The Martian (3D) Unlimited Preview

Sunday 27th September 2015: 19:45: Bolton

As the title sequence faded in over the Red Planet horizon and the letters of "The Martian" appeared in slow sequence I knew I was in good hands.  The poster for Ridley Scott's most recent film prefixed it with the words "From the Director of Gladiator and Prometheus", for me it would have been sold better as "From the Director of Alien and BladeRunner", but some of the audience have forgotten anything pre 1999

The survival adventure kicks off pretty much in the first few minutes of the film as Matt Damon's Mark Watney is left for dead on the surface of Mars after a monstrous storm calls an end to Ares III's mission.  Mark is left to fend for himself hoping that NASA will send someone to rescue him or he must find a way to survive until the next mission turns up (and also make it halfway across the planet to the new landing site)

The Martian is the most entertaining film I have seen this year, and possibly for a good while.  Very interesting, immensely funny and nail biting tense moments are perfectly sectioned.  Each scientific experiment is narrated (via videolog) by Matt Damon and they are explained as if he is doing a documentary giving the audience the right scale of science mumbo jumbo and layman terms.

I watched the film in 3D as this was how the Unlimited Screening was being shown, however, I think this was completely unnecessary.  All the 3D screening did was dull the colour and annoy me, so if I do get chance to watch this again with Clare it will definitely be the 2D version

The Martian is highly recommended and is a must see at the cinema this year