Krishna
Well, the story can be told in a mini paragraph – an astronaut who was left behind in Mars due to an emergency evacuation survives against almost impossible odds until they plan a rescue (again against very improbable odds). Sounds trite and boring, right? How can you make a long movie out of this atom of a story? How can you make it interesting to boot?
If any one can, Ridley Scott and his crew can and he shows how. The movie is not just interesting, it is exciting to watch. Brilliantly shot and brilliantly planned, the movie keeps you completely absorbed until the end.
Well, this is not the first movie of its kind where they show miniature stories in a fantastic manner. Gravity has been there in 2013 and even earlier, Castaway did it in style, just to quote two examples. But still it does not take away from the fact that it is a story very well told, with sensitivity and humour to boot, and keeps you engaged till the very last minute from the very first minute.
The circumstances where the astronaut Mark Watney gets left behind are credible. They search for him until the very last minute, even putting the crew in some danger but realize that he is probably dead and have to leave anyway to save the rest of the crew. Matt Damon as Mark Watney is brilliant. In addition, you have to admire the variety of roles Jessica Chastain takes on. In this, she is the commander Melissa Lewis who has to make the difficult decision to leave Mark behind. Compared to Zero Dark Thirty or Crimson Peak, this one could not be more different. It is also interesting. It is also interesting to see an older Jeff Daniels as NASA director.
But this movie is all about Matt Damon, and others just have bit parts in it. It is the story of his survival. How he gets water from the inhospitable Martian atmosphere, how he faces setbacks, how he plans his travel to the potential site of the next landing, how he realizes that almost everything he does may not be enough to save him are all fabulous.
In addition, there is a lot of humour in the story that make you smile while rooting for the intrepid astronaut. He faces every adversity including waking up initially with an antenna stuck in him, with full determination.
There is no way to describe in detail the story, you just have to see it. But the moments there where he fixes an earlier, primitive, broken down communication equipment partially (only visuals) and how he manages to have a ‘two way’ communication are fascinating. His failed efforts (initially) to create water and the “fertilizer” he uses to grow his potatoes all provide clever humour.
The efforts to resupply him also end in abject failure when the probe, due to an emergency decision to cut some safety checks, explodes just after leaving earth. These provide the drama in the story.
One incongruity is that to accept Chiwetel Ejiofor as Vincent Kapoor, the Indian member of the crew, you have to squint very hard.
Though the moments where they hatch a secret plan overriding the Director to rescue Mark are cinematic, and even though the rescue and the daring plan to hurtle through space hoping that the crew would be in position to catch him is even more cinematic, they do not take anything away from the visual and intellectual feast this movie provides to the viewer.
Really top class and I award it a 9/10
– – Krishna