Into the Deep Black – The Martian
It feels like a long time ago that Matt Damon was at the movies. That’s only partly true, thanks to great cameo in Interstellar (I only accept spoiler bitching about movies that haven’t been released more than half a year ago), but I realised that I’m quite fond of him.
Good to see the trailer for Ridley Scott’s The Martian then!
It’s based on Andy Weir’s novel published in 2011 of the same name about an astronaut stranded on Mars after the mission he’d been on had to be aborted and the crew leaves the planet. Said crew believes him to be dead and is on its way back and NASA believes the astronaut to be dead. To make matters worse he only has a month’s worth of supply of food and the next mission to arrive on the planet is to be in four years time. The conflict lies in the habitation of an uninhabitable planet as well as getting to the place where the next mission is supposed to land all the while struggling to survive and „science the sh*t out of this“.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ue4PCI0NamI
In Deep Space
Ever since A Space Odyssey 2001, space gave me the creeps. Interstellar and Gravity for that matter gave me a queasy feeling of lightheadedness and dread, not unlike the feeling the deep sea instills into me, and the Martian looks great. I do have a problem with the connection to Interstellar by proxy, though. Matt Damon’s character in Interstellar got stuck on some planet and got batsh*t insane and this story feels like a prequel to that story arch. Adding is the involvement of Jessica Chastain, who’d been stationed on Earth in Interstellar and here is part of the astronaut’s crew. Exchange „older guy“ Michael Caine with Jeff Daniels, and there you go.
Apart from that, the trailer looks fantastic. I’d never have expected Matt Damon to become this sort of universal guy, who can play an action hero as well as a zoo keeper (I didn’t watch that movie, but still), and then an astronaut, and be charismatic and captivating on screen. The cast is made up of Chiwetel Ejiofor, whom I have been dying to see in something new after his awards circuit 1,5 years ago, Michael Peña, Kate Mara, Kristen Wiig, Sebastian Stan, Donald Glover (Childish Gambino!) et. al.
Living up to the promotional content?
Ridley Scott didn’t live up to the hype of Prometheus, but he is a Sci-Fi mastermind. The visuals should be extraordinary again, and I dare hope to imagine Matt Damon can carry this movie in a way that makes the cleverly produced promotional content not the best part of the whole experience. It feels so realistic to hear the astronaut explain the stuff going on in his spaceship (?), just like the astronaut Alexander Gerst showing pictures from the International Space Station (do look at his pictures! Although he’s back on Earth, he still regularly posts pictures taken from the space station – they’re magnificent).
I’m getting excited for this movie! Please don’t disappoint.