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The Martian

Friday night I went to see the movie The Martian with my friend Melody.  I came home after work, fed my mom's cats and then went to meet her for a quick last minute unplanned bite to eat and a drink before the movie at Bahama Breeze.

Thursday night I got a text from Melody asking me if I wanted to go see The Martian with her because her usual movie buddy couldn't make it.  I replied, "Sure why not!  Sounds like fun."  I love going to the movies.  I know, it's expensive and I could just watch something at home and save some money, but there's still something about going with a friend or a group or on a date or even alone that has this little magic feeling to it.  The whole experience from buying a ticket from the person at the box office, to getting some fresh popped popcorn... handing in your ticket stub to the ticket collector... then finally finding your seat and settling in.

I just enjoy it.  I always have, always will.  Expensive or not... I think it's a fun experience.

So we went to Bahama Breeze first, I got the coconut shrimp tacos.  I highly recommend them.  They are crispy and delicious.  They come with a dipping sauce that rocked my world.  For the side I got the fruit, pineapples and grapes with a little tiny bit of sorbet, or it might have been sherbet...  Honestly, does anyone ACTUALLY know the difference between those two?  Seriously, they taste the same to me.

Along with my crispy coconut shrimp tacos I got a Bahamarita...

 

I didn't actually take that photo, that's a Google image search photo.  But that's pretty much what it looked like.  And it was yummy!  It was very light on the alcohol though... So I didn't really feel it at all.  But that's ok, I was super tired from work this week so if I'd had any more alcohol than what was in that drink I would have fallen asleep during the movie.

After Bahama Breeze we walked over to the theaters.  I love the KOP Bahama Breeze and movie theater there because you can just park anywhere in that lot and after having a drink or two and some dinner you can just walk over to the theaters.  It's just super convenient.  There should be island themed restaurants next to all movie theaters.  The world would be such a wonderful place.

When we got there we found out that the movie was in this RPX theater.  RPX means the seats are premium and the video and sound quality is super extra digitally enhanced.  That also meant the tickets were a little extra.  Personally, I feel like it was kind of worth it.  You get to pick your seats too when you buy the ticket.  So it's more like going to see live theater than just a plain vanilla movie theater experience.  I definitely feel like the sound system was amped up a little more, and the picture quality was VERY crispy.  Almost as crispy as my coconut shrimp tacos... but not quite, almost though.

Melody and I settled in to watch the movie.  About twenty minutes in there was some sort of medical emergency with one of the movie goers.  None of us really knew something had happened until the movie stopped suddenly.  I think someone tripped or fell coming up the ramp into the theater.  It was weird because it just paused out of nowhere.  At first I thought that they stream the movies, just like Netflix, and that it was buffering.  Then I thought maybe the system crashed.  Then the house lights came on and an usher announced that the movie would resume after the ambulance arrived...

We sat for about ten minutes until an ambulance arrived and took the person away.  I hope the person is ok and it wasn't anything major!  Like I said I don't exactly know the nature of the injury since they were in the one hallway and not in the theater itself.  I just know the usher guy had a roll of paper towels in his hand when he made an announcement to us.  Lots of people used the time to use the rest room, including myself.  Personally, I feel like they should pause all movies halfway through for bathroom breaks for five minutes.  It's a fantastic idea!  During the pause as well we started chatting about what had happened so far and what we thought was going to happen next and about some of the other aspects of the movie.

It reminded me of a couple times in college how my friend Ron and I used to watch documentary movies and kind of discuss them along the way.  I actually think it would be a fun to start a movie club where we pick a movie and meet as a group, and then we pause the movie perhaps two or three times during the movie to discuss and share our thoughts or feelings.  I love that kind of stuff.  Call me nerdy or academic, but I just really love things like that.

They resumed the movie and rewound it a few minutes so that we could catch up where we left off.  I really liked the movie.  I thought it was very, edge of your seat, suspenseful kind of deal.  Matt Damon is a great actor in my book and I thought he played the part well.  The humor in the movie was well placed, and the cast was excellent.  Some of the people in the movie threw me because I didn't expect those types of actors to play more serious roles as the ones they did.  Kristen Wiig and Donald Glover are normally comedy types... So it was different to see them play more serious roles.

One of the parts of the movie that I really loved was how they made the decisions they did.  I found it to be something that we all could consider in our own lives, or our jobs.  It's this theme of constraints and making decisions based on budgets, and calculations... but mixed with that is the human aspect.  In the movie, without giving too much away, they have to decide to rescue a stranded astronaut stuck on mars (that's all in the preview)... which is obviously outrageously expensive... by risking the lives of others.  This was actually a question posed in one of the iTunes U courses that I listened to a long time ago... the scenario was, if you would risk one person's life to save many... would you?  How much is one human life worth?

It's a tough decision to make.  Do you spare the lives of five or six people and let one life go?  Or do you risk the lives of all those people to attempt to save one?  As well, how much money do you spend save a life?  Unlimited amounts of money?  What if there is only so much money and if you spend money on one life... you won't have enough to save another?  How do you decide... Yes, obviously the best outcome is... save everyone... but what if it cost a million dollars to save a life... and you have five people to save, but you only have four million dollars... How do you reconcile that problem?

This happens in our everyday lives in a less extreme manner... if a company only has enough money for ten employees and they currently have eleven... How do you decide who to let go?  Or on a personal level if you have to buy food and pay bills and spend money on your car... but you only have enough for two of the three...

One solution is to borrow the money... but eventually that has to be paid back.  This is something that governments deal with all the time.  Borrowing money is one solution but then how do you pay it back?  If you still have less money than what is needed to keep those eleven employees... You can't borrow every year to keep paying them...

So yeah, there were lots of things to think about from this movie.

They had to deal with things like how much food and supplies he had left... and work against those limits to problem solve in order to keep him alive.  It was pretty intense to say the least.

Intenseness aside, I thought the movie was great.  It was action packed and entertaining, with a few bits of humor thrown in.  But it also made me think as well.  Of course it also made me nearly cry in some parts as well.  So, it kind of had it all.

I recommend checking it out if you decide to go see a movie in the theaters any time soon.  When we were leaving the theater they handed out readmission tickets good for another movie.  It was an apology for stopping the film.  That didn't bother me too much really.  It was only ten minutes.  It was no different than pausing Netflix and then resuming it.  So now I have one free ticket to use for another movie!  I'll definitely have to get myself a margarita and see another movie in the near future.

Oh, so here's the trailer for the movie.   But, yeah, definitely catch this one if you can.