Ridley Scott‘s best movies have managed to be simultaneously suspenseful, thoughtful and impeccably executed, and you can now add “The Martian” to a list that includes “Alien,” “Blade Runner,” “Black Hawk Down” and the Oscar-winning “Gladiator.”
His new film premiered on Friday night at the Toronto International Film Festival, where it screened in the huge Roy Thomson Hall to an audience that took it to heart when Scott introduced the film by saying, “It’s OK to laugh.”
In fact, it’s not just OK to laugh at “The Martian” – it’s all but mandatory. The story of an astronaut who’s left by himself on Mars when his fellow crew members think he’s dead may not sound like the stuff of levity, but Scott has a light touch with the material.