Film Review - The Grey

At least... we are... ALIVE! Oops, sorry. Wrong film.

A plane crashes in the snowy Alaskan wilderness, and the few who survive are picked off one by one by the harsh climate and/or the circling wolves and/or, perhaps, each other. The result is relentlessly bleak, ridiculously cheesy, and a completely guilty pleasure.

This is definitely one of those "leave your brains behind" films that desperately tries to be credible with its zoological insight, before undermining everything with its OTT action scenes and stupid dialogue.

For example, in one scene, our intrepid survivors have been trudging for hours through deep snow, barely able to lift their feet. They are aiming for a line of trees ahead, and someone comments that the trees don't appear to be getting any closer. A wolf appears, and they are suddenly able to run on the snow like it's asphalt, and within 60 seconds are sheltering in the previously-elusive trees, the wolf apparently having given up and disappeared. It's one of those kind of films.

But I'm not going to hold that against it. Its multiple set-pieces are unquestionably successful, achieving moments of genuine tension, and even a bit of sentimentality thrown in for good measure.

There's very little going on here that's in any way original, but not since Cliffhanger nearly 20 years ago has it been this successful.