by Mctangle

Way back in September 2012, Dredd slipped under the critical radar – way under. It pounded out a resounding 59/100 on Metacritic, and I didn’t feast my eyes upon the merciless justice-fest until early 2013; by which time I’d missed the opportunity to have my cash ripped from the loving bosom of my wallet by the local cinema – what we Old Empire folk call a theatre. Dredd is one of my favorite movies, I’ve seen it a staggering TWELVE times to date, and this is my opportunity to justify my insanity.

Dredd tells the tale of one Joe Dredd, played by the excellently gruff Karl Urban. A Judge in the dystopian Mega City One – a vast city of 800 million stretching across the eastern seaboard of the former United States – with the power to act as judge, jury and executioner for the 17,000 crimes reported per day. Dredd is tasked with the training of a rookie by the name of Anderson, played by the particularly aesthetically pleasing Olivia Thirlby, as she – a Judge Academy dropout mutated by radiation near the external wall of Mega City One – struggles to survive in the brutal environment of the ‘New World’. The film portrays Dredd as a rough, gruff lawmaker who is undeniably analogous to Christian Bale’s role as Batman in The Dark Knight. With a voice that sounds like he ate a bowlful of gravel for breakfast, without any milk, and with an attitude to boot, it’s not hard to see why our antagonist fills the steel-toed boots of Official Badass in this face-blasting outing.

One reason why I find Dredd so satisfying to watch is that the action scenes – spread throughout the movie gratuitously – are equal parts brutal and cathartic. Dredd and Anderson’s signature Lawgiver pistols have a distinctive low ‘thunk’ that compliments the inevitable fleshy squelch of a shot on target perfectly, and the hardened veteran played by Urban makes the whole experience seem trivial.  Headshots and kneecapping are abundant in this iteration of the Dredd fiction, the myriad types of ammunition used by the pistols and the seemingly endless supply of goons provide ample target practice for our oddly ambivalent hero and his newly-found sidekick. The oversaturated scenes provide a clear demarcation line between standard film and 3D-gimmick-media, although in full HD these still present a visual treat. The film makes excessive use of slow-motion shots through the aptly-named ‘Slow-Mo’ drug, the primary vice of the films antagonist, Ma-Ma. These scenes, although clearly made for the enjoyment of exploitable cinema-goers, provide much pleasure in the form of twinkling glass effects and hyper-gore bullet wounds.

The entire film is reminiscent of ‘The Raid: Redemption’, an undeniably excellent Indonesian action film from September 2011 that I will no doubt be revisiting in the near future. The film caught significant critical flak due to its similarities to The Raid, including the use of main characters working vertically up an apartment block in search of the antagonist; however Dredd does enough to differentiate itself from a cheap copycat to earn my vote of confidence. The sense of isolation is highlighted in multiple scenes where Dredd’s expertise with death-dealing comes into play to turn the odds in the dynamic duo’s favour, and the viewer will never lose sight of the fact that Dredd is a lawmaker above all else, with just a small part to play in the rich fiction of the anarchic universe.

Unlike many pop-culture adaptations of stories, Dredd does a lot to appeal to the hardcore fanbase of 2000 A.D. comic book veterans. Numerous references to both the 1995 Stallone film and the comics themselves are evident in the opening scene with more subtle references – like the setting of the film, Peach Trees, unveiling themselves as the movie presses on. And presses on it does, the brutal action only giving way to abrupt dialogue at the mercy of the impatient Dredd, who wishes only to see justice done in the most efficient way possible. Eventually bending to the insistent protests of Anderson the fan-service side of Joe Dredd is revealed later in the movie – the side that is forced to make tough, subjective decisions based on the law and circumstances on a daily basis. There is much to critique about this movie, sloppy scriptwriting and bad camera cuts result in the film taking place inside a building where every floor is an alleged 16 feet tall and where Dredd’s actions directly contradict what is being shown on screen; but these errors are semantics when held up to the light and inspected for what the film really is – a delightful blood-stained romp up 200 floors of fetid super-apartments.

Saving Private Ryan, it ain’t. But as my go-to choice for a straightforward action film, the hat fits. Dredd is a film that will keep me coming back time and time again, if not for the hints of exposition that coerced me into reading the comics – the first 50 at least – then for the relentless and idealistic pursuit of justice that has kept Joe Dredd at the pinnacle of the British comic scene for 36 years. The film sets out as a small part of an already well-established fiction, and concludes as just that, far from the three-hour epics and emotionally resonant storylines of other comic book films; notably Watchmen, Dredd is – above all else – a modest affair. Unexpected characters add to the mix of a seemingly predictable story, some minor ulterior motives and an excellent iteration of Dredd’s iconic ‘I am the law’ catchphrase provide just a hint of spice to what would ordinarily be a run-of-the-mill death-fest. It might not be the greatest movie ever made, but it’s certainly up there in a list of my all-time favourites.

                8/10

Full Disclosure: After I’d seen Dredd six or seven times, I took a short trip off to London, whereupon I found a 50-issue anthology of the Dredd comics in an off-the-beaten-track comic store. Having both seen the movie well in advance of this review and read the comics, I cannot be said to be totally unbiased, as my love for the rich Dredd fiction is not well camouflaged in this review. Please bear in mind that no review is totally impartial, and that this is simply the honest view of one irrelevant amateur in a sea of competent professionals.