Movie Rental Review: The Gray

I had seen the previews for this movie, and knew that it would be a movie that I would want to watch.

            But having missed it in the theaters, next up came the DVD, and the opportunity was there recently.

            Most everyone that I spoke to about the movie that had seen it seemed to say the same thing: that it was depressing. So, I knew not to expect an uplifting and lighthearted comedy, obviously. Of course, anyone who saw the previews kind of got the sense that it would be a tense movie, presumably.

            It starts off with narration by Liam Neeson in his character, Ottway. He is talking about how he ended up in northern Alaska, on some kind of work camp just before everyone is sent South, to go home for the winter, presumably.

            Ottway is a man on the edge. We learn that he has lost everything, including hope. We do not know how exactly he got where he is, in the remotest corner of Alaska, but we know he is a deeply unhappy and troubled man. Also, he seems solitary, although that might be more what he is going through.

            He struggles with his demon, as he is about to go back to a life that he obviously was trying to escape by coming up to remote Alaska. So we can understand his trepidation as he boards the plane back to that life, and his sense of fatigue, his desire to escape, amidst the loud rowdiness of the roughnecks on board. We also catch our first real glimpse of what troubles him, as he gets involuntary flashbacks of some ex-lover, who we find out has left him.

            Of course, anyone who has seen the previews also knows that the plane crashes, and that Ottway is one of just a few survivors. Most have been killed in the crash, or very quickly thereafter. The survivors are stunned, but they try to make sense of what happened, and collect their bearings. One of them finds a homing beeper, and it seems that perhaps there is a chance that they will be discovered.

            When wolves unexpectedly show up, and start to threaten the men, then it becomes all about survival. It seems Ottway is the leader of the men, although not in an uncontested manner. There is one man in particularly who remains cynical throughout, and challenges everything – until he himself becomes the target of a wolf attack, and the reality of the situation comes bearing down on him.

            Ultimately, the men try to make their way by heading southwards, and hoping to find some traces of civilization, some kind of escape, before fate turns against them. The entire time, they are hounded and stalked by aggressive and very hostile wolves, that threaten to kill them at any moment.

            One by one, the men succumb, one way or the other. They are taken out, and the numbers keep thinning. Ottway tries to develop strategies to continue fighting, to continue moving. They begin to find traces of hope and progress, but it seems for each promising sign, there is some major setback or other waiting around the corner, and the numbers grow incredibly thin before long. Sometimes, the difference between survival and death are mere inches. Yet, one by one they fall, until eventually, this film reaches it's climax, right at the end.

            Of course, I am not going to give what happens away. After all, this is a review of rental movies, which means that you, the reader, are free to go and rent it yourself. As far as survival movies go, this one is pretty intense, although there are others that I still prefer, such as The Edge, with Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin, in which some other survivors of an airplane crash in the remote mountains of the far north are also forced to try and survive while hunted relentlessly by a huge and menacing Klondike bear. Also, Castaway with Tom Hanks was a very good movie, more or less in the vane of Robinson Crusoe, where the survivor of yet another airplane crash (do you notice a theme here?) has to find a means to survive on a tiny island in the middle of the ocean, completely alone and learning to survive entirely his own power. One of the major pluses about Castaway is that it features some incredible acting by Hanks, who was still at his peak during this movie. Really, who else could make you get emotional about a man losing a volleyball?

            This movie is not quite as good, although it might be more realistic than those other movies, because, simply stated, most do not survive until the end of the movie. After all, there is a good reason why this movie has a reputation for being depressing. It is well earned, at that!

            That said, it is a good movie, and makes you think.