The Martian

Movie Information

The Story: Matt Damon as a man stranded on Mars fighting for survival and hoping for a rescue.  The Lowdown: A grandly entertaining film on every level. It's smart, funny, suspenseful, clever and beautifully acted. Is it profound? Not really, but it's such great entertainment that it hardly matters.
Score:

Genre: Science Fiction
Director: Ridley Scott
Starring: Matt Damon, Jessica Chastain, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Kristin Wiig, Jeff Daniels, Michael Peña, Sean Bean, Kate Mara, Donald Glover
Rated: PG-13

THE MARTIAN

 

Ridley Scott’s The Martian may not be a great film, but it is great pop entertainment. For a full two hours and 20 minutes, it has the ability to hold an audience spellbound with a clever screenplay, perfectly cast performers, stunning visuals, sharp comedy, suspense and a wickedly funny and apt pop music soundtrack. It’s a feel-good movie without the guilt, because each such moment is earned. It may have no great staying power. You probably won’t be thinking about it for days on end — except maybe to remember how cool it was and how much fun you had in its company. But while it’s onscreen it’s hard to fault — unless you work at it, and I’m not inclined to, since I was perfectly happy with it as a moviegoing experience. Having said that, I urge you to see it in a theater. It needs the size. No matter the state of your state-of-the-art home theater, it won’t really duplicate the experience.

 

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If you don’t know — which seems improbable at this point — The Martian is at its heart a modern sci-fi variant on Robinson Crusoe, which, yes, already had been rather quaintly played with in 1964’s Robinson Crusoe on Mars (a movie best left to childhood memory). Modern audiences might more readily think of it as Cast Away in Orbit — minus the volley ball, of course. But here we have Matt Damon as astronaut-botanist Mark Watney. The hapless soul has been left for dead on the red planet when his vital signs monitor is broken in a sandstorm, which had threatened to destroy the ship he and his comrades landed in if they didn’t take off at once. Even without the added bother of having been impaled by a bit of antenna, this is what we used to call “a bad scene” — marooned on a lifeless, inhospitable world with limited supplies and oxygen and only his commander’s (Jessica Chastain) vast collection of disco music for company. Watney, however, isn’t the sort to just give in, and so he sets about figuring out how to survive in the mission’s somewhat limited lab and living quarters — and how to get a message to earth that he’s alive.

 

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This sounds like pretty standard stuff, but it doesn’t play like it. It’s all handled with style and wit — helped immensely by Watney keeping a wryly humorous video log of his efforts. But there’s more, because this is a tale that takes place in three places — Mars, earth and the returning spaceship. Against all manner of improbable odds, the film actually manages to find worthwhile ways to make use of its impressive cast — something I thought was impossible going in. Sure, the film’s focus is on Matt Damon, but the large, brand-name cast is not ill-used in any way. This isn’t just a string of glorified cameos. It’s not a game of “look quick or you’ll miss Chiwetel Ejiofor.” Perhaps more remarkable still is the fact that the various locations shrewdly build in such a way that, by the end, the film manages to feel like the three parts are all the same. It’s a pretty neat trick if you can pull it off, and Scott and screenwriter Drew Goddard can.

 

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As with any film of this type, there’s a tendency for it to play out in a series of set-pieces — some tense, some comic, some desolate — but they never feel forced. This is a movie that includes two montages set to complete pop songs — David Bowie’s “Starman” and ABBA’s “Waterloo” — and it pulls it off both times, despite the fact that “Waterloo” is part of the running gag about the commander’s dubious musical taste. (However, she gets the last word over the ending credits with an unarguably perfect disco choice.) Really, I can’t think of anything that doesn’t work — even the theoretically accurate science-speak goes down smoothly. Certainly, I can’t think of any reason you shouldn’t see this movie, and quite a few reasons why you should. Rated PG-13 for some strong language, injury images and brief nudity.

 

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About Ken Hanke
Head film critic for Mountain Xpress from December 2000 until his death in June 2016. Author of books "Ken Russell's Films," "Charlie Chan at the Movies," "A Critical Guide to Horror Film Series," "Tim Burton: An Unauthorized Biography of the Filmmaker."

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35 thoughts on “The Martian

          • Ken Hanke

            So…you’re honestly saying that Blade Runner is better than — for two examples — Metropolis (without which Blade Runner wouldn’t exist) and 2001, huh?

