Barely a day goes by now without 20th Century Fox drumming up excitement for Ridley Scott’s The Martian – and no wonder, considering that the sci-fi flick is just days away from its world premiere at the ongoing Toronto International Film Festival.
And so, on the heels of yesterday’s first clip for the movie, the studio has unveiled a new viral video that asks if Matt Damon’s cocksure botanist Mark Watney is made of the right stuff. Focusing less on the Ares-3 and its mission on the red planet, today’s footage takes a closer look at the man in the suit, and the rigorous training regime he undergoes to fulfil his dream.
Once complete, Damon’s budding astronaut will enlist alongside his fellow crew mates as they make tracks for Mars, but after touching down on the martian terrain, it isn’t long before all hell breaks loose. When a raging storm comes bearing down from one of the planet’s vast, towering mountain ranges, Ares-3 uproots and abandons its mission, accidentally leaving Watney behind in the process.
Cast astray on the arid, sun-scorched planet, Damon’s character is long presumed dead, though it’s only when he engineers a means of contacting the remainder of the crew that he’s forced to put that rigorous training into practice and, against all odds, carves out a rudimentary existence on Mars while he waits to be rescued.
The Martian will have its theaterical release on October 2. It’ll act as the perfect primer for director Ridley Scott, too, considering that the next project he’s set his sights on his another genre piece in the form of Prometheus 2.
During a manned mission to Mars, Astronaut Mark Watney is presumed dead after a fierce storm and left behind by his crew. But Watney has survived and finds himself stranded and alone on the hostile planet. With only meager supplies, he must draw upon his ingenuity, wit and spirit to subsist and find a way to signal to Earth that he is alive. Millions of miles away, NASA and a team of international scientists work tirelessly to bring “the Martian” home, while his crewmates concurrently plot a daring, if not impossible, rescue mission. As these stories of incredible bravery unfold, the world comes together to root for Watney’s safe return. Based on a best-selling novel.
