The Grey

• Title: The Grey
• IMDB: link

Liam Neeson stars as one of seven oil workers (Frank Grillo, Dallas Roberts, Joe Anderson, Nonso Anozie, Ben Bray, Dermot Mulroney) to survive a plane crash in the Alaskan wilderness. A skilled hunter hired to keep the wolves off the workers in the fields, Ottway (Neeson) takes control of the survivors who have been marooned in the middle of the hunting grounds of a large pack of hungry, and vicious, gray wolves.

When the film sticks with the tension of the men’s fight for survival it works well enough. Sadly, the plot is also filled with flashback dream sequences of Ottway’s life with his wife (Anne Openshaw), Ottway and Diaz’s (Grillo) cliched alpha-male dick-measuring in the wilderness, and the heavy-handed sequence involving the man bemoaning the state of his life and contemplating suicide as the film opens. Is it better than most dead of winter theatrical releases? Sure. Is it worth owning on home video. Not really.

The Grey, especially for fans of the glut of middling films Neeson has turned out in recent years, may be worth a single viewing, but, with the exception of Ottway, all the most interesting characters have four legs. Although the film gets the feel of a bunch of dickheads in the wilderness that aren’t worth saving right, that’s kind of the problem. We really shouldn’t be rooting for the wolves.

Extras on the Blu-ray and DVD include deleted scenes and commentary with writer/director Joe Carnahan and editors Roger Barton and Jason Hellmann. The Blu-ray also includes a UltraViolet digital version of the film.

[Open Road Films, Blu-ray $34.98 / DVD $29.98]