One should always pay attention to the beginning.\u00a0 This is when the seeds of the end are sown.<\/p>\n
Once more into the fray,
\nInto the last good fight I’ll ever know.
\nLive and die on this day.
\nLive and die on this day.<\/p>\n
I was a tad under excited about seeing The Grey<\/em>.\u00a0 It looked like The Edge<\/em>, except with a bigger Brit saving the day.\u00a0 The previews (BTW I\u2019m going to start researching and paying attention to who throws these trailers and previews together, most today are guilty of 1 of 3 crimes: revealing too much, misrepresenting the story, or just sucking) were for a movie I had already seen.\u00a0 If any of you remember The Edge<\/em>, its about a plane crash in Alaska after which the survivors are hunted by a big ole bear.\u00a0 Anthony Hopkins defeats the bear with his wits.\u00a0 The preview for The Grey<\/em> looked like the same movie except instead of AH beating a bear with his brain it was Liam Neeson beating up a wolf with a broken vodka bottle.\u00a0 Not an unentertaining prospect, but not something I absolutely needed to see.<\/p>\n This film was the victim of misrepresentation.\u00a0 It is not a remake of The Edge<\/em>, though its trailer was.\u00a0 It\u2019s more of a nod to Jack London stories.\u00a0 Most of the film reminded me of To Build a Fire<\/em>.\u00a0 More on that later.<\/p>\n The basic plot: bunch of miners or oil workers (and one sniper) are working in Assfuck, Alaska and their shift or whatever is over so they get to hop a plane ride to the relative civilization of Anchorage.\u00a0 And after much foreshadowing, the plane crashes into a blank spot on the map somewhere between Assfuck and Anchorage.\u00a0 There are several survivors and there seem to be enough random supplies to make an attempt at survival.\u00a0 Except they have crashed landed on what a large pack of wolves consider their territory.\u00a0 This is bad because wolves give themselves the right to kill\/eat\/play soccer with the organs of whatever is in their territory.<\/p>\n So not only are these few survivors in what must be at least 30 below 0 (Fahrenheit) blizzard conditions; they are also running from large wolves.\u00a0 And the wolves are pretty cool actually.\u00a0 They have a gift for the dramatic without being too obvious about it.\u00a0 And they know where to stand to look scariest.<\/p>\n But fighting the wolves isn\u2019t really what the film is about.\u00a0 It is about despair in the face of cosmic indifference.\u00a0 This is what recalls To Build a Fire<\/em>.\u00a0\u00a0 The terrible cold in that story is described as exposure to the universe at large.\u00a0 Alaska in winter was the cosmos directly touching the earth.\u00a0 And the universe unmasked was the essence of death.\u00a0 When confronted with the indifference of the universe to our pain and suffering, one will question the existence of God, and the point of life.\u00a0 And there are awesome To Build a Fire<\/em> moments in The Grey<\/em>.\u00a0 If there is a supposedly benign being in charge of the universe, why won\u2019t he throw me a bone and all that.\u00a0 But eventually, in The Grey<\/em>, we come to realize that\u2019s not really the point.\u00a0 Liam Neeson and his buddies are confronted with the cold unmasked cosmos and pursued by giant wolves; but the point is: on this corner of a wet rock, in the face of the unrelenting cold of the universe, they and the wolves are together on it.<\/p>\n I\u2019d see this movie if I were you.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" One should always pay attention to the beginning.\u00a0 This is when the seeds of the end are sown. Once more into the fray, Into the last good fight I’ll ever know. Live and die on this day. Live and die … Continue reading