Al Gore has ManBearPig and now Larry Fessenden has wendingos avenging a warming planet as man decides to drill in the barren arctic wilderness. The film is one that is steeped in eerie, ghostly images that is until you get to the end and it all seems to fall apart.
Ed Pollock (Ron Perlman) is a representative of North Oil Company. The company has been allowed to sink a test well in the arctic tundra and eagerly wants to get to drilling.
They’ve put a team up in the area to access the feasibility of their activity and Pollock had scientist James Hoffman (James LeGros) forced upon him by the company since James is an environmentalist and give the impression that North is doing the right thing.
Pollock is just gung ho to get those platforms to the area and sink the wells. It doesn’t help matters that Hoffman is screwing Pollock’s old girlfriend Abby (Connie Britton). Pollock has rushed up north to see what the holdup is and puts the blame firmly on Hoffman.
However, strange things are happening at base camp as people are having hallucinations and the radios are getting strange interference. Is Mother Nature fighting back?
The Last Winter starts off as a creepy, claustrophobic, apocalyptic film and in that degree it excels and brings back memories of John Carpenter’s The Thing as well as Robert Wise’s The Haunting. It’s when you get to the end that it all seems to fall into a puddle of melted permafrost.
It had me hooked until we got a good luck at what was causing all the mysterious doings at the arctic station. Fecking CGI wendigo ghost caribou! Up until that point I was very impressed with the film, although I’ll have to say that Fessenden wears his green badge very prominently on his sleeve.
I found the plot point that mankind was melting the area and that those climate changes were making people have hallucinations and odd behavior more believable than what the film brings out at the end as the culprits.
Although I’ll have to play devil’s advocate with myself and say that perhaps that was also hallucinations as well, but then they also physically damage some characters so I guess they’re real – run for the hills!
For about seventy-five percent I loved the film and found the atmosphere was excellent. Sadly it’s that last twenty five percent that made me like the film less.
The Last Winter is presented in anamorphic widescreen (1.78:1) and is enhanced for 16x9 televisions. Special features include a two hour documentary about the making of the film. There are some deleted scenes and an interview with Fessenden, but they’ve been incorporated into the doc.
Luckily the doc has been divvied up into chapters so you can get to those items if you just want to see the scenes or interview. There’s also a commentary from Fessenden.
The Last Winter will have the environmentalists hiding under the couch, but I thought that aspect of the film was a bit preachy (especially since the avengers of Mother Nature appear to be of a supernatural variety). Where the movie excels is in the isolation and terror that the characters experience. Sadly, the ending doesn’t keep up that terror.
The Last Winter is now available at Amazon and AmazonUK . Visit the DVD database for more information.
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