REVIEW: The Grey

I like it when a film surprises me. I'll admit, I didn't know a lot about The Grey before I went in, except that I thought it was a survival film about some characters who manage to live through a plane crash.

While I was partially right (the film was a survival film), what I wasn't expecting was a film that also mixed in some good old-fashioned horror (the slasher film, no less!) with a hint of drama.

The Grey is a film about Ottway (Liam Neeson) who boards a flight home from his job in Alaska (he hunts wolves to make sure they don't kill his co-workers) desperate to get home to his wife. The plane crash lands in the middle of the icy landscape and Ottway, with a handful of survivors, are left to face the elements... and a pack of blood thirsty wolves who are out to defend their den.

For a survival film, the characters are key. As the audience, we need to care about them and will them on to actually survive their ordeal and get back to their homes. While The Grey suffers a little bit from too many characters, the key character that we are supposed to care about (Ottway) is left as mysterious and brooding. However, this kind of works. We are given glimpses of his wife and also his childhood (in a rather awkward flashback scene) that provides the crux of the film's message - that it's all down to our own choices as to whether we live or die on this day. The backstory of his wife is minimal but does help to provide some emotional backbone to our protagonist. I couldn't help but feel that a little bit more about his wife was needed to truly make it effective though.

Another character that the film builds up brilliantly is the setting, Alaska. It's unrelenting in it's power, strength and hostility. The constant howl of the wind provides not only an obstacle for the characters, but for the audience as well - you just wish it would shut up!! The rocky landscapes, blinding blizzards and unwelcoming environment all help create the constant secondary villain, behind the wolves, for our characters to face.

However, as I said before, the film majorly surprised me with it's use of the typical slasher film plot when the wolves were introduced as the main threat and tension in the film. While it was a refreshing take on the survival genre, (imagine the wolves were replaced with a pack of inbred "hicks", and you have films like Wrong Turn and The Hills Have Eyes all over again) it sometimes uses it's cliches a bit too much. Like when one of the characters on night watch decides to go off into the dark night to take a wee instead of watching over the group, we know he is going to die. Or, when the character who is scared of heights must face his fear and traverse across a gorge to the other side, we know he is going to die (a scene that was surprisingly reminiscent of the beginning of Cliffhanger!)

Also, like many slasher films before it, some of the comedy relief in The Grey is a little mistimed. The hacking off of a wolves' head and tossing it back as to goad on the rest of the wolf pack is a little overly long and silly. Some of the characters' chat over the nightly campfires are a welcome respite from the action, but also sometimes a little overly long.

Having said all of that, these are aren't issues that will spoil enjoyment too much, as The Grey is actually a pretty solid film. Even though some of the characters are a little "thin", the fact that we are shoved into the environment with them means that we want them to survive. The wolves are built up as a formidable force to be reckoned with (and the CGI/effects work on them is actually quite impressive - in your face crappy CGI wolves from The Day After Tomorrow!!)

So overall, I do recommend going to see The Grey. Just be prepared for a few jump scares peppered around here and there (because I wasn't!)

**** / *****