The Martian | Book & Film Review

The Book 

90% of the books I read now are audio books. Mostly because I spend a lot of time on the road for my job, and sometimes the radio can get incredibly dull. 

When I downloaded The Martian, it was purely because, where possible, I like to read the books before I see the movies. I was a bit nervous about listening to The Martian because I figured it was going to be pretty scientific and I was concerned that I wouldn't be able to follow it, especially when I was concentrating on driving! However the way that the book is written makes it quite easy to follow when you're driving and you have no knowledge of science!

I think my favourite this about this book is the way that it is structured. It is largely in first person from the log entries Mark Watney, the engineer / botanist that is left behind on Mars after a series of unfortunate events. However we also see third person accounts of the events back on earth, transcripts of the conversations between Earth and Mars, and the other conversations happening as the book progresses. This way of writing gives depth to the story as you can actually visualise what is going on both in space and at NASA. 

Mark Watney may be one of my favourite written characters ever. The voice actor for the audio book (R. C. Bray) did an excellent job of portraying Mark's dry, dark and brilliant sense of humour. Mark's brilliant mind is the only thing that manages to keep him alive on Mars, and Weir does a fantastic job of showing the thought train for every challenge and obstacle and how Mark gets through it all. 

It's hard to write anything else about this amazing book without giving any spoilers away so I'll leave you with this:

I am not the kind of person who will sit and read books about science. I don't like reading things that are going to make me feel stupid or confused. The Martian did the opposite of this. Instead of making me doubt my intelligence, it had me sat on the edge of my seat, hooked onto listening to it whenever I had a spare moment and desperately praying that a fictional character was going to finish this book safe and sound! 

I'm so glad that I read this book before I watched the film because the experience of reading has been an absolute pleasure. 

The Film

My God, what a movie. So I have literally just finished the credits as I'm writing this and I'm both laughing and crying! 

I'm always nervous when books I love have been turned into movies but this adaptation did a sterling job. The opening sequences felt like they had been taken out of my imagination, and the fear levels throughout mirrored my anxiety for the characters as I was reading the book.

I did not know how they were going to get the amazing sense of humour of Mark Watney to transfer to the screen, but Matt Damon was perfect. The emotions, the jokes and the highs and lows I had experienced when reading were as perfect in the movie as they were in the book. Damon was definitely an excellent casting choice. Another character who lived up to expectation was Dr Kapoor (played by Chiwetel Ejiofor), the Director of Mars Operations at NASA. When reading the book, it was the conversations between him and Watney that made me laugh most and the relationship was just as sassy and humorous for the movie. 

In terms of the things that they added to the movie and the things they cut out, it was done perfectly. They took out one of the major catastrophes on Mars, but this was replaced by a gorgeous "where are they now" style ending, which perfectly rounded off the film. 

A common theme throughout the book and movie is disco music. I won't go into it too much, because spoilers! But the title credit song of "I will survive" is absolute perfection.

I didn't think I'd enjoy either the film or book as much as I did. I'd definitely recommend it as both a sci-fi drama and comedy!