Review of Dredd (2012) by Brian S — 12 Nov 2013

Well this came completely out of left field. Dredd is like the cinematic grandson of Paul Verhoeven's ultra-violent (and ultra-tongue-in-cheek) trio of films that started with the mean streets of Detroit in RoboCop, then went to the red planet of Mars with Total Recall and ended with all that imperialist propaganda of telling us "the only good bug is a dead bug" in Starship Troopers.

Dredd manages to (unashamedly?) take from all of the above films in both aesthetic (this movie is gory-which was always a Verhoeven trademark) and with the treatment of the story (try not to compare this to RoboCop or Starship Troopers with its use of satire).

Speaking of story, it isn't the most complex, but director Pete Travis and the writers do a great job of keeping the plot moving at a very fast rate (even with all that use of slo-mo) and still make us like a character that doesn't even show off their face (RoboCop?).

If Dredd is the name of judgment then accept it with open arms, because it is a worthy justice for all viewers to experience.