There were a lot of things that felt like they were kept secret on purpose before sitting down and viewing The Grey for the first time. The trailer hints at the movie being nothing more than a survival thriller starring Liam Neeson as he struggles to survive not only the unrelenting cold elements, but also the ferocious wolves that inhabit his surroundings. The Grey is written and directed by Joe Carnahan, the man who brought us Smokin' Aces and The A-Team. The movie is also produced by Tony and Ridley Scott, which you think the marketing campaign would jump all over but doesn't even mention. Not only that, but there is quite a bit more to the movie than the trailer and TV spots let on.

As the movie begins, Ottway (Liam Neeson) narrates a letter he's writing to his wife. This segment just made me realize what my life is lacking most right now and that's a Liam Neeson voiceover for every thought that crosses my mind. Think about that. It'd be the most amazing thing ever. The trailer reveals a few major things: that Ottway is stranded in the middle of nowhere in the blistering cold thanks to a plane crash and that wolves stand in the way of him actually surviving this ordeal. The plane crash itself is one of the best executed in recent memory. The way it's filmed and edited is downright ruthless. It's as if you're on the plane as it goes down. The Grey doesn't just place you in this blizzard-ridden hell infested with wolves, it kicks your teeth down your throat, laughs in your face, and throws you into it with everything it has.

The movie gives new meaning to some of the simplest things. Seeing your breath in cold weather takes on an entirely new definition and the way The Grey deals with death just feels incredibly powerful. Ottway questions faith right from the start and takes matters into his own hands throughout the movie. The events that transpire take a toll on even the most religious plane crash survivors. Death is more of a relief than something worth distancing yourself from. Ottway describes it as being a warm sensation and thinking about the thing you love most in life before completely giving yourself into it. Many of the campfire conversations are entirely more impactful than they have any right to be. The conversation about faith in general hits you like a potato sack full of cinder blocks.

The Grey manages to shout its message even when there's nothing being said on-screen. One of the images that stuck with me long after the movie ended was the shot of blood flowing into the paw print of a wolf in the snow. There's a scene by the river that strictly relies on sound and the way you succumb to it is nothing more than brilliant. There's another shot at the end of the film where (and I'm trying to avoid spoilers the best I can) Ottway is arranging some objects in the snow. The way Liam Neeson's fat, sausage-like fingers delicately wrap themselves around these objects and the way his hands tremble as he does this illustrates not only what this man has been through, but also that he's at the end of his rope. Plus the movie will make you want to look over your shoulder the next time you consider relieving yourself out in nature somewhere.

That level of greatness The Grey eventually achieves isn't around at all times. Some lame dialogue does squeak through and characters manage to do really stupid things at times (John Diaz, played by Frank Grillo, especially), but that seems to help the movie more than anything. People, real people, occasionally do stupid things especially when they're scared. So this kind of made the characters feel more genuine and made it very clear that certain characters were caving under pressure.

There was a movie that came out back in 2000 that was called Vertical Limit. It was one of my most trying times at the movie theater. I fought vehemently to leave about halfway through because I hated it so much, but I was with people at the time who wanted to stay until the end. It was probably one of the worst experiences I've ever had to pay for. The Grey is basically everything I wanted that movie to be. The cast is fantastic, their actions are mostly believable, and there's this meaning to everything that really speaks to you.

The Grey is a grainy thriller that knocks the wind out of you on more than one occasion. In fact, it's rare that the movie actually allows you to catch your breath. Everything is such a raw, vicious, and brutal test of faith. It's fantastically violent and Liam Neeson is superb. If The Grey is anything to fall back on, then 2012 is going to be one hell of a year for movies.

The basic problem of The Grey is the difference between what the filmmakers think they had and what the marketing department wanted to sell. This is promoted as a dramatic survival action movie in the trailers and even Liam Neeson's talk-show circuit tour pushed the same line - a plane crashes and a bunch of guys have to survive things that want to eat them. Kind of 'Alive' meets Jurassic Park. With Ra's al Ghul.

Unfortunately, it's this difference that's going to disappoint most of the audience. The film starts with Liam's melancholic voice-over (which isn't a good sign) and a fairly dim setup of oil-riggers beating the ever-loving out of each other. We then see Liam shooting a wolf, lamenting the loss of his wife and then putting a rifle in his mouth and contemplating sparing us from another 2 hours of this. And it gets more depressing from there when the trip home ends abruptly in a plane crash.

It's at this point that the film's indecision about what it is becomes a real problem. As an action or survival film, Liam guides his band of survivors in the most irresponsible way possible, making mistake after mistake and fundamentally dooming them all to becoming wolf entree. There are some basic errors, such as a stack of shotgun shells packed with his rifle, and anybody who's familiar with wolf behavior is going to be really unhappy at their depiction in this film. Anyone from Alaska is going to be even more unhappy at the depiction of swimming in rapids too.

Also as an action film, the wolves have a supernatural capability to outsmart the survivors and behave more like Spielberg's raptors than any real life wolf. At one point they jump a ravine and the wolfs are waiting with GPS precision. They pick off our band of survivors one at a time, leaving us with intermittent testosterone-fueled in-fighting to pass as drama. If only Liam hadn't left the crash site, where rescue teams would already have arrived with burgers and cocoa.

But here's the problem - it's not an action film. It's not a survival film either. It's a psychological drama about facing death where the wolves act as furry metaphors for the grim reaper. From the very first scene to the last, Liam Neeson (who's very good as always) emphasizes this theme and it reverberates over and over. And that's where the film could have been quite good and a welcome break from the survival genre but unfortunately it's too late by the time it becomes clear that the wolves' uncanny supernatural sense has a very good explanation.

My guess is that the everyone expecting an action drama is going to be very unhappy, along with animal rights, PETA, Alaskans and oil-riggers. It's a real shame they didn't recut the trailer before the release.

Countless philosophers and religions have tried to answer that by actually giving us a set of commandments, rules or viewpoints to actually give meaning to something we simply do not have a straight answer for. In the end, the meaning of life is the meaning we ourselves give to it.
The Grey is all about this, had the writer director for this move have been a fan of normal Hollywood movies with a lollipops for everybody and a happy endings this probably would never have made, and that would have been such a shame.
The basic premise of the movie is pretty simple; a plane crashes in the middle of Alaska and a group of survivors try to make their way into civilization while being hunted by the local wolves. I could talk about the magnificent photography, the brilliant casting of Liam Neason or the stark beauty of the Alaskan landscape, but instead I will focus on what becomes the central point of this movie; when everything seems to be against you, what is it that truly matters to us, what makes us tick and in the end when everything seems to be done, what comfort do we get out of it?
The answer is as varied as the characters of the movie itself, and in a sense some have that quite moment of reflection take away from them by the circumstances, and some others simply have the moment come upon then after everything else seems to be exhausted.
Rarely have I watched a movie and felt this weight upon me, because we might dodge the issue and try to justify the way we have lived and the things we have done, but it is with movies like these that we feel a creeping feeling that we might have take our time for granted or numbed ourselves in our petty little lives surrounded by our petty little machines and toys...but in the end we face the reality of the meaning of our lives...and we might find it lacking, or surprisingly fulfilling ...
Do not watch this movie looking to pass a few fun hours, try to see is for what it is, a masterpiece of modern cinema that dares to make us come face to face with our deepest demons and the way we deal with them in our everyday lives....