At the risk of spoiling the entire film, I must warn anyone who was stirred to see The Grey from its promising trailer. It’s not that the latest picture from writer/director Joe Carnahan (Narc, Smokin’ Aces, The A-Team) isn’t his best yet — in point of fact, it is — but it’s that the film that was sold to you is not really what you’ll be getting. It’s not dissimilar to Drive, an art film stuck with a “fast and furious” trailer. These aren’t bad movies, but the false pretense on which you see the film may leave you dissatisfied.

So here’s my warning: If you, like me, watched the trailer and determined that a snow-covered and wartorn Liam Neeson fighting wolves with a fistful of broken bottles was a film worth your hard-earned dollars, be prepared to be disappointed. It’s not that you’ll dislike The Grey, but this is a film that will give you everything but what you thought you were promised. The outrage from the audience was palpable and reasonable when the ending credits began, as though a ruse had been pulled and we had been gipped a dollar. But there is still a lot to like in The Grey, so long as you can accept the movie on it’s own terms.

Neeson stars as the brooding John Ottway, an oil refinery sharpshooter charged with keeping the local wolf population away from the refinery workers at a remote facility somewhere in the Alaskan mountains. This is a job that employs society’s undesirables, and Ottway is a man with neither the energy or the inclination to do more than merely exist. He drafts a letter that he never sends to his long lost love, and ponders its contents even as he boards a small plane home. But amid a harsh snowstorm, the plane malfunctions and goes down in one of the more visceral experiences in recent film history (those weary of turbulence should prepare to have their worst fears depicted, if not fully realized).

Eight men survive the crash, and are quick to realize that the chances of a rescue are slim. Not long after this realization, the wolves set in to attack. Ottway knows that they may have crashed near the wolf nest, and he sets the men on a hike toward the distant treeline in hopes of leaving the pack’s perimeter. The rest of the survivors include character actors such as Dermot Mulroney, Nonso Anozie, Frank Grillo and Dallas Roberts, and the veil of who is to be picked off next is never lifted until the moment of the attack. I recently told a friend of mine that most people are not victim to a bad a situation but rather merely victim to themselves, but The Grey is a harrowing example of a group of fellas who almost certainly did nothing to earn their torment.

For a bunch of hard-nosed ex-cons and burnouts, these fellas sure do have a gift for the gab. In between being under siege by wolves, snowstorms, and internal bleeding, these guys chat away — pondering existential quandaries ranging from the existence of God to what-could-be their individual sexual swan songs. The initial intuition is to pounce on the script by Carnahan and Ian Mackenzie Jeffers (who wrote the short story on which this is based), but the talkiness surprisingly only occasionally overstays it’s welcome. Mostly, these are fine performers having very realistic conversations at the edge of the world. Were I doomed to be killed by wolves or by a snowstorm, I suppose I’d be talking about God and sex too.

But the film’s final moments are nonetheless a disappointment. Carnahan’s ending demonstrates restraint — something we’ve never seen from his previous films — and it is often the aim of an artist not to give an audience exactly what they think they want. I can see myself perhaps enjoying the ending more if an overzealous publicity team hadn’t tricked me, but I can’t be sure. I think future generations will enjoy The Grey more than the current crowd, but that doesn’t change the collective groan that is occurring in theaters around the country every time a screening ends.

Rating: 3 1/2 out of 5 stars

For more of Gary’s reviews and musings, visit garysundt.wordpress.com.
For more information on Gary’s work as a filmmaker, visit summertimekillersmovie.com.