          • T.rex

            Yes but I love those movies too. I also love both versions of Solaris. Im a huge geek when it comes to Blade Runner, like trekkies are for Star Trek.

          • T.rex

            Right now I need to see Martian (and lots of stuff, so behind) As Arnie says…”Get your arrz to Marz”

          • Ken Hanke

            Being a geek for Blade Runner doesn’t make it great in any constructive sense. It only makes you a fanboy.

          • Ken Hanke

            And I don’t like either Solaris, but I do rate Danny Boyle’s Sunshine and Boorman’s Zardoz over Blade Runner, too.

          • Ken Hanke

            List is a little Spielberg heavy for me, but I’m good with many of them.

          • T.rex

            SUNSHINE was wonderful until the third act became a B rate slasher film. Not only did Blade Runner have a wonderful future noir setting the story was almost Shellian. Whats it like being human? What would you do if you could meet your maker? One of the few times a film trumped its literary source. The music by Vangelis? Perfecto, best music for a rainy day. I could go on and on.

          • T.rex

            Mostly a great list but theres some “popcorn fluff” there. Gaurdians is fun but cant say its a great film.

          • Ken Hanke

            The old last act of Sunshine blah, blah, blah…Phooey with a maraschino cherry on top.

          • Ken Hanke

            Not only did Blade Runner have a wonderful future noir setting the story was almost Shellian. Whats it like being human? What would you do if you could meet your maker? One of the few times a film trumped its literary source. The music by Vangelis? Perfecto, best music for a rainy day. I could go on and on.

            You could, but I still wouldn’t buy it. And what is “Shellian?”

          • Edwin Arnaudin

            One of the few times a film trumped its literary source.

            Nope.

          • Ken Hanke

            I’m not about to listen that tears in the rain thing again.

            And you still haven’t told me what “Shellian” is,

          • T.rex

            Just a reference to the Frankenstein creature. Us wanting to meet our maker…..it sounded smart and fancy. That term goes with my elbow patches and pipe.

  1. Ken Hanke

    The problem with this kind of broad, emphatic, and insistent approach is that it works counter to the best interests of the film in question.

  2. T.rex

    I dont get all the hate for this movie online, outside of “well, its popular so im sure its bad”. Is it the best if the year? No but its a damn good time at the cinema and Im very happy to see a big studio make an intelligent film, especially one that can get kids into science and math. Are there some complaints? Yes, albeit minor ones. The third act needed a twist or just some more tension and they could have lost the David Bowie montage. (great song though) What really pisses me off are the so called film fans who wont go see it and will wait to watch it on their tiny tvs or tablets. You cant be a film fan if you dont support cinemas. Still the best way to see true film!! Jessica Chastain was fantastic too and thats not just my love for redheads typing. Great film but I think THE REVENANT will take it all for 2015. We shall see.

    • Ken Hanke

      I dont get all the hate for this movie online, outside of “well, its popular so im sure its bad”.

      Ding! Ding! Ding! And the boy wins a gold cigar.

      Of course, you then had to go further and start saying things about “more tension” and “needed a twist” and “could have lost the David Bowie montage” (if you’d said that to me in person, I might have slapped you) and diminished my good will considerably.

      And I’m still waiting for someone to tell me just why they’re all jazzed about The Revenant. Every time I see a trailer I just shrug.

      • T.rex

        SPOILERS……….The song in that montage was ofcourse freaking awesome but the montage itself was pointless. We get it, Nasa and China are teaming up to save our guy. I guess I cant be too hard on it though. This film did kick ass right at the begining without giving us a boring intro narrated bt Sally Exposition.

          • T.rex

            Now thats funny. Im glad we can both love this film from different angles.

          • Ken Hanke

            Strangely, I’m less inclined to look for things to kvetch about.

      • T.rex

        Whats to shrug over The Revenant? Trailer 1 is like a tiny silent film. There is no spoon feeding there, it leaves me asking more.

        • Ken Hanke

          It leaves me looking at a grey-brown mass of nothing that interests me. I hope I’m wrong. I hope it’s great. Right now, I’m not getting that sense.

          And I think you’re going to see a very reactionary slate of Oscar nominations this year. That all-art-title run we had last year was bad for business because the nominated films were completely irrelevant to a broad audience.

  3. Ben Heise

    Awesome movie!!!! Loved every second! Matt Damon did an excellent job.

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