Movie Review: The Martian

I'm a Space Pirate!

Director: Ridley Scott

Starring: Matt Damon (I love him in everything)
               Jessica Chastain        
               (Interstellar's McConaughey's daughter)
               Kristen Wiig (my SNL star)
               Kate Mara (House of Cards' Zoe Barns)
               Sean Bean (The Ned Stark)
               Sebastian Stan (whom I confused with Robb Stark)
               and many more...

Genre: Science Fiction

Recommended For: Matt Damon lovers like me

The Gist: Due to a severe storm on Mars, NASA's astronauts are forced to leave the Red Planet, leaving behind a crew member Mark Watney (played by Damon) they believe is dead. How Mark spends his time there and what NASA and other Earthlings do about it is what the movie is about.

-ve points: Towards the end, a launch vehicle has to be designed such that it is 5000 tonnes lighter (or some other figure like this). This requires losing some parts of the vehicle like the seats, a few machine attachments, the windows (yeah!) and the top of the ship (get this!). What they do use as a substitute is something I can't digest! (not sure if scientifically the new material makes sense, but it defies my common sense)

+ve points: The movie did not leave me at any point being hopeless or sad like Gravity or Interstellar (both awesome movies) The Martian takes the adversities with a pinch of salt and uses his brain to come up with solutions that are so simple they are elegant!

All the greatest brains of earth, literally all of them, are trying to solve my problem and the greatest solution that they have come up with is- drill a hole.

My Verdict: Watch it.

My decision: To read the book "The Martian" from which the film has been adapted. My friends say the movie is good, but the book is way better.

Of science and imagination

Yes, this is about Nolan's latest. It's also about Disney's latest. This Saturday, I saw two movies; both awesome. Interstellar and Big Hero 6.

Interstellar is about the future where our planet has literally turned to dust and schools have rubbished achievements like Apollo Space Mission to keep the last generation of human population in dark about the glorious past and the inglorious past that resulted in this present. While many of my friends (all of them engineers) are laughing at the walking-in-and-out-of-black-hole-feat that Nolan makes

Matthew McConaughey achieve, I see a powerful work of imagery excellently portrayed on-screen.

The story also ticks "a world with more than three dimensions" off my bucket list. Nolan loyalists

voice their disappointments about implausible track of the movie only because they expect absolute 

logic from the master filmmaker. Agreed. But since my knowledge about the black holes and laws

governing it are next to nil, I saw the movie as a story, and in stories there is no need to adhere to any

laws. Full marks to Interstellar. 

Big Hero 6 is a 3D cartoon film about a naughty genius who is astray until his good boy elder brother

dedicated to help the humankind dies. Then the genius uses his knowledge of robotics to avenge the 

death and the story is classic good v/s evil. Now, the lead robot Baymax is a balloon-like bot, made 

of carbon fiber, which is an extremely strong and light polymer used in aerospace auto-motives. 

This, in a way, validates the incredible amount of flying sequences this fat bot does in most of the 

second half. The use of laser beam to shred army of micro-bots and use of liquid metal embrittlement 

aide the young hero and his gang in their victory. Now considering the fact that the movie was

mostly watched by primary-school kids, like my cousin with whom I watched it, & most importantly

is a cartoon, use of science is not really needed. Thus the movie aces with kids despite a few technical

terms thrown here and there. And so, full marks to this movie too. 

JJJ