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Can The Martian Give NASA's Mars Efforts a Hollywood Bump?
Flash Modin writes: NASA has poured considerable time and resources into Ridley Scott's The Martian — perhaps more than any other movie in history — going so far as to time a Mars human landing site selection workshop to coincide with the film. Jim Green, NASA's head of planetary sciences, was one of the consultants, with other astronomers fact checking every aspect of the set and script. The rockets, modules, and space suits were built — and 3-D printed — with heavy guidance from NASA. The filmmakers even hired Rudi Schmidt, former project manager of the European Space Agency's Mars Express spacecraft, to test the experiments done in the movie, including turning water into rocket fuel — which works. And, on the eve of The Martian's premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival this weekend, some of those scientists believe that this obsessive adherence to science fact will be enough to make NASA's Journey to Mars real for Americans. The space agency needs a Hail Mary because, in truth, the real program is nowhere near ready for prime time.
No one cares for Mars. It's a frikin dead rock. There are so much better exploration targets out there.
Free Mars!
is old news - I had plastic rockets that you filled with water and compressed air as a kid before they put men on the moon. They actually work pretty well - the whole point of a rocket engine is to throw mass out the nozzle as quickly as possible - water has the mass and the compressed air has the quick.
Propulsion science is just too primitive at this time. This is where the bulk of the money needs to be spent.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
I just hope the tone down the swearing from the book. I loved the book, but my wife hates swearing and couldn't get past the first sentence. I'm afraid that if they keep that amount of swearing in the movie then she will hate the movie and that would be a shame since it looks like it will be a great flick.
No.
Yes, the movie can give NASA a Hollywood bump. A small, ultimately meaningless bump.
The Daddy casts sleep on the Baby. The Baby resists!
No, we are no interested. Next question.
The last big bump NASA got was the moon. I really wish that program had follow up instead of being just a giant publicity stunt.
Currently there are plenty of arguments for and against man in space, either way I would like the decision not to be one of which looks the coolest.
There's nowhere near enough reaction energy for a hollywood bump to get anything to Mars. Even "Gravity," which was hailed as "the most realistic space movie ever," (What were they smoking when they said that?), came out the year that NASA endured the government shutdown, and two years after the end of the space shuttle program, had no effect on NASA funding. "Gravity" had a lower budget and lower box office than "Guardians of the Galaxy" which didn't boost any Federal agency in the slightest - there was no drive to create the Federal Superhero Agency to save us from alien invasion. "Realism" is just part of Hollywood hype.
Have you seen the usual Mars movie from Hollywood? This movie is FAR more realistic than almost any other ones out there. And for true space geeks (of which NASA is full of), the book is fantastic.
The movie isn't some ultra-clever attempt to kickstart public support, although that doesn't hurt. NASA's funding has shrunk as a portion of GDP, as a portion of government spending, and even when just adjusted for inflation even while NASA now is tasked with a far more ambitious mission (to send people to Mars), such that NASA makes up less one half of one percent of the federal budget (this while the public either think NASA has a much larger portion of the federal budget or has been utterly shut down). A little public support wouldn't hurt, though what NASA really needs is the political freedom to rationalize some of their programs (like being freed by Congress to use existing launch vehicles for exploration, like from ULA or SpaceX, instead of spending so much of their budget on SLS) so they can afford to build things like landers and the like instead of things the private/military sectors already have built (like launch vehicles).
Only if it makes a trillion dollars at the box office which is then donated to NASA. 100billion dollars to buy politicians for the next 70 years it is going to take for NASA to rush three people and one flag to Mars. And 900 billion dollars for NASA to develop a capsule and another big rocket to get the job done.
And if you think that is an impossible amount of money, consider that over a trillion dollars were printed to keep the government's buddies out of trouble after they messed up the market 8 years ago.
Not that anyone's bothered denying the Moon landing lately; why bother? It's not even old news, it's history. And NASA still insists that people in a space station can't manage their own damn schedule with their own damn alarm clocks. Picture Mal Reynolds waiting for Mission Control to run through a million-point checklist to do anything . . .
I think you mean the other way round!
I've said before to underwhelming response, we need to spend on protecting this gorgeous planet of ours from big rocks coming at us. It has happened before, so instead of trying to get off this really nice planet on to a crappy cold rock, we should first make sure we can defend the nice home with air, water and food before trying to build on a long shot.
The public isn't interested in space, period.
The past N media spectaculars (fiction or non) didn't change that, the N+1th won't either. There's no camel's back for the straw to break.
I think the book's key point was the other way around: He took Hydrazine (rocket fuel) and converted it to water.
"Can The Martian Give NASA's Mars Efforts a Hollywood Bump?"
Yes, for about 30 days. Then we'll have BlackFriday, Xmas, etc. All will be forgotten, while waiting for the next Survivor/Dancing/Bachelor/whatever.
...the entire country needs a hail mary, never mind NASA. It's constantly being fucked over by politicians. It's sad that I've gone my entire 40 year life now without seeing a single good US president.
BeauHD. Worst editor since kdawson.
How many people here pictured Scarlett Johansson playing the role of Johanssen?
The Moore-Murphy Law: The number of things that will go wrong will double every 2 years.
