Andy Weir’s book, The Martian, has hit the big screen. The film, directed by Ridley Scott, turned out to be fantastic. This is one of the best book-to-film adaptations (with some welcomed changes) I have ever seen. Matt Damon does a phenomenal job copying the protagonist, Mark Waney, from the book and pasting him on to the big screen.

Watney is stranded on the planet Mars after being left by his crew, and now has to survive for four years until the next space mission. He is only left with a few months’ supply of food. This film has the whole package, going from drama to science fiction to comedy. However, the film does make a few changes here and there, though some of these changes were welcomed.

The cast included many veterans of the screen. Jessica Chastain played Melissa Lewis, Kristen Wiig played Annie  Montrose, and Jeff Daniels played Teddy Sanders. The problem with casting these famous actors as characters is they drew away from the action of the movie and produced some scenes that you just don’t care about. Aside from that, their performances were top-notch. Other nice additions to the cast included Kate Mara, who played Beth Johanssen, and Micheal Pena, who played Rick Martinez.

This film was one of the best novel-to-film adaptations because the movie changed some scenes to be better than they were in the novel. That being said, there always will be differences that people will complain about in any adaptation. In The Martian, some aspects were changed because they were irrelevant to the plot. This was a welcomed change. The scenes were also shot beautifully, giving the readers of the novel an unimaginable view of the planet that they only wished to have thought of while reading. Also, the CGI used for the planet itself was nicely done so that to a viewer, it looked like a normal object.

Overall, the film was fantastic, and definitely deserves the positive feedback it’s received. Although there may be some controversy over how some scenes differed between the movie and the book, it could have been much worse. This movie is one of the best, especially if you are a fan of the novel or just want to watch a good movie. This is one you do not want to miss.