2026’s The Fort opens with a group of children and teenagers huddled in what appears to be an empty classroom.  The atmosphere is gray and bleak.  One gets the feeling that this is a place where they have been hiding for a long time.

Billy Magnus (Kevin Sorbo) enters the room and sits down in front of the children.  The viewer notices the graffiti written on the walls and the dry erase boards behind him.  “2×4=7?” someone has written.  As I watched the film, I have to admit that I had a hard time looking away from 2×4=7.  Was that meant to indicate that the educational system had collapsed or was it an homage to Orwell’s claim that followers of the State will convince themselves that one plus one equals three?  Or was it a call back to the numerology of the Bible, in which seven is presented as the perfect number?

Billy tells a story about what life used to be like, before whatever happened to send everyone into hiding in abandoned buildings.  He talks about how normal society collapsed under the weight of financial hardship, civil unrest, and a pandemic that was used as an excuse to strip people of their civil liberties.  (Hmmm …. sounds familiar.)  Billy tells how a former army chaplain named Cooper (Tim Perez-Ross) lost his family to the pandemic and how he subsequently defeated Aamon (Richard Grieco), who claimed to be a follower of a group of people who called themselves the “Light Bringers.”  Ammon died in his encounter with Cooper but was later brought back to life by a demon named Balthazar (Dean Cain) and then….

Okay, okay.  I hear you snickering out there.  Dean Cain as a demon?  Richard Grieco as a wandering enforcer of evil?  Yes, it’s easy to mock and I should point out that this is definitely a low-budget production so Balthazar brings Aamon back to life involves a very small electrical charge.  And yet, it was more effective than I was expecting.  The blank-eyed look of the demons was effectively creepy and Richard Grieco’s wasted appearance captured the character’s self-destructive energy.

Eventually, Cooper ends up leading a group of people to The Fort, a village that he runs with a firm but benevolent hand.  Unfortunately, some citizens of The Fort chafe under all of Cooper’s rules and Cooper himself often doesn’t seem as if he truly wants the burden of being in charge of everyone.  When a fallen priest shows up with a doctor (Eddie McClintock) who claims that he has the curse for the latest pandemic, the people of the Fort are tempted to reject Cooper’s rules.

The Fort is another low-budget film from Jason Campbell.  That budget is noticeable in the film’s sometimes risible special effects.  At the same time, there are other moments that effectively capture the isolation of being separated from the rest of the world.  Tim Perez-Ross gives a pretty good performance as Cooper, playing him as a man who struggles with his own anger and doubts.  In the end, I appreciated that this film was more about redemption and forgiveness than punishment.  That’s an important theme that a lot of end-of-the-world films tend to miss.