Dredd 2012 (Movie)

In a violent, futuristic city where the police have the authority to act as judge, jury and executioner, a cop teams with a trainee to take down a gang that deals the reality-altering drug, SLO-MO.

The Die Hard comparison I made above isn’t made lightly, either; it’s really two people against the world in a series of increasingly-unrealistic and yet awesomely entertaining scenes of combat. The overwhelming forces that Dredd and Anderson find themselves mowing through serve to make their entire ordeal feel heightened–like eventually they’ll just be swarmed and consumed like in a zombie movie. That they’re able, time and again, to find a clever way to reverse the tide and come out with some spectacular win is the kind of thing that makes an audience stand up and cheer–even if it’s during a time when something really grotesque and inhumane is happening to someone onscreen. 10/10

Lagamorph wrote:It's Judgement Time.

Dredd has just screened at Comic-Con 2012, and here's our first reaction to the comic-book reboot...

2000 AD aficionados can rest easy - Judge Dredd's latest cinematic outing is brutally true to its comic book source and a vast improvement on Sylvester Stallone's universally loathed 1995 interpretation.

Last night, fans at San Diego's Comic Con were treated to a preview screening of the Alex Garland-scripted, Pete Travis-directed Dredd and breathed a collective sigh of relief as a lean, mean Dredd laid violent waste to scum in a gritty, grubby Mega-City One. And kept his helmet on throughout.



Despite rumours of rifts during production, Garland and Travis have created a horribly gorgeous vision of dystopian future where monolithic housing towers are run by criminal gangs - and policing is undertaken by judge/jury/execution officers, Judges. Cue Dredd (Karl Urban) a no-nonsense hardass who's got a psychic rookie, Anderson (Olivia Thirlby), tagging along for his shift.

Called out to tower block Peach Trees to investigate some splattered body parts, Dredd and Anderson find themselves trapped in a Raid-esque running battle, fighting their way up - one run-down filthy floor at a time - to gang leader Ma-Ma (Lena Headey).

Urban certainly has the downturned mouth and super-cool, gravelly delivery to pull off Dredd's nonchalance but he's aided by Garland's smart, fast script, a relentless flow of Rorschach Test blood sprays from bone-shattering brutality, eye-poppingly beautiful 3D visuals and peppy banter with Thirlby.

The body count is high, the humour grim and the violence stylishly graphic and reminiscent of Sin City (scenes involving a drug called Slo-Mo are visually intoxicating).

And that famous headgear stays resolutely on. Perhaps ready for Dredd 2? According to Garland there are two other Dredd adventures he's ready to write - based on this fast and hard outing, audiences may well be wanting more of the law...

Something Fishy wrote:Excellent, apparently IGN have given a good reaction too but the article has been taken down for the mo.

Something Fishy wrote:it seems like it has all come together. I was a bit worried though hoped the great choice of actors and the writer could pull it off.

kommissarboris wrote:

Something Fishy wrote:it seems like it has all come together. I was a bit worried though hoped the great choice of actors and the writer could pull it off.

two more possible movies.

Anderson set up in the first.

maybe a build up to a Dredd V Death finale

that would be lush.

Alex Garland, the film’s screenwriter, addressed the possibility of sequels during the audience Q&A.

Putting a number on it is always a bit approximate, but Garland said that $50 million box office from Dredd in the US would be enough to get a sequel in motion.

Here’s a direct quote courtesy of Little Bleeder Caspar:

We’ll see a sequel if the gross is above $50 million in the US. It’s a simple financial equation. We’re an independent movie… In terms of Dark Judges, I wrote Death into this script, but it didn’t feel right for the first film. I thought it felt right but after about 16 drafts and it really didn’t work out.

I needed to have set up the city and Dredd first before taking on what is essentially a riff on the Judges. You need to know what the Judges are before you can subvert them.

I wrote a second script which was about Dredd going out to the Cursed Earth. That was rejected for similar reasons.

If they want to make sequels, I’ve got a story that goes from this one into the origins of Dredd and the city. Then the third one has would have a strange, existential attack from the Dark Judges.

So, if they get to it, the third film would bring in Judge Death and the Dark Judges. Fan bait.

At least that’s Garland’s current plan, and plans change. As he said, Garland was going to give us Judge Death in the first film for any number of drafts but eventually decided this first film would better served if it focused instead on introducing Dredd and Anderson.

kommissarboris wrote:

Something Fishy wrote:it seems like it has all come together. I was a bit worried though hoped the great choice of actors and the writer could pull it off.

two more possible movies.

Anderson set up in the first.

maybe a build up to a Dredd V Death finale

that would be lush.