Today watched The Grey.
A really grey movie to be sure. I am still thinking whether the grey was supposed to be related to the wolfs , the weather , the atmosphere , or to Liam Neesons' grey outfit... No matter which was it supposed to be , all of these 'things' were grey.
Obviously I am not going to tell the story or the plot , so don't be afraid of spoilers. This movie anyway wasn't the type of movies that can be spoiled by a major plot twist. From the very start it was pretty clearly set. The mood of the film didn't change drastically, bet went on a downward spiral . It was gloom at the start and it stayed that way. However , there was some moments that made the audience laugh a little bit , but those were kinda forced laughs. At least that's what it seemed like in the movie. In my opinion they didn't really work as a genuine jokes, but then , its hard to imagine anybody cracking jokes in the situation they were in.
In the whole , the thing I look forward to , in a film , is emotions and some kind of motive . A motive/reason why the film had to be made. Well clearly this film had one , although ,I would still argue that it held any motive that's beyond the screen. What I mean is that the film did make you feel sad and touched and scared , but ultimately I would have to say that it failed to make me value my life more , which I believe must have been the thought behind it all. At least the fact that I am saying , was supposed to, means I am not sure. That's the deal with this film , after you have watched it , you are left with a feeling: why I had to see it? . The movie sure does ask a lot of questions. It questions , fear, willpower, human strength, memory , death , afterlife , and even God . But It does not answer to any of those.
On the other hand , bad things happen to us all the time. People die , and nobody knows why. Accidents happen , and people get killed . Life doesn't give us answers why. However , because that happens in real life , do we than have to show the same stuff again in a movie? or is it not the meaning of a movie to show and give people something more than real life does? Its no secret that most of our life's are not as half as interesting as those people have in the movies . Still this movie didn't provide any of that. It just showed the bloody and harsh nature of animals and wildlife. Or did it? ... the wolves seemed a bit too .. lets say werewolf-y... So if it was intended to be a true representation of a harsh environment , it was not real enough, it seemed exaggerated , and that would be OK , if only it would be clear why. There are a lot of great films that exaggerate and over exaggerate things and they do it well , because they do that to increase the emotions they create and give.
Ok I drifted off a bit...
Back to the movie. One thing that really stopped me from truly believing the story , was some of the bad technical and practical bugs and errors. Like snow on the face that doesn't melt on the warm skin( I come from a snowy country so I know the habits of snow :D ) , the fact that while some of the characters were thoroughly wrapped in cloths to protect their face and neck , the main character walked in the blizzard with an open collar and bare chest( no survivor would do that , he would be coughing restlessly after couple of hours)... Some scenes used the wind as a extremely loud background noise, some of them ( when people were talking) were completely windless. While I was clearly led to believe that it was incredible loud and harsh whistling wind blowing in one scene , in the next ,the people spoke with no problem hearing each other from a big distance... And finally , in one of the later scenes , we see a close up , of Neeson , and the huge scar he had on his left cheek throughout the whole movie , suddenly it appears on his right one... I mean how tired the make up artist has to be to make such a mistake( not even speaking about the actor himself or the director or any other staff member) obviously it wouldn't be a big deal if the scar was small , but its NOT its big.. its even on the poster ,and is used as some kind of symbol... maybe it was intentionally? dont think so , but may be...
Yes , you may call me silly that I care about these things and that I am niggling too much . however these kind of MISTAKES , make me think that the crew didn't work as attentive as they should have , and it just makes you fell like you are watching something of a lower quality , that the makers of the movie haven't put all their enthusiasm in it .. Well I am not saying everything has to be perfect, but just that some people haven't done their job :(
Okey , now some good things :)..
Overall it is a original movie comparing to those that are being shown now. I mean I cant remember the last time this type of movie was made... The closest ones are probably The way back , and 127 hours, although even those are not like this one. So it was a nice change in the too used to comedy-adventure-comic-fayrytale type of movies. Also the landscape was beautiful the wast snowy hills and forests of Alaska, lovely . And it really seemed that they were filming there, so at least the nature was authentic.
No matter how hard it tried to be the classic survivor movie( like Alive 1993, weirdly enough this exact movie was referred to in this film , shortly after their accident)
However , it didn't bring the full on man vs wilderness story ,or not as near that kind of fear and excitement.
SPOILERS
and sadly it did kill off quickly the character you were early becoming to like , that's never a good way of making the audience to attach themselves to the characters and really feel the emotional reality of the film.
One of the character ask the main character( we dont learn they names till very late in the film) why is he still living ? what is his willpower to live? ...Answer to that should have been the main emotional string or reason of the whole movie being more that just Neeson being badass... Sadly it was not. The answers to these questions are never answered and you live thinking , why did he kill all those wolves? why did he fight?
OK this is deffinelty enough said... Probably not a good review , but more like an essay :D ..
Anyway , If u have seen the movie , please feel free to add comments about your point of views ,and your thoughts about it!
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