RipDelight This is a tender, generous movie that likes its characters and presents them as real people, full of flaws and strengths.

Kaelan Mccaffrey Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

Quiet Muffin This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.

Dana An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

kapelusznik18 ***SPOILERS*** Taking a three week hike through the wilds and deserts of Arizona three survivalists Julian Paul & John, Shane Dean Cavin Gray & Slade Hall, soon confront a matter of life and death when John due to the first time at this, surviving in the wild, butterfingered Paul slipping up and causing him to get stabbed by a wild bore trap that Julian set up to get food. Now with an injured person to care and look after both Julian & Paul's troubles have only began with the unfriendly forest and it's inhabitants slowly closing in on them.Living off the fat or gooey of the lands by eating bugs and worms as well as needing desperately needed medical help for John the two soon start to turn at each other in them accusing each other of not doing enough to get themselves out of the mess that they now find themselves in. Even though it was the rookie Paul who caused all this trouble he seems to be taking the high road in as if he's the one who's the injured party not the barley hanging on to life Paul. As the tension between the two survivors-Julian & John- reach a fever pitch when Paul now within moments of suffering a painful death in the wilds is peacefully put out of his misery by a kind and caring Julian smashing his skull in with a bolder before he has to suffer any farther.Now with the two remanding survivor of this trip in the wilds going after each other for reasons that they can only explain it's only a matter of time before one or both end up dead: Either by killing each other or dying of exposer or hunger in the wild. ****SPOILERS**** It's the far more experience Julian who despite everything that Paul does to kill him who ends up alive even though by the time he's discovered by a search party he completely lost it and is ready for a lifetime stay in a mental institution. As for Paul by then he's completely out of the picture or movie in him trying to go on his own and ending up nowhere.P.S Ther's a very interesting scene with a drugged up, who had couple of uppers hidden in his shirt, and out of his skull Julian having a jolly good time naked as a jay bird splashing and frisking around in a local stream with Mother Earth played by the sexy Katrina Matusek who's fun was interrupted when the drugs wore off.

jay_hovah703 I don't mean to belittle the director or anyone who worked on this film, because clearly it is a labor of love. A crew of people staying in the woods for 16 days filming a movie just as long takes guts. Unfortunately, the movie itself falls flat. At the same time, this movie is the reason why not everyone should make films. The movie is full of unclear motivations, sloppy dialog, and a nonsensical script. I can't believe the number of times I heard the words "good people" in this movie. Not only is this colloquialism a baseless adjective, but I almost laughed out loud when it was used as a term for one person. It was little errors like this that are the movies ultimate downfall. However, the actors are remarkably good given the source material, but the plot itself makes no sense whatsoever. I started counting the number of times Julian ran off the screen for no reason whatsoever. I still don't know why any of them took peyote, given the events in the film. Yet, none of this needs to be explained...apparently. There is no clear direction for the movie and the ending....well, it makes as little sense as the rest of the movie. Might be spoilers from this point forward: Three men hike into the woods and Julian, the nominal leader, has something to prove, or learn of himself or, just to go bloody ape-sh!t? There's a thread of discourse that takes place inside the actors that never becomes clear, never is stated out loud and frankly, is the largest plot hole of the movie of all. I say this for the same number of reasons as there are the cast: The first being, that the remarkably relaxed friend, John, seems to trust Julian with his life, who for all intents and purposes, appears one step away from insanity. I would never follow such a man into the woods for any reason whatsoever, but the beginning of the movie hints that something diabolical is going to occur later in the movie. John seems aware of this and trudges forward, like old friends. MAJOR SPOILER HERE: The second is Paul. He struggles with a number of questions in the movie, but one thing he shouldn't have hesitated at was killing Julian, or at least getting the hell away, after witnessing Julian bash John's head in with a rock. These people set off into the woods and under a week later, he watches Julian take John's life. With a large rock. I don't care if John was dead anyway, a rational person (allegedly Paul) should have recognized that from that point forward, he was dealing with a psychopath. Again, spoiler: And lastly, of course, there's Julian. Admittedly, Julian was the strongest actor of the three and I enjoyed watching him throughout the movie. I believe he acted out the part that the director intended for him perfectly. But that makes me question the director, not the actor. Why, oh why, did Julian go native in just about a week, kill his best friend, then Paul and end up running naked in the woods 34 days later killing search party members? The entire movie hinges on this and yet there is never any clear reasoning behind it. Again there are hints at his insanity from the get go, but any sane person wouldn't accompany this type of man into the wilderness.My hat's off to the actors for being as apt at communicating the intentions of the director. Yet the film industry can only handle a finite number of one named celebrities, and one of those names is not Roze.

