First appearing in 1977's second issue of 2000 AD, an obscure British sci-fi magazine, and created by equally obscure John Wagner and Carlos Ezquerra, Dredd is a hard-nosed, bad-ass supercop in charge of acting as judge, jury, and executioner in an intense war on crime in the near-future dystopian Mega-City One. I've never had the pleasure of reading the comics, but from what I could gather about them Dredd's adventures quickly descend into a very surprising rabbit hole. I assume that most people's exposure with Judge Dredd comes from the sloppy 1995 Stallone movie. From that, audiences could probably guess that Dredd's comic book tales take him on trips through a Mad Max-esque type of post-apocalyptic hellhole, correct? Well... in the comics Dredd faces off against aliens, alternate-reality zombies, mutants, and various kinds of robots. Typical comic book stuff, but clearly movie audiences wouldn't buy a cent of this crap if aliens showed and started shooting up the place. You'll be happy to know they didn't include any of this in the latest theatrical outing of the Judge.
Dredd sees the titular character taking Cassandra Anderson, a rookie Judge fresh from the academy, out for her final examination before she becomes a full Judge. Anderson technically failed her academy training, but the higher-ups insisted she be taken out for a field test, because of her valuable mutant telepathy powers. Cops that can read minds are clearly a rare, and powerful, commodity in Mega-City One. Upon responding to a triple homicide in a rough part of town, Dredd and Anderson are closed off from the outside world by viscous gang leader Ma-Ma. The Judges will have fight through an army of psychopaths and murderers if they want to survive.
If you zoned out during that last paragraph, let me sum in up for you: "Die Hard with Judge Dredd and a little bit of Training Day for good measure". Sure the premise isn't all that original, but I say "Die Hard with X" is a winning formula for any movie to take, and Dredd pulls it off spectacularly. The film succeeds on every major level and only fails in-part, during a few minor ones. The filmmakers, lead by director Pete Travis (Vantage Point) and writer Alex Garland (28 Days Later, Sunshine) have captured a vision of a disgusting post-apocalyptic world perfectly.
Seriously, this is one of the grossest representations of the future I have seen, but it also comes off as being very true to what I would guess the future would look like. No, not particularly grimy 'n gritty, but the technology in the movie is highly varied, with some people having cool future shit and others living in pathetically ordinary ghettos, which is how the future should look like. I'm getting very tired of seeing uniformly futuristic movies, where everyone is on the same page about the latest in technological advancements. Let me ask you a couple of questions: does everyone nowadays have a smart phone? Does everyone use a computer? Does everyone have a large hadron collider running through their plumbing? The answer to all these question (if you're not an idiot or a smart-ass) is no. Nobody is, or has ever been, on the same level of technology, so why in the hell should the future look this way? To be fair, the only reason why Dredd pulls it off so well is due to a smaller budget, but the film embraces it wholeheartedly and makes it its own.
I have to give some massive credit for Karl Urban (Star Trek, RED) in this movie. He plays Dredd in this flick, and just like in the comic Dredd's face is never fully revealed and the word on the street is that Urban insisted on never giving us the goods. I betcha his agent nearly had a heart attack. He growls his way through this movie, but it works extremely well and the gravel in his vocal cords gives him a commanding presence onscreen, surpassing Stalone's atypical Hollywood action schmuck by miles. Olivia Thirlby (Juno, The Darkest Hour) does a competent job performing as Dredd's sidekick, giving us a fresh take on the roles of "rookie", "psychic lady", and "action girl" by rolling them all up into one and balancing them accordingly. Lena Heady (300, Game of Thrones) leads up the well-characterized team of bad guys, and has both a threatening and memorable role onscreen as a pretty damn good villain; something Hollywood is in dire straights of at this moment.
The effects are hit & miss with some being extraordinarily awful, while others are so gorgeous it makes me want to dry hump the screen. The action manages to somehow be both brutal and subtle, giving us what we need at just the right time. Highlighting some of action is the macguffin drug called "Slo-Mo" (one guess as to its effect), slowing down the action and highlighting some particularly gory bits.
Dredd is a wonderfully dark time at the movies and if you haven't seen it yet, you're misisng out on one of the year's best. See you next time.
Score: A-
