Michael Omartian or "The Martian?"

Selling vintage skateboards during summer is not a wise business decision.  Selling vintage skateboards during the dead of winter is.  Chatting up films during the summer didn't seem like a wise business decision, or at least I have not seen much publicity for new films this year, until now.  The Academy Awards are forthcoming on February 28th.  It would have been nice to have seen some promotion for new films of 2015, but television is a dying medium.  I don't watch during prime time.  I watch late night.  That being said I have resumed my movie-watching practices recently after an aberrant wisdom tooth was removed from my jaw. Accompanying it on the way out was a badly decayed molar destroyed by a resorption cavity created by the offending wisdom tooth.  It almost was perpendicular to the molar, and the cavity completely was disguised inside the otherwise apparently healthy molar.  Dentists failed to diagnose this with X-Rays.  (Note to self.  Have full X-Rays taken every year.)  My abdominal issues completely have not subsided, but they are getting better.  I think it may be an ulcer.  A colonoscopy doesn't look into the small intestine, where mine may be hiding.  At least my bowel tells me this from time to time.  I should stop drinking.  Although my music studio is taking shape, diesel trains carrying jet fuel to Fort Bragg disrupt my concentration from time to time.  Last night was such a time, so I opted to see The Martian.  I did not know Ridley Scott was its director, and he is one of my favorites.  The movie artfully was shot, but something was lacking making the movie an Oscar contender at least for best film.  What was it?  As I watched it became clear the dialog was simplistic at best.  There was not much dialog, and when the actors spoke starkly it was colloquial.  These were not theater-trained actors, and any remnants of the theater were absent.  Instead a new crop of seeming millennial actors was employed unfamiliar and bland as your neighbor next door.  Casting Harry Dunne as the head of NASA was a mistake.  From the onset of the movie the tone, like Spectre, was dark, stagnant, vacuous, and bleak.  With all of the beautiful images gracing the big screen, this was disappointing.  It was like real life.  Aren't the movies supposed to provide more?  The movie was neo-epic in scope, and once the tasks became apparent the plot progressed quickly.  I left the theater not understanding how the hexadecimal system helped Matt Damon communicate via a still frame camera from the 90's.  There were bits and pieces of other space movies, but I never felt Ridley Scott.  It was because of the script.  It was not much.  The words spoken were inane, not clever, and boring.  The faces of the actors were forgettable.  The Martian still is sticking in my mind, and that is a good thing.  They had an opportunity, and they seized it.  It will not make history.