Simply A Masterpiece

Fantastic!

As Good As It Gets

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

I'd like to point out that the only reason I even finished this film was because it was so short.The premise of the film is that there had been a zombie apocalypse in the not too distant past. San Fransisco appears to be the last bastion of human civilization. The demand for supplies has prompted San Fran to form up militant squads with the mission to head out into the country to scavenge whatever food/water/materials that they can find and bring it all back.Based upon the clips of video footage shown during the opening credits the setting of the film appears to take place sometime in the 1960s. For whatever reason the director decided to continue to embrace the time setting by artificially making the video quality, throughout the feature, seem grainy and diluted: as if it was filmed in the 60s. This doesn't make much sense to me since the film isn't shot from a first person perspective, like one of the actors was shooting home camera footage.The film was pretty much just a zombie scenario. This movie has next to no story or character development, which is sad because the only thing that makes a zombie movie interesting is getting to know and care about the characters who are surviving the horror. Without character development you can't care when the protagonists begin to die.The writing, the acting and the dialogue were complete rubbish.They find a remote house and decide to make it their base of operations or at least the site of their last stand. Plenty of lumber, nails, water, and flood lights. That's all they need. Two of the group's flunkies are set out to dig a fighting hole in the front yard to use as a observation post. Meanwhile the sarge, lieutenant, and major argue a bit over the fraternization going on between the LT and the SGT. Then come the zombie horde, which promptly get tipped off as to the location of the humans when the LP/OP send up a signal flare in the front yard. So they decide to play Cowboys and Indians from the roof of the house. After an inspiring "Brave Heart" rallying speech from the female LT, the gang put up a valiant effort trying to defend the Alamo from dozens of zombies until the last of their 10 bullets are expended. At this point it all goes downhill when they abandon the roof to try to keep the dozens of surviving zombies from breaking into the house. They did a lousy job barricading the doors and windows and within a few minutes they're all zombie chow except for the female LT who escapes back to San Fransisco empty handed.

In this zombie short a group of survivors head out looking for supplies. If you like zombie films this is well worth checking out. The acting is pretty good and the effects are much better than I was expecting. I thought the final shot was especially well done. There's plenty of zombies, a decent dollop of gore and some nice scenery. I would have liked to have seen a bit more of 'Brickhouse' going nuts as he seemed to be the most interesting character. Anyway, if you like this kind of thing and have 20 minutes to kill I would recommend it.This is better than world war z and was $189 million dollars cheaper to make so that's worth an extra point I think.

I've seen my share of zombie movies, independent films, and short movies. I've had to endure some really shoddy film-making, sound quality, and bad production along the way."The Hell Patrol" has none of that.The ONLY reason I gave it a 9 out of 10, and not a 10, is because it's, well, too short. LOL And yes, I knew it was a short film. But it leaves you wanting more. In a movie, that is always a good thing."The Hell Patrol" begins in an already desolate scenario and takes you through experiences that are gritty in their realism. You can feel what the characters are experiencing. And yet, somehow, it doesn't make the mistake of taking itself too seriously. Nor do the comedic moments take away from this snippet of post-apocalyptic life after Zombies.The creators of this movie seem to have a better-than-average grasp of how true human nature reacts under extreme duress and fear; small moments become everything; people crack jokes at inappropriate times and at stupid things; but it doesn't feel stupid or inappropriate.I don't normally watch commentaries, but as soon as the movie ended I went straight to the commentary and watched it again with the commentary on. I wanted to hear what the creators of the movie had to say about it. I was glad to hear in the commentary that they hope to expand this into a full-length feature at some point in the future.For atmosphere alone, this movie sits proudly with other classics of Zombie and apocalyptic lore. I frankly think the only other Zombie movie that truly made me feel that bleak sense of "everything we knew is gone" was "The Last Man On Earth." Happy to own it, and can't wait till the full-length feature is available!