Saying The Martian will get the American public excited about going to Mars is like saying Capricorn One is the reason the American public lost interest. It will be hard to show causality, but we'll find out in about 30 years.
used to mean a ski slope of Peruvian blue flake, I guess they do get down at the nasa... powdered donuts make me go nuts !
Its not "Ridley Scott's The Martian", its Andy Weir's The Martian. Ridley Scott is just making a movie of it and hopefully not bastardizing it too much.
Within 20 years of us being able to regularly move back and forth between the moon and earth like we move personnel between military commands, we'd have the technology to give the USMC their very own ODST special forces unit. The military tech opportunities would be immense...
Gravity and Apollo 13 and [haven't seen it yet] The Martian and others are stunning visions... intricately crafted works of awe-inspiring wonder. Some people working on these films, some folks going to see them, actually desire to explore space. So they must see these films, because they have some space in them. Many see these as space movies. I see them differently.
GENRE: Things go absolutely fucking wrong.
SUB-GENRE: Things go absolutely fucking wrong in space.
We love those 'things go absolutely fucking wrong' stories. To overcome adversity, to never give up or give in, keep your spirits high in the face of certain doom. But these do not help to prepare us to face the most perilous moments of a modern mostly-comfortable existence. What do do as you graduate school tomorrow, whether you should start fishing for a better job (and what if you find one?), when to pay the bills. Hollywood knows that the best formula is to deliver action, danger and adrenaline rushes to theaters. So human conflict turns violent, science turns menacing and the future hangs by a thread.
But when you get right down to it most people don't like violent conflict, menace and a future in dire peril. Personally that is. So you could say that these movies are like poisoned apples that are fun to taste, then spit out. Is it possible to spit them all out, and do you lose something else in the bargain? And what is the effect of all this on children? It's easy to wait until someone else creates something awesome, point to it and say "THIS is the PROBLEM". I'm not trying to do that here. I ask rather, what is missing?
Imagine for a moment *IF* you were forced to pick out some media to become an integral part of a school curriculum, from Preschool on up. What you will find is that the material we consider appropriate for younger children only approaches 'high budget' production values as its content departs from reality --- extremely, like those bizarre Pixar abominations. On the other end of the spectrum you have stunning documentaries that may inspire but do not always entertain, because to produce a science documentary you have to scrub the 'passion' and human interaction out. (One exception: Cosmos old and new). You have reliable PBS-y things like Sesame Street, informative and interesting (but yet) few children would insist on seeing an episode right to the end if you offered them a movie. So what movies would you offer them, if you wanted to inspire in them a yearning for space travel?
MISSING SUB-GENRE: Things go absolutely fucking right, in space. With children in them. Being people, successfully.
Oh maybe a little human conflict here and there, or a technical challenge that is presented as a simple challenge and not a cheap friggin' menace. And (Hollywood: hint) if you really want children to grow up to become people who yearn to explore and colonize space and planet, you must show them children --- already in space! Oh no you say. Space exploration and colonization is an 'adult activity'. (Pretend helicopter parent: on) In order to prevent, um like, kids from sneaking into launch sites and becoming stowaways on our missions, we must only show them movies with adults doing adult things, like battling monsters. In the leave-taking scene on the eve of the mission, the astronaut's daughter never cries, "Take me along, please!" because she knows her Mommy or Daddy is going to do adult-stuff in space and that is no place for kids. Like going off to war. Her lines are only, "Come home soon!" Children, as props.
Poor thing. Children deserve to be portrayed as more than simple emotional props. They are watching for Chrissake.
I'm not calling out action movies as the problem. By being the only way you get to leave the planet, they're better than nothing. They're Grrrreat! Please let's have more like, Commander Tom brought a chainsaw into Spaace on Halloween -- see what happens next! This mons
<blink>down the rabbit hole</blink>
Seriously, my mousewheel starts smoking whenever one of these new web 3.0 pages come up. Scrolling scrolling scrolling forever. Who the hell likes these things>? Is there something so wrong with embeded images? does every page have to be some downward scrolling adventure? its just supposed to be a god damn article!!!
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after the moon landings they had the earth rise photo on the wall on the oval office.
a year later they replaced it with a stupid tree painting, that's the true level of commitment to space by dumb fucks in office that are nothing more than high school jocks in a suit.
nasa also got a retard looser for a head that didn't want to be there.
fact is, USA and corporations would rather spend $20 trillion dollars over 40 years on wars and military, while nasa gets a few crumbs. Criminals they all are in office, utter scum.
"Ben Rich Lockheed Skunk Works director had admitted in his Deathbed Confession that Extrat errestrial UFO visitors are real and the U.S. Military travel among stars."
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
http://www.misterswift.com/iSTEM/The_Martian_files/The%20Martian%20-%20Andy%20Weir.pdf
Read the book, for free, the way it was originally started. 'Theatre of The Mind', and all that... Use your own Ghu-given imagination before giving $$$ to thieves.
Nobody in their right mind can ever think that 'M-M-Matt Damon, Matt Damon!' (didn't we all love 'Team America'?) could even be a believable fictional character.
Cool! thanks! I didn't know the Author released it for free - I've only seen the printed copies in the stores.