The Grey Review

The Grey (2011)


Director- Joe Carnahan 


 Liam Neeson (Taken, The A-Team) plays Ottway, a hunter employed by an Oil Company to protect its workers in the harsh Alaskan wilderness where they are drilling for oil. As the workers make their way home at the end of their term, the plane they are travelling on crashes and Ottway leads seven of his colleagues from the wreck to safety, only to be hunted by a pack of hungry Wolves. 


 The Grey is a film about Survival and The Will to Survive. Unlike the Familiar Alive (1993), which is even mentioned in this feature, The only thing that is eating the dead are the wolves. The Storyline is a simple one. A plane crashes leaving seven survivors, who quickly realise that they are being targeted by a pack of Wolves and no matter what they do, they cannot shake these beautiful, but deadly beasts, and from this you would be forgiven to believe that The Grey is just another straight forward action adventure flick, which in some respects it is, but mostly The Grey is angled at portraying the human emotions of the predicament. It is a feature which pushes the men's Will to live to the extreme and shows how different people react to it. 

 The film is beautifully shot and the script is strong, each caricature is believable and I found myself caring for each of their well being. The acting is excellent from all the cast involved and Neeson returns to a caricature close to that he played in Taken, Cool, Calm, Intelligent. The Direction is spot on and the plot line is far from predictable, even though, from the simplistic storyline, you wouldn't believe so. The best thing about The Grey though has to be the direction of the Wolves. I'm sure that we all are frightened of Wolves to some extent but generally I wouldn't believe them to be in the top ten of peoples most horrid fears. Joe Carnahan's Wolves in the Grey, are scary, they aren't big over sized monsters or have super strength. They are in fact clever, devious and only pick off their prey one at a time and have been portrayed excellently in this film, they are scary and I'm sure once you have seen The Grey, you will be allot more frightened of these beautiful creatures than you were before. 


 All in all I have to praise this film, The Grey is a great piece of cinema and even though you could pick holes in certain spots, has all the right ingredients to satisfy as a top notch Survival-Thriller.


8/10