setting up scenery for movie - help?

I d/l a model of a hospital ward from 3D warehouse and I I tried selecting all of its objects and using material editor to make all objects in model the default gray but it didn't work - here's what the model looks like (see image):

--second, what are those gray things that look like they're hanging from the ceiling/upper part of the model/do I really need them (appears as gray overlay)?

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--when I zoom out using the mouse wheel, the scene zooms out too much so that it goes beyond the outer "wall" of the model, so how do I zoom in/out incrementally instead of "over-zooming" in/out (I've maximized the perspective (the lower R view in Max's quad viewer)?

Thanks in advance.

EDIT - I believe I've accidentally posted a message in this forum a minute ago with a misspelling of the word "incremental" before I was able to google the correct spelling of this word, my FireFox browser wouldn't let me open a second window to google the spelling and I forgot to do a copy/paste of the message before posting, so if you find this message posted a minute of so before the time stamp on this message, could you please delete it?

thanks.

I d/l a model of a hospital ward from 3D warehouse and I I tried selecting all of its objects and using material editor to make all objects in model the default gray but it didn't work - here's what the model looks like (see image):

If I had to guess, I would have to say that there are probably materials applied to those objects that won't change to the default gray. Open the material editor, select an empty material slot, click on the little eyedropper tool and then click on one of the objects that will not change to gray. If there is a material applied to the object, you will see it appear in the empty material slot.

--second, what are those gray things that look like they're hanging from the ceiling/upper part of the model/do I really need them (appears as gray overlay)?

I have no idea what those things are. That's one of the issues you have to deal with when using a model built by someone else. You will have to figure out what those things are and decide if you need them or not.

--when I zoom out using the mouse wheel, the scene zooms out too much so that it goes beyond the outer "wall" of the model, so how do I zoom in/out incrementally instead of "over-zooming" in/out (I've maximized the perspective (the lower R view in Max's quad viewer)?

Instead of zooming with the scroll wheel, try holding down your alt key, ctrl key and middle mouse button/scroll wheel. Now move your mouse forward and backward. This will allow you to precisely zoom in and out.