The Martian

[Lord Snow]

The movie adaptation of the debut novel of Andy Weir (and one of the best reads I had in years) is apparently gathering a lot of talent. Ridley Scott is directing, Mat Damon has the lead, and Jessica Chestain (interstellar), Kate Mara (House of Cards), Donal Glover (Community) and Sean Bean are only part of the names in the support cast. The film is expected to be released November 2015.

I'm fairly excited for this. Seems like people are pretty serious about trying to make it good. My only concern is that the story will have to be adapted smartly - as most of the book is composed of the main character doing smart things (many of which require some basic knowledge in physics, engineering, chemistry and occasionally botany to understand) to solve seemingly impossible problems. Without the POV journal internal monologue its going to be next to impossible to understand the events of the book and, possibly even worse, being a lone astronaut on Mars means that the main character does not really interact with others all that much in the novel.

So clearly, something has to change for the movie unless they want to relay on near constant narration. There are several good ways to approach the problem, and I hope they choose one of them, I just hope they don't flop. This is going to be about more than just filming events in the novel - it will have to be adapted to a different medium and change as a result. I hope they pull this off.

[DaemonAngel]

Meanwhile, back in 1964
Robinson Crusoe on Mars

[Aberzombie]

The wife and I saw this movie last Friday - an excellent flick. Solid acting, a compelling and well-thought out story, good special effects. The science, engineering, and physics aspect of the movie was a big bonus.

I look forward to reading the book, but that won't be until after my PE Exam. So....sometime next week.

[Chris Mortika]

Saw it last night. Fantastic.

But if you do an Iron Man maneuver, and you're not pointing your jet stream exactly away from your center of gravity, you aren't going to go where you want.

[Sissyl]

Worse... If the stream rushing out of your glove is strong enough to move you that fast, then holding it that direction is going to be next to impossible.

That said, it was a great movie. Far better than I thought it would be.

[Purple Dragon Knight]

Good movie.

spoilers movie plot:

I would have expected at least two (or three, or four...) crew members to shout "NO WAY" when their mission commander told them we're turning back, but hey, maybe astronauts are a more 'bonded' team than I would expect.

[Sissyl]

Plot:

I certainly get the sense that they are. Being left to die on another planet, and having done so to a friend... I don't see a problem with it. They all knew it could have been any of them.

[Purple Dragon Knight]

I suspect that real life astronaut groups can, at times, include overachievers that put their career, research, overall mission, family and personal prestige in front of the life of a single crew member.

movie plot spoiler:

I'm not saying that such a scenario would not be possible, but not a peep from the entire crew was a bit weird. There's also the effect of conformity, which could essentially make certain crewmembers shut up and not voice their 'different' opinion in such a case, but smart Ph.D. type astronauts would have perhaps at least asked a series of very specific questions on how the entire endeavor would be achieved. Not to say that they were ordered not to go back I believe, and that they just turned back on their own volition.