THE GREY

I should probably warn anyone reading this who hasn't seen the movie that there might be a spoiler, of sorts, even though I have no intention of giving too much away. It's just that I can't talk about what I thought was the coolest aspect of this film without going into the ending a little, so forgive me if I accidentally—or just carelessly—ruin your viewing of The Grey with anything you come across here. Besides, knowing the ending won't ruin what is ultimately a satisfying experience, assuming you like your entertainment kind of gritty.

Any movie that starts with Liam Neeson sticking the barrel of a rifle in his mouth promises to be pretty dark, so you can't go into this hoping for a happy ending. The title's kind of a giveaway—what would you expect from a movie called The Grey? What other kind of movie would that title be appropriate for? Something about the Civil War? Depressing. About food? Disgusting. About elderly people? Boring. No, grey is the color they invented Prozac for, it's the color of suicide and horrible weather. It has little to no positive emotional connotations. The filmmakers chose well.

Which is not to say that The Grey is a downbeat experience. Far from it. Nearly everything about it is gripping and intense, there's a good deal of suspense throughout, and I believe anyone watching it would have a hard time not picturing themselves in the same situation and wondering if they could push themselves to the same extremes.

Neeson plays a man who shoots wolves for a living in order to protect the lives of oil rig workers in Alaska. One of the opening scenes of the film depicts him taking out a wolf as it charges a couple of men, oblivious to what's coming their way. It becomes clear early on that he's dealing with some serious personal issues...As I said, he almost shoots himself in the first few minutes. A little later, he boards a flight with a number of workers, and on the way the plane goes down in a remote part of the Alaskan wilderness in the middle of winter. Neeson and several other men survive the crash, but have little food and not much idea how to keep themselves alive in a hostile environment.

Along with the cold, a hungry and very territorial pack of wolves makes life miserable for these men. They have no choice but to try to find help, and that involves a difficult, grueling trek across an unforgiving tundra. This leads to a lot of tension between the characters, not to mention some unproductive chest-thumping. I liked this element of the story, mainly because I think it's pretty likely that a group of macho guys like this would have a hard time working together under such trying circumstances without somebody vying for the position of alpha male. That person, of course, winds up being Liam Neeson, in case you had any doubts. None of this comes across as clichéd or obvious, and instead feels like a natural part of the narrative. It's fitting for a story depicting these kinds of characters, and the actors bring it all off convincingly.

It's a pretty grim story of survival. I don't think I'm giving too much away when I say most of the men don't make it. Between the wolves, the cold, and the usual injuries that occur while tromping around blind in an unfamiliar world—or trying to shimmy down a rope over a yawning chasm—these guys don't have much working in their favor. It gets to a point where you wonder if any of them are going to live.

That's what's so surprising about The Grey, and what finally makes it a rewarding viewing experience. Hollywood almost never makes movies this genuinely intense or bleak. Oh sure, lots of Hollywood movies look bleak or have dark themes, but few of them really go the distance the way this one does. The only other one I can think of is Se7en—no happy ending there. Even Fight Club and Schindler's List sort of ended on high notes. The Grey is a slightly different breed of storytelling.

In truth, this isn't really a movie about survival at all. The fact that most of the cast doesn't survive effectively underscores that point. What The Grey is trying to tell us goes a bit deeper than that. This is a story about the inevitability of death, and humankind's relationship with its own mortality. All of us will die, and the only difference between us in that regard is how we deal with it. Some of us are stricken down without warning, some die violently, others quietly accept their fate and wait for death to come, and still others choose to fight it until their last. This film pretty much covers the full range.

It's Neeson's character who chooses to fight, and I have to say, the last final scene in this movie is one of the most badass things I've seen in a while. I'd say it's totally the equal of Chow Yun Fat sliding down a banister while shooting two pistols at the same time in Hard-Boiled, or Clint Eastwood blowing away a gang of rangy outlaws in A Fistful of Dollars. Neeson faces down the alpha wolf of the very pack that has been picking off his companions with nothing but a knife in one hand a few broken airplane liquor bottles wedged between his fingers in the other. The confrontation is executed perfectly, with zero pandering to the audience. It is simply the toughest, baddest, grittiest thing I've witnessed in a movie for years.