IMDb metadata: 2 hours and 24 minutes of life @ 8/10 from 597,255 zits
The most boring job at NASA in 2055? Monitoring the visual feeds from its Mars satellites. But someone does it and detects activity on Mars!
Backup a little for the set up. Ares I is NASA’s first crewed mission to land on Mars with four men and two women. They are at work on the Red Planet collecting samples. The combination of camera filters and sands with the desert in Jordan is well done in creating a Mars.
As they work, on cue a large and powerful sandstorm strikes before they can all get inside the ship. In the ensuing maelstrom, one of the crew, Watney, is struck by a flying rock and carried away into the murky darkness. Meanwhile, the rocket is so buffeted that it is in danger of tilting too far to the looney right for takeoff. It’s a do-or-die situation.
Commander, as she is called, pushed the button for blastoff, after suitable lip chewing. It is clear they could never find him in the storm and that the computer predictions of a catastrophic tilt are accurate. Willpower does not overcome the laws of physics, as it too often does in Hollywoodlandia. It is five against one to complete the mission.
Off they go on the six month return flight to Earth. What can go wrong?
Watney did not die. Through a combination of circumstances he survived the impact of the rock and the storm but he is now ‘Marooned’ (1969) on Maris. (Remember that one?)
Red Mars
He becomes a ‘Robinson Crusoe on Mars’ (1964), remember that one, by first cleaning up his wounds and then setting about surviving with all the gear Ares I left behind.
Watney determines he will do science to survive. He uses his knowledge and sets about learning more as he goes. First air and water, then food. Then energy for the rovers and the Rube Goldberg mechanisms he engineers to meet his needs. It is not easy. Things go wrong. Mistakes are made, but he persists. Science is the way. Right down to burning a wooden cross left behind by a crewmate to make a fire. Banned in Alabama and Iran for that.
He survives by homework, not prayer.
The storm destroyed communication so he cannot call home. Ares continues toward Earth. Watney does not know and does not ever seem to think the Mars satellites might spot him or his traces. He could have spelled SOS with the solar panels and saved us all a lot of time. On time see below. But his traces are spotted.
They watch his tracks as he manoeuvres solar panels and batteries. A lot of this. Too much.
NASA has thrown a lot of taxpayers money at Mars and left machines there from previous unmanned landings. Watney scavenges parts and material from the junk yard, including some communication devices.
Back at the ranch in Houston, Rubber Chin has to decide whether to tell the world Watney is alive and whether to tell the crew of Ares, some of whom are still chewing their lips. The decisions are complicated: nice scenes of hysterical journalists looking for a kill in a press conferences, and the political reactions related to funding some kind of rescue mission which may arrive too late anyway.
The two most interesting parts of that are the deux ex machina involvement of the Chinese space program in the planning and Richard Sharpe’s mutiny in leaking a hairbrained plan to the crew of Ares. By the rules of Hollywood, the hairbrained plan is the path of redemption which they must take.
Even more hairbrained schemes come into play to recover Watney. Glad wrap to the rescue. In ‘The Doomesday Machine’ (reviewed on this blog) it was aluminium foil.
Loved the emphasis on science and on teamwork and brainwork pace ‘Apollo 13’ (1995) to find solutions to one problem at a time. There are no histrionics. No he-man stuff and no resort to prayer to solve problems. Banned in another seven states and Syria.
Watney is well realised but not so Rubber Chin who has neither depth nor gravitas. Maybe I say that because in his efforts to look serious he reminds all too much of Al Gore whom I could never take seriously.
It is an ensemble piece and apart from these two, the screen time is distributed among the members of the group, many of whom are super nerds, as indicated by their ragged attire and evident poor personal hygiene. Keep those tired tropes coming!
Space flight, take off, link ups are marvellously presented, the gear has verisimilitude. No one smokes on Mars, unlike the 1950s visits to Mars by B-movie landers.
Again in contrast to that era, no big deal is made out of that the fact hat there are women on the crew or that the Commander is a woman. Even in the 1980s this was a theme screen writers had to use as a substitute for creativity.
Also mercifully absent were any magnified spiders much to the disappointment of the fraternity brothers.
Director Ridley Scott is the master of the medium.
It is an epic. — for the audience— to endure at two and half hours, and it could certainly have been cut to feature length. We don’t need to see everything when much of it is repeated in the video logs Watney makes and the ever present mini cams. Much of the footage seems to be there because we have it, not because the story needs it for the audience.
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