DREDD (2012)

Genre: Sci-Fi/Action
Director: Pete Travis
Cast: Karl Urban, Lena Headey, Olivia Thirlby, Jason Cope, Warrick Grier, Langley Kirkwood, Kevon Kane
Runtime: 1 hr 35 mins
Rating: M18 (Violence)
Released By: Golden Village Pictures
Official Website: http://www.dreddthemovie.com/

Opening Day: 20 September 2012

Synopsis: The future America is an irradiated waste land. On its East Coast, running from Boston to Washington DC, lies Mega City One- a vast, violent metropolis where criminals rule the chaotic streets. The only force of order lies with the urban cops called "Judges" who possess the combined powers of judge, jury and instant executioner. Known and feared throughout the city, Dredd (Karl Urban) is the ultimate Judge, challenged with ridding the city of its latest scourge - a dangerous drug epidemic that has users of "Slo-Mo" experiencing reality at a fraction of its normal speed. During a routine day on the job, Dredd is assigned to train and evaluate Cassandra Anderson (Olivia Thirlby), a rookie with powerful psychic abilities thanks to a genetic mutation. A heinous crime calls them to a neighborhood where fellow Judges rarely dare to venture- a 200 story vertical slum controlled by prostitute turned drug lord Ma-Ma (Lena Headey) and her ruthless clan. When they capture one of the clan's inner circle, Ma-Ma overtakes the compound's control center and wages a dirty, vicious war against the Judges that proves she will stop at nothing to protect her empire. With the body count climbing and no way out, Dredd and Anderson must confront the odds and engage in the relentless battle for their survival.

Movie Review:

Comparisons with perhaps this year’s best martial arts film ‘The Raid: Redemption’ are inevitable, given how both movies employ essentially a ‘Die Hard’ premise to deliver relentlessly brutal action. But despite the similarities, this big-screen reboot of the cult 2000AD comic book icon is every bit as solid a B-action movie as ‘Raid’ – grim, intense and most importantly, delightfully violent. And yes, if you have to know, it erases all nightmares of Sylvester Stallone and Rob Schneider from our minds.

Adapting John Wagner’s creation is no easy feat, given Dredd’s personality as a dour, laconic, and uncompromising upholder of justice. Yet screenwriter Alex Garland (best known for’28 Days Later’) accomplishes the unlikely task of making Dredd engaging – and that is even without Dredd removing his signature helmet. Instead, his Dredd is unexpectedly appealing thanks to some blunt charisma and a dash of deadpan humour, without ever tipping into camp or caricature.

The opening sequence where Dredd is seen on his motorbike pursuing a trio of wanted criminals on the run, simultaneously on a drug called Slo-Mo which makes the brain think that time is moving at one per cent its normal speed, establishes unequivocally the Dredd of this adaptation. Fully embracing his role as judge, jury and executioner, Dredd shoots an incendiary flare into a baddie’s mouth just five minutes into the film, causing him to combust from within.

And the good news for fanboys is – that’s just the tip of the iceberg compared to the mega-violence that Garland and director Pete Travis have lined up. Applying a veteran-rookie setup, Dredd is immediately paired with the psychic newbie Cassandra Anderson (Olivia Thirby) – though the former is none too impressed by her underachievement at the Academy. Both are unwittingly thrust into the field when called to investigate a triple homicide in a 200-storey high-rise slum called Peachtrees, where all manner of lowlifes reside.

Their opponent is the ruthless drug lord Ma-Ma (Lena Headey), a former prostitute with a sadistic streak that now owns the entire Peachtrees property and runs her narcotics dealings from it. Afraid that Dredd’s capture of one of her henchmen might lead to unwanted attention from the authorities, she orders Dredd and Anderson dead. The ensuing war is pure carnage – numerous heads smashed, countless bullets fired and an entire floor of the building levelled by an almost unrelenting stream of gunfire for five minutes – and Paul Leonard-Morgan's throbbing bass score makes the destruction even cooler.

By now, you can see why ‘Dredd’ was branded a futuristic copy of ‘The Raid’ – though the subsequent dismissal by some was rather unfair in our opinion. Despite the structural similarities in both stories – including the chief villain’s use of a building-wide intercom –the phenomenon is really mere coincidence. For one, while ‘Raid’ opted for an ultra-realistic tone to its violence, Travis and his British cinematographer Anthony Dod Mantle (who also worked on Danny Boyle’s ‘Slumdog Millionnaire’) goes for a more stylistic approach, exploiting the powers of the narcotic drug to create dreamy hallucinatory sequences punctuated by slo-mo shots of bullets ripping through flesh - which when viewed in 3D makes it even more dazzling.

Garland’s pairing of Dredd and Anderson also proves different from the sibling duo in ‘Raid’ – while Dredd remains from start to finish a man of few words not unlike what a ‘Dirty Harry’ of the future would be, Anderson is shown wrestling between the cold-hearted justice required of her profession and the compassionate empathy needed for her psychic gift. Though not played up, it’s clear that both the impartial Dredd and the merciful Anderson actually complement each other – and the ending is a particularly sweet reminder of that dynamic.

As Dredd and Anderson respectively, Karl Urban and Olivia Thirby are nicely matched. Urban goes for a minimalist portrayal, staying grim and appropriately badass all the way as the upright law enforcer. Thirby brings as much heart into the movie as she can, but a nice touch is when her Anderson reveals herself to have just as much inside her to take out the bad guys one by one. Headey is suitably diabolical as Ma-Ma, and together the triumvirate of Urban, Thirby and Headey pretty much carry the entire movie through its brisk duration.

And within that one half hours, ‘Dredd’ essentially delivers what the fanboys have been looking for in a big-screen incarnation of their beloved character. Indeed, this Dredd is as much removed from the campy cartoonish Stallone version as can be – terse, tough and no-nonsense like how the books have made him out to be. It is also just as graphically violent, perhaps even more enhanced in 3D, so if you’re one of the squeamish ones, then you’re probably better off checking out the 1995 dud. For everyone else, this delivers the hard-hitting goods as it promises, the effect of which on your mind and heart is ironically just the opposite to that of the drug Slo-Mo in the movie. 

Movie Rating:

(Grim, intense and delightfully violent, this Dredd reboot goes back to the hard-hitting roots of the comic and delivers an adrenaline-pumping experience fanboys will enjoy)

Review by Gabriel Chong