So, many of you have probably already seen the movie The Martian, featuring Matt Damon as Mark Watney, and even Norwegian Aksel Henie as a German astronaut. The movie is based upon the book by the same name by Andy Weir.
As should be fairly clear from the trailer, and without spoiling too much of the story, Mark Watney is believed dead during an emergency evacuation from Mars due to extreme weather, and subsequently abandoned.
Once the weather has passed, he finds that he is completely alone on the red planet and all communication with Earth is dead. The equipment he is living in is basically only designed to last for their original 30 day mission. He needs to survive until the next mission arrives in a few years, and he has to somehow make his way to the next mission's landing zone. So to quote Watney: "Let's science the shit out of this." And what follows is a story that surpasses even MacGuyver's ingenuity and greatness!
As usual the book is much better than the movie. With that said, I think the movie is great, even though I am no huge Matt Damon fan. The main reason that the book is much better than the movie is that, of course, the movie has had to do compromises and due to play length restrictions and keeping up the narrative they have had to drop cool stuff and alter other cool stuff somewhat in order to make it all fit in a feature length movie. That being said, what they have managed to squeeze into this almost two and a half hour long movie is impressive.
Still, if you see the movie and like it, or have already seen it and liked it, you really, REALLY, should consider reading the book or listening through the audiobook. I did the audiobook myself, before seeing the movie, and heartily recommend both! I will also probably buy the book in the near future, just to get to read it myself, and then keeping it in my sagging bookshelves as another cherished work.
If you have not seen the movie yet, rent or buy it from somewhere like Google Play Movies and enjoy. If you have not read or listened to the book yet, then as usual I recommend your local library, or buy it from somewhere like Amazon/Audible, and enjoy it too.
Next week I am going to write about yet another book, this one also about Mars, more specifically the Curiosity rover, written by its Chief Engineer.
