BEFORE: I could have followed the Toby Kebbell link out of "A Monster Calls", because he was also in the remake of "Ben-Hur", and last year's "Kong: Skull Island" and "War for the Planet of the Apes", all movies that I want to see, and that would have rivaled last fall's Michael Stuhlbarg festival for originality and obscurity. But following the Liam Neeson link gets me to this film, and ultimately to where I want to be on February 1. Which is really not that far off, just 5 films with James McAvoy and 2 with Miles Teller, and I'll be there.
I waited a long time for "The Grey" to pop up, it was in theaters in 2011 and then just never appeared on premium cable. My guess is that it just sort of fell through the cracks, and I moved forward without it, I think I've done two or three Liam Neeson groupings while waiting for this one. Finally it ran on the Sundance Channel, which I usually avoid because they run commercials now (it was not always so) and they also edit out curse words. I supposed I could have watched it on iTunes for $3.99, but those charges add up after a while, and I don't get to KEEP a copy of the film that way.
AFTER: Well, it's been a quality month for survival films, especially winter-themed ones, and I can't really program January any better than that. "The Finest Hours" was set during a blizzard off Cape Cod, and "The Way Back" featured prison escapees walking through frozen Siberia. "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them" also had some snowy scenes set at the Central Park Zoo, and "The Man Who Knew Infinity" showed an Indian mathematician trying to stay warm during his winters in the U.K. But tonight's film is set in Alaska, I think - and there's just a whole lot of nothing up there except snow and wolves, apparently.
The "survival film" genre has really exploded in the last few years, with "The Revenant" being the most recent good example, but before that there was "All Is Lost", "Into the Wild", "Lone Survivor" and "127 Hours", in addition to the other films I mentioned above. I guess you can go back to "Cast Away" in 2000 and "Alive" before that in 1993. Combine this with dystopian future-set films like "The Hunger Games" and a few dozen zombie films, and you get a feel for just how big this genre can get. If there isn't one already, there really should be an entire film festival just for survival films. (I tried to google it, but there are too many guides on the web to surviving film festivals themselves...)
For a brief minute I thought this film was not following a linear structure - since I knew the plot in advance, when we first see Neeson's character, Ottway, hunting wolves, I thought that might be taking place after the plane crash, and then we'd flash back to show how he got into that situation. But no, the oil company paid him to hunt wolves around the drilling platforms, to keep the other workers safe. But this job, or perhaps the climate, has taken its toll on this man, and we see him writing a letter to his wife, detailing his plans to commit suicide. It's a little unclear whether his wife is alive or dead, real or imaginary - I suppose anything is possible, but either way, apparently the existence or the memory of his wife is not enough to sustain him. Maybe he's got that Seasonal Affected Disorder (SAD) which can happen to people who are up north, where there's not much daylight during the winter months.
Of course, it's his last day on the job and he's headed back to his wife (I suppose?) and OF COURSE, the plane therefore crashes in the most ironic way possible. (Alanis Morissette, take notice, this is how it's really done...) So the guy who wanted to end it all the day before now finds himself in the position of trying to keep himself and 7 other people alive. (Or, maybe he died in the crash, and this is his concept of the hellish afterlife...mind blown!) And as always with a Liam Neeson film, we find that his character has a particular set of skills that turn out to be just what's required to fix the problem at hand. Or thereabouts.
But are 7 people, one of whom has survival skills, enough to handle an angry, hungry pack of wolves, who allegedly are the only animals besides humans to understand the concept of revenge? The movie states this, at least, I can't say as I've heard that little urban myth before. Can these humans put aside their differences long enough to come together and get back to safety? Ah, but that would be telling. Wikipedia will tell you that the ending is rather ambiguous, but I'm not so sure about that.
But the movie has a clear message for anyone who flies on a plane and is super-annoying - you know, the kind of person who just wants to make conversation with you, and keeps saying "Bro!" in every sentence, when all you want is some peace and quiet, so you can take a nap? Now at least you can console yourself with the knowledge that if your plane crashes, you can choose to NOT try and save the passengers who talk too much, or keep kicking your seat, or take the last kosher meal when you specifically requested one and they didn't. Be sure to tell these people DURING the flight that you won't make any effort to save them after a crash - that should shut them up for a while, or at least curtail their offensive behavior. You're welcome.
Also starring Dermot Mulroney (last seen in "Truth"), Frank Grillo (last seen in "The Sweetest Thing"), Dallas Roberts (last seen in "Dallas Buyers Club"), Nonso Anozie (last seen in "Pan"), James Badge Dale (last seen in "The Walk"), Joe Anderson (last seen in "Copying Beethoven"), Ben Hernandez Bray (last seen in "Out of the Furnace"), Anne Openshaw.
RATING: 5 out of 10 sharp sticks
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