Accurate Nomination For Best Picture

Rating: 9/10 (16 February 2016)

The Martian is directed by Ridley Scott and stars Matt Damon as Mark Watney, the astronaut that accidentally is stranded by his team on Mars. The story follows Mark as he struggles to survive on the barren planet, and his crew as they try to rescue him. Now, Ridley Scott has made some good films, such as Gladiator, Alien, and Blade Runner. Now he's made another one. The Martian is easily one of the best films of 2015, up there with The Revenant and Fury Road. Whether or not it deserves best picture is another topic, but I'll get to that soon.
To start, the directing is very good. Ridley Scott always takes nice, wide takes of action, or just to show the epicness of this movie; epic meaning grand scale. That also leads to the cinematography being good. Although Mars is a barren, desert planet, the cinematography somehow makes it look beautiful, especially in far off shots of the vehicle or the base.
The acting is also very good. Other than Matt Damon, there are a lot of other good actors in this movie. Jessica Chastain, Jeff Daniels, Kate Mara, Michael Pena, and Sean Bean are also in this film, and they do really well. Matt Damon and Jessica Chastain have pretty good on screen chemistry, and their conversations and banter really work for the movie.
Another great thing about the film is how hard the movie beats down Mark Watney. Every time he has things going his way, something happens to knock him back down, and the audience really begins to feel bad for him. This is common throughout all "stranded" films, such as Cast Away, Gravity, or 127 Hours. However, being on a completely different planet - and one humans haven't visited yet - really adds to the theme of the film, which is how a man would handle a situation such as this when all he has is his wit and his will.
The above paragraph actually leads me into my main negative, which is storytelling. Throughout every film, the audience has to figure out what's currently going on, or "what's the plan." In a good movie, they learn from things occurring, but this film straight up tells you. Every time Watney is making little videos recapping the Martian day, or "Sol," he tells the audience up front what's happening. We don't have to figure it out, he just lets us know. This is my biggest problem with the film, which disappointed me due to how great the rest of the film was.
Overall, the Martian is a great movie with very few problems. I think The Martian deserves an A-, or a 9 out of 10.