That being said, it was a fairly entertaining film.

Mark Watney (Matt Damon) is on a mission to Mars with his disco music loving commander Melissa Lewis (Jessica Chastain) when a very nasty storm rolls in. Are such storms even possible in Mars’ thin atmosphere, and if they are what’s NASA’s plan for their escape module to avoid falling over in such a wind? These questions and more may run through your mind as you watch Mark get left behind by Melissa and the rest of her crew, Beth Johanssen (Kate Mara), Mark’s wisecracking buddy Rick Martinez (Michael Pena), and a couple others too insignificant to list here. Commander Melissa is led to believe by events that Mark is dead and as such leaves Mars with a heavy heart before her escape pod falls over and they are all stranded. Mark, of course (spoiler alert) is not dead. The bulk of the movie depicts how he is going to “science the heck out Mars” in order to survive. Needless to say, he has a few setbacks, but where there is a will, there is a way (at least in Hollywood).

To the movie’s and the writers’ credit, there is considerable time spent watching the team at NASA in Houston and JPL in Pasadena work with Mark to help him help himself. This movie borrows the scene from “Apollo 13” wherein some tape and a bunch of stuff on the table must be used in order to create a jury-rigged oxygen generator. “Apollo 13” had the benefit of being based on actual events; “The Martian” does not. Instead, we are asked to believe that Mark can solve a leaking space suit helmet with duct tape (it’s silvery, so maybe it’s NASA duct tape) and then shortly thereafter seal up his compromised habitat with the same tape and some plastic sheeting – remember, this is the same planet that had winds which just about toppled the escape pod. Oh well, its “science” fiction; emphasis on the fiction.

This type of movie follows such a set formula, you can almost set your watch to the events on screen: Mark solves a problem, next problem coming up in 3, 2, 1 seconds – bingo, go solve another one Mark. The writers do address this scenario in the very end during a lecture to new astronauts: they must be prepared to do just that, solve one problem, then another. So, maybe, this really is the way space travel is and will be conducted; or maybe, it just some kind of cinematic alarm clock that must be adhered to. However, formula or not, “The Martian” as directed by Ridley Scott and written by Drew Goddard based on a book by Andy Weir is exciting. You know problems are coming, you know solutions will always be there, so don’t worry about the predictability, just sit back and enjoy the ride. And it is an entertaining ride, a ride made the more enjoyable by the remarkable sceneries created to stand in for Mars coupled with some very poetic cinematography by Dariusz Wolski.

The technical tools used to make this movie, the build –up and release of tension and the frequently wry comments made by Mark as he addresses his seemingly hopeless situation help make this a fun movie. It quite probably would have been a better candidate for the summer blockbuster season, but considering how well it has done in the market place, it would seem the studio knew what it was doing when it released “The Martian” during the roll up to the Oscar-contending film release season. One other curious note about the movie is the use of large amounts of Disco music in the soundtrack. The screenplay has Mark complain fairly non-stop about Melissa’s musical choice, and I presume the viewers must assume she is the only one to have brought any music to Mars, but what was Ridley Scott and Drew Goddard thinking? Is there some musical or thematic reason to use this musical genre? Are they trying to drive the audience that much closer to the edge of their seats with musical anxiety? In any event, “The Martian” can fall into my guilty pleasures category. There are no surprises, no deep currents running in this movie, but it was a fun and thrilling ride to spend a rainy afternoon watching.

Movie Review: Interstellar

Interstellar (2014)

Four and half Stars out of Five

Cooper: Matthew McConaughey

Brand: Anne Hathaway

Murph: Jessica Chastain

Director/Writer: Christopher Nolan

Writer: Jonathan Nolan

Cinematography Director:  Hoyte Van Hoytema

Music: Hans Zimmer

Christopher Nolan has consistently shown himself willing to take on difficult-to-tell stories (the reverse time flow of Memento is a good example). As the director and co-writer with his younger brother, Jonathan, Nolan has found with Interstellar an incredibly challenging story to tell. If one focuses on the science and time sequence issues, the story might be as confusing as 2001: A Space Odyssey. On the other hand, if one instead focuses on the father/daughter tale, it is a wonderfully emotional story than anyone can follow and appreciate.

The story is of a future Earth (with oddly contemporary trucks and cars) where a “blight” is systematically destroying the Earth’s food crops and converting the atmosphere to an oxygen-free version of today’s air. We are introduced to Cooper played by Matthew McConaughey and his immediate family, which includes a pre-adolescent daughter, Murph (Mackenzie Foy). These early scenes are often oddly comic in dialog but deeply sinister in foreshadowing. Borrowing sequences from Ken Burns’ documentary on the American dust-bowl, the viewer is shown that the Earth and her inhabitants have no future in this second dust-bowl.

Through a largely unbelievable story line Cooper is engaged by NASA to pilot a vessel to Saturn, enter a worm hole and venture out to three prospective new worlds where Humankind might begin again. There are logical inconsistencies in setting this stage, and the physics (despite being advised by Cal Tech’s Kip Thorne) require on several occasions much from the viewer, but then this is fiction, science fiction, and one must make allowances for this kind of tale.

The stage is a fantastic one, but like television’s The Walking Dead, the viewer is allowed to take in situations and people on this stage that are completely believable in this context and to take part in several scenes of overwhelming emotional intensity. This has always been for me the hallmark, even the raison d’etre for good speculative fiction, whether of a scientific or fantasy nature. That is to say create a stage where the story-teller can give the audience a tale that will involve them emotionally and inform them intellectually; and ideally tell such emotions and ideas that simply cannot be told without that fantastic stage.

The Nolan’s in Interstellar have created a story that makes intimate and completely requisite use of time dilation, of Einstein/Hawking attempts at a theory of everything (and of course, they get one – hey, it’s Hollywood), and to involve the audience in the effects of the former, and the necessity of the latter to save Mankind. Such a fantastic stage this is. And yet, because of the time dilation effects of immense gravity near a black hole, we are treated to a story of life-long love between a father and a daughter that simply cannot be told in any other way.

The acting by McConaughey and Chastain as the adult Murph are as in last year’s Texas Buyer’s Club for McConaughey and 2012’s Zero Dark Thirty for Chastain are easily Oscar-worthy performances. Indeed, this movie is filled with superb acting: John Lithgow as Coop’s father-in-law, Michael Caine as Brand’s father, Matt Damon and Anne Hathaway as fellow astronauts. But for me the highlight scene involved McConaughey reacting to a message from home – it was almost too painful to watch for its intensity.

Another great aspect of using the science fiction stage was the incredible special effects depicting the worm hole and black hole (though I must say, some of the space ship exterior scenes seemed oddly of a lower caliber). The editing near the end of the movie and the music score by Hans Zimmer throughout were of very high quality. The use in particular of an absence of sound for various space scenes to help give a feel for space versus the soaring music for other scenes of great emotional intensity were often spectacular.

I loved this movie and wanted so badly to give it five stars, but alas the science and logical inconsistencies won’t let me. But I did love this film and want everyone to see it. I’ll write elsewhere of the problematic parts that keep occurring to me after walking out of the theater.