Parents' Guide to The Martian

Damon's charm, humor, and gravitas make this smart, action-packed adaptation an all-around perfect film for families with curious, science-loving teens and older tweens. It's equal parts Cast Away, Apollo 13, and Gravity: Like Tom Hanks in the former, Damon must portray the evolution of someone left for dead, but Watney's situation doesn't allow him to sit around eating tropical fruit; he must work hard every single day to ensure that he's not going to die. And while the movie isn't ceaselessly intense like Gravity, there are dizzyingly tense parts in store for those who haven't read the book and don't know what happens. As for the Apollo 13 comparison, that (along with Damon's performance) is where The Martian proves remarkable: It focuses not just on Watney's survival, but also on how the ground teams at NASA and at Jet Propulsion Laboratory work nonstop to come up with solutions to bring him home.

The acting ensemble is terrific. In addition to Damon and the Ares 3 crew, led by Chastain and Peña, the all-star cast includes Chiwetel Ejiofor as the Mars mission director, Jeff Daniels as the cautious head of NASA, Kristen Wiig as a put-upon NASA public-relations director (and the only non-scientist in the movie), and Sean Bean as the brash Ares 3 flight director. But in the end, of course, this is Damon's show, and he doesn't disappoint; he's funny, smart, and generally so charming that viewers will be with Watney every step of the way. The only music he can listen to is Lewis' impressive digital collection of disco, and the 1970s soundtrack provides surprisingly perfect accompaniment to Watney's various challenges, like "Hot Stuff" when he figures out a way to keep warm or the end-credits song, which is too perfect to spoil. There are few movies that have it all: big-budget artistry, wonderful performances, humor, and real heart, but with The Martian, Ridley Scott has managed to make his best film since Black Hawk Down.