busctothebusc It's a shame when people undertake the effort to make a feature film when they simply do not have the requisite tools to even superficially command the craft. The filmmaker(s) should have spent more time doing another short film or two in order to better prepare (or better yet) learn the craft of story design and character development. The movie is reasonably well shot, but this is the extent of what I'm willing to give this movie. Good work by DP.The movie drags and drags. The characters are not well drawn – very little debt. All we get is three guys that go into the forest on a self-imposed mission to test themselves with very little water and a bag of peyote. The reason for this is not very well justified. We're left to assume that it's a contrived "guys" thing – not good enough as far as a premise goes. We're not given a whole lot of insight into Julian's character aside from the fact that he's got some sort of unresolved internal issues – none of this is well mapped. He and Paul are drawn up as having issues with on another, but again nothing is really fleshed out in any discernible dramatic sense. Their relationship is flat and one-note.As mentioned earlier, nothing really happens with these guys. The structure is week and no discernible dramatic tension is created that is able to sustain a feature length telling of the story (or lack thereof). The movie simply wallows along as we follow these week characters through the forest.I really long for the days when people stop pretending to be filmmakers just because they have the financial means to do so. Of course, we can't really define well made movies without having our fair share of bad or mediocre movies like this one. The filmmakers of Deadfall Trail will do well to be honest with themselves and learn to appreciate the art of story craft – maybe consult those that do have experience instead of assuming that they already have the tools. Learn how to write stories that resonate with the audience and populate your story with compelling characters that have some emotional debt and complexity and are able to pull the audience along. Reach out for serious notes from experienced story tellers if you need to. And don't fall into the fatal trap of only taking notes that praise or validate you. Learn how to work with honest notes, even if it hurts. From what I understand, the filmmakers are instructors at a two year film program in Scottsdale, Arizona? My hopes are that this does not cloud their ability to take notes from others. It's very easy for people like this to feel like they have all the answers when surrounded by eager students that look up to them.

bob_meg I have to agree with the other, few, reviewers here....why this film has barely a "4" rating is beyond me. It's about twice that good. Not only is it an interesting story, the characters are well-drawn and complex, the action is very well staged and performed, and even the special effects are creepy and effective.Julian and John (Shane Dean and Slade Hall) are well-worn survivalists. Their idea of a kick-ass weekend is to walk for a few days into Arizona desert with nothing but a couple bottles of water. Julian seems to have taken these treks a bit more seriously over the years, and balks when John invites his younger loud-mouthed bud Paul (Cavin Gray Schneider) along for their latest adventure into the Arizona Coconino (?) forest (a new one on me, but a very cool location).There's good tension between them as Julian and Paul constantly tear-down and one-up each other with John desperately trying to referee. Much like "Deliverance," however, the trio encounter an unexpected turn of events that has them fighting for their lives for two-thirds of the film.I'd never seen any of these actors before, and I was extremely impressed with all of them, particularly Shane Dean's Julian, who takes a role that could have easily been written off into crazy-ville and instead makes it compelling and oddly tragic.What really blew me away were the dream and drug-infused (via peyote, of course) sequences. For a low-budget movie, these were extremely creepy and vividly rendered.The ending is chilling, and not easy to shake. The only minor quibble I have with the film is many of the insider survivalist techniques. They're not really "explained" very well, and there's ample opportunity to do so, given that Paul's character is a newbie.But this is a minor flaw in an otherwise trippy, tense experience.