Dredd - Written Review

This wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be.  In fact, I don't think I'd use the word "bad" to describe it.  Don't get me wrong, it wasn't fantastic either.  It was...somewhere between ok and good.  I was originally all set to blow off this movie just based on the trailer, but decided to give it a shot anyway.  Now, to be fair, I had extremely low expectations going into this movie.  This movie was surprisingly enjoyable with SO many things working against it.  And the 3-D was one of them.  Even so, Dredd was enjoyable.

I am...the law.

You might be wondering what I'm talking about when I say there was so much working against this movie.  If you don't already know there was another Judge Dredd movie that came out in 1995 staring Sylvester Stallone, which really wasn't that good.  It was pretty bad.  That movie felt like a cheesy sci-fi movie from the 80's on the same level as the 1990 Total Recall.  It.  Was.  Bad.  And it barely resembled anything from the Judge Dredd comic.  That's another thing: Judge Dredd is actually a British comic book.  So those are the things that this movie was dealing with: an obscure comic with a nitch audience and a really bad cheesy movie preceding it.  And the trailer didn't do this movie any favors in making it look any better.

Told you.  He is the law.

However, despite the crappy 1995 movie, which this movie took absolutely zero cues from, this movie was actually quite enjoyable.  I mention the trailer because the trailer mentions a new drug in the film called "slo-mo," which causes users to perceive time as going by at 1% it's actual speed.  I was expecting that I was going to be watching a 20 min movie stretched out to 90 because of the use of slow motion.  But they kept the use of the slow motion to an astonishingly low number of times.  It was pleasantly unexpected.  Another thing that this movie did right was not take off Dredd's helmet...at all.  That might not sound like a big deal, but it is.  In the comic you NEVER see Dredds face.  Ever.  In the 1995 movie he had it off about 96% of the time he was onscreen.  They also upped the budget for this movie and used it correctly.  And, unlike the 1995 version, they made Dredd a bad-ass, like in the comics.

Ouch.

Overall, Dredd was enjoyable.  Violent, bloody, actiony; but enjoyable.  The story was a little weak and extremely easy to follow.  But in a movie like this you don't want to think much.  This is a movie about one-liners, gun fire, and action.  And Dredd delivered on all fronts.  It doesn't try to pretend it's something it's not.  The acting is actually very good.  Karl Urban, like always, is great.  And Olivia Thirlby is great too.  This movie might fall into the category of guilty pleasure for most people, including me.  Overall this movie delivers a bit more than advertised.

Film Crazy Adam approves and recommends this movie.