JUDGE DREDD
A film review by Stephen Rafferty
Copyright 1995 Stephen Rafferty
* - Very Poor ** - Bad, not much here. *** - Good. **** - Very good, see this. ***** - Excellent, a must see. One of the years best
**
Directed by Danny Cannon Starring: Sylvester Stallone, Armand Assante, Rob Schneider, Max Von Sydow. Written by Bill Wisher, Walon Green, John Fasano, Steven De Souza. Cinematography by Adrian Biddle, BSC. Edited by Alex Mackie
Completely disappointing is the only way for myself to describe JUDGE DREDD. I've collected Dredd comics for close to ten years now, and unfortunately this film is not a good depiction of the comic. However, this is not for the obvious reasons an avid comic collector might have.
Stallone plays Dredd, a Judge in the 21st century who is the complete package: Judge, Jury, and Executioner. The Earth is split into basic two parts: the Cursed Earth which is a barren wasteland where savages exist, and a few Mega City's spread throughout the world. Mega City 1 where Dredd's beat is, is not a far cry from the futuristic world of BLADE RUNNER, but a little bigger and a little lighter. Block wars, where a whole block of inhabitants of Mega-City basically go on a rampage, are the norm. Dredd is constantly quelling these outbursts in his usual calm, unemotional manner. He is the quintessential steel nerved man; he Judges with no connection to the humans involved.
Basically the plot is this: bad old Judge comes back and tries to take over Mega-City 1, he tries to kill his old brother Dredd, and Dredd battles him until the slam-bam climax. Guess who wins?
My problem is that the script is just poorly written, and never challenges the viewer once. The plot follows the course you think it will after you've seen the first twenty minutes. The script being so bad makes the film a let down because Stallone is actually good in the lead, and the film does a great job of depicting Mega City 1 as it is in the comic. In fact, when I first saw the matte shot of Mega City at the beginning of the film I was very impressed with it's almost perfect version of the crime ridden metropolis. He will have his detractors, but Stallone is perfect for Dredd, who is really a man turned robot. Even though he is unmasked unlike the comic, for most of the film he keeps the stoic posture that is Dredd. He Judges and executes without remorse. Stallone only fails when the character as written fails; when too much emotion is involved.
If Director Cannon, a self confessed Dredd fanatic, had stayed truer to the comic's campy, satirical tone with a stone-faced hero, he'd have made a much better film.
Stephen Rafferty
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