The Last Winter
Interestingly, this movie was simultaneously released on limited screens (NYC) and on Movies on Demand, so if you have that kind of cable, you can see this movie right now for only $6. The Last Winter is a film building its terror on the science related to global warming, but not at all being about global warming. A group of scientists and drillers are in the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR, played by Iceland), the last frontier of untapped oil reserves and a significant wildlife conservation hot-button. Our characters don’t sit around and preach to each other, thankfully, but the balance still must be struck between their corporate drive for product and the facts of nature, namely being that the permafrost is melting for the first time in 10,000 years and it’s not safe to be out there. More than that, something else agrees with that assessment, and it’s coming.
The Last Winter is shot in an icy, white bleakness, pressing home the utter isolation of these trailers and Quonset huts huddled in meager pools of light in the utter blackness of the Arctic circle. Director Larry Fessenden has worn many hats in the film industry: actor, director, cinematographer, editor; he brings his renaissance experience to bear to maximize the effect of his environment and his actors. Ron Perlman and James LeGros are the primary pipe-swingers in the group, with Jamie Harrold and Zach Gilford sprinkling in some anxiety and lunacy just when it’s needed.
The Something Out There is kept vague and nerve-wracking until the last possible moment, when it by necessity loses some power by being known. The final shot, one that clearly has enormous impact on the story, is done aurally rather than visually, which was a let-down. However, the bulk of the movie has a great and terrifying atmosphere, aided by a spooky score and Magni Agustsson’s perception-skewing camera work. Terrific POV shots put you in the quaking boots of the cast, and roaming the camera unobserved through and outside the camp gives you a sense of forboding, lurking doom around every corner. Nature itself is a character, though it may or not be the scary character haunting this band of fragile meat puppets. Even in the bright light of day, the wide open, whited-out sky is as menacing as the darkest, rustling primeval forest, and to me, that’s quite a feat.
I found the whole film to be very suspenseful, even kicking it on my couch with a beverage and a purring cat. The performances were good and grounded, not hysterical or campy in any way. The masculine aggression felt right in place in the bitter cold, where stupidity can erase survivability in a heartbeat. The ladies were reduced to sounding boards and caretakers, but the testosterone poisoning was too powerful to overcome in all those layers. Come for the eerie unworldly menace, but stay for the well-balanced currents of terror that manages to sustain itself throughout the film.
MPAA Rating Not rated (some violence, profanity, brief nudity)
Release date 9/21/07
Time in minutes 101
Director Larry Fessenden
Studio IFC Films
