The last winter is a movie that starts up promising with an oil field expedition in the arctic plains. The atmosphere of coldness, emptiness, isolation and the resulting paranoia are captured perfectly. Basically the movie starts off a lot like The thing with some modern ecological themes mixed in. There is something under the melting ice... is it nature taking revenge on man, is it ghosts, is it just the paranoia of the crew turning on each other or is it seeping gas from the ground causing hallucinations like the ecological adviser of the team suspects?? We don't know... but I didn't care because the atmosphere, music and beautiful pictures of the white nothingness are just too gripping. Until 2/3rds into the movie I really loved it and was waiting for something to drop the curtain for applause. But it didn't happen... the finale is a mix of all those ideas mentioned, unsure if the thrown in CGI Animal-Ghosts are just products of imagination or natures wrath or whatever. You just get some themes thrown in that never were mentioned before (so what are the childhood pictures supposed to mean and why was the strange box introduced into the plot heavily in the beginning to be dropped off in the end) plus a totally open and disappointing ending that I had the impression to have seen more than once before. Honestly I was angry there about a great movie being ruined so heavily... sitting there and kind of screaming "zoomout and pan, goddamnit" to the camera man. But he didn't ... I can't believe how stupid the last shot is. Watch the first half of the movie, turn it off and leave the rest to your imagination... I think then it could be a lot better than with the directors imagination leading nowhere.