The true story of a 1930s frontier trapper who adopted the ways of the wild and found love among its people. After discovering that the woods of the great north were being threatened with extinction his passion leads him on a crusade to fight for the land hes come to love. Subtitles in english and spanish. Studio: Sony Pictures Home Ent Release Date: 04/22/2008 Starring: Pierce Brosnan Annie Galipeau Run time: 117 minutes Rating: Pg13 Director: Richard Attenborough

Richard Attenborough's passion weighs so heavily on every frame of Grey Owl, the true story of a pioneering conservationist in the Canadian wilderness, that it tends to smother the characters. Pierce Brosnan is stiff, deliberate and terse as Archie Grey Owl, a part Scotch Native American adopted and raised by a Canadian Ojibwa tribe. He gets by as a trapper, hunting guide, and sometime writer, but becomes an internationally revered activist in the 1930s when he publishes a book on the vanishing wilderness. Annie Galipeau is the native Canadian woman who sees through his tough hide and secretive quiet: "Yeah, I know. You're a loner. You have to live in the wilderness. I hear it everyday." But she doesn't pierce his most zealously guarded secret, a distracting subplot that most of the audience figures out in no time. Attenborough's hushed reverence for Archie's dream slows an already lugubrious drama, and Brosnan all too often comes off as a walking cliché, his flat speech and long, slow stares a Brit's idea of a movie Indian. The real star of the film is the magnificent Canadian wilderness: carpets of forests, clear crystal lakes, and vast blue skies. There's no doubting Attenborough's good intentions, and his love for the wilderness is felt in every gorgeous frame, but somewhere in the forest he loses track of his story. --Sean Axmaker