Dredd

2012 • 95 minutes

About this movie

In the future, America is a dystopian wasteland. The latest scourge is Ma-Ma, a prostitute-turned-drug pusher with a dangerous new drug and aims to take over the city. The only possibility of stopping her is an elite group of urban police called Judges, who combine the duties of judge, jury and executioner to deliver a brutal brand of swift justice. But even the top-ranking Judge, Dredd (Karl Urban), discovers that taking down Ma-Ma isn't as easy as it seems in this explosive adaptation of the hugely popular comic series.

Ratings and reviews

A visioning of Dredd, that doesn't need to resort to fan service, but looks to take the character and background to deliver a coherent story that explores some of the darkest elements of where we are going as a society when our technology development and resource exploitation will far outpace our economic and political development. Dredd is a world where far too much human life is cheap. The problem is, unlike the present, the cost of poverty seems bearable given how technology makes enough food, medicine, and shelter to 'solve' the issue of the humble masses. When in reality they are left to the hopelessness of pointless existence in a largely post scarcity economy. In such a world all sorts of villains, victims, and heroes emerge, and in this film are well explored to a very satisfactory conclusion.

Honestly, I thought I'd get a lot more bang for my buck, since I'm still riding off the high of The Raid Redemption, but alas, no. The plots are fairly similar: large living complex being run by a drug lord and a scarce few cops try to bring it down. My problem is it just feels so awkward and I shouldn't have shelled out five bucks for the HD version. I suppose my hopes were just a little too high. Special effects are solid and bloody action is around every corner. A solid two stars sounds fair for the price.

For one thing, obviously superior to the 90's version. It's a very accurate adaptation of the tone of the comic. Very dark and violent, which could be off-putting for some, but there's a very subtle undercurrent of humor to it. It's not a black comedy or anything, but the very downplayed lightheartedness makes it clear that while it's brutal and dystopian, it's not some satire preaching a message or trying to be provocative. While the violence is constant and graphic, it's really never exploitative; there are no extended scenes of mutilation or torture, it just pulls no punches about showing people being killed and injured. The plot is basic, but effective; little variety of locations, but good direction keeps setpieces interesting. It's not a highbrow film, but it has bits of well-done character and theme showing that it has its head on right, and avoids a lot of mistakes action movies often run into. It plays a few predictable cliches rather underwhelmingly straight, but also has its moments of subversion and cleverness. If it sounds like your sort of thing, it probably is. Given its underwhelming profits so far, I think it's great that it's this popular here.