The comic is meant to be a satire of facism. One story featured a man who decided to grow the biggest nose in Megacity one. Dredd gets invlolved when the nose is stolen.
Note that the comic started in the late ’70s so Robocop and Bladerunner came afterwards.

Hi David, thanks for the insight - I’ve never read the comic. However, I’m guessing Blade Runner and Robocop did not copy it the look of the comic. I’m guessing the “look” of the comic could have been done without adding a number of throw-away mimicing visuals. But again, this is only a minor issue compared to the story problems. If in fact the movie is also intended as some truly insightful and whitty intellectual satire of facism, count me as one of the fooled.

I think Robocop was at least partially inspired by Dredd the obviously bladerunner wasn’t.
There are various interviews with the guys who invented Dredd in which they discuss how their original script ideas where totally overun. Your basic Hollywood disaster story of interfering idiots.

I never forget that there was an Anthrax song about Dredd (I Am The Law).
Just so you know

Hi David Gentle, actually I didn’t know about the Anthrax song - that’s pretty cool.

As for the Script ideas being totally over-run by Hollywood Execs, this is hardly surprising in the least. No, the surprising thing with most any movie coming out of Hollywood is when the unique and interesting idea actually survived!

I’m all for good risk assessments to mitigate potential monetary loss, but Hollywood has taken this to such extremes that they end up ruining the project 20 times over. We have numerous examples of this - some movies like Dune, for instance, really don’t even survive in an even slightly intact way even AFTER filming was complete.

This is one reason I spend so much time trying to track down foriegn (to me - meaning outside the US) cyberpunk movies. They generally need to take a risk to succeed, and in the process, often create a wonderful gem of a movie.

4/10? Judge Dredd? No way! This is a classic!

I remember goig to see this twice when it was at the cinema! Sure enough it’s Hollywood, but there’s alot of interesting stuff going off here. The ABC animatronic robot looks alot better than anything computer generated.

Not really sure how you can say this is a low cyberpunk movie SFAM- it has mean machiene in it for pete’s sake.

Hi David, we definitely have different tastes. For someone who thinks Robocop 2 should be an 8 star movie, it doesn’t surprise me that you feel similarly about Judge Dredd. This is useful to you in that you probably have a good idea how we differ - this should help you interpret whether or not you’ll like a movie based on my review - even if my score for the movie isn’t very hight. Unfortunately, I didn’t find very much interesting occurring from a cyberpunk standpoint. For the most part I found Judge Dredd to be a regular ultra-good tough-guy dystopia movie with a number of poorly thought-out plot points.

I personally enjoyed this movie. I’ve never even seen the comic, let alone read it, but this is what I call the TNT classic type movie. Its got great goofy one liners from both Stallone and Schneider, some really great visuals, and Diane Lane in spandex. While its not “cool” its great fun plus, it has a giant pissed off robot, whats not to love? Is it oscar quality? Not a chance, is it even a great movie? HA, but I’ll watch it every time its on.

Hi Anonymous - I’d agree that many would call Judge Dredd a fun movie to watch.

SFAM-

most of the movies which you have listed by decade ‘are’ classic cyberpunk, very few aren’t )but I have yet to review all of them), but Judge Dredd IS classic cyberpunk.

I have to dmit though, when I was watching the film, I was thinking about the comics the whole time, and comparing the universe of teh comic to that of the film. I reckon Dredd could have been a bit colder though, and I have to say that this is probably my fave stallone movie. Stallone is gradually becoming a joke like Schwazenneger and other movie stars from that time. Bercause it is Stallone as Dredd though, I cannott laugh, because I love the comics all too much.

That was me who posted up there about Dredd, forgot to put my name in. But, it looks like Im going to HAVE to track down some of the comics. I might even have to dig around the Walmart dvd junk bin and see if I can find this flick.

Hi David, perhaps I would view this movie differently if I had read the comics. I haven’t though. All I have had to go on is the film. I’ll try tracking them down though and see if this changes my perspective. But as it stands just by watching the film, I just don’t see including this as classic cyberpunk. Would I call it Overblown Hollywood Summer Blockbuster trash? Sure, I’d go for that. I just don’t see much at all insightful or interesting here. Clearly others disagree with me (including you and L1zrdking), and I’m OK with that.

Had we been talking about a few points different from one another, I might even be cajoled into adding a star to my rating, but we’re pretty far apart (4 stars to 8 stars), so I don’t know that this makes sense.

Judge Dredd is a character that started out in the magazine ‘2000 A.D.’ I think it was released in Britain in 1979, and then they later branched into the USA and Canada. I remember 2000 A.D. sold a shit load more comics in the summer of 95 when the Dredd movie was out, everyone I knew was buying it monthly.

It probably is Hollywood summer blockbuster trash, where artistic endevor is concerned, it’s alot better Hollywood trash than the family laugh along poo that emerges from the LA sesspools before the summer holidays NOW… CUT TO: two and a half months later, and a movie that has cost $40,000,000 ends up in the bargin bin basket at your local pharmacy.

Good bad, Stallone stampering macho bullshit, comic classic, or Hollywood blockbuster poopoo, the cyberpunk visuals in Dredd are pretty ‘high,’ as is the correlation to the cyberpunk theme. Hell, if the Dredd/2000 A.D. universe isn’t cyberpunk, then that makes Dah Taahrminator suitable for airing on children’s Saturday Morning.

As a longtime reader of the comics I can say that the film doesnt do them any justice at all, so try not to let the film inform all your opinions on everything to do with Judge Dredd. Also, while the film certainly ripped off more than a few other films, the comics were way ahead of their time in terms of cyberpunk themes.
Whether or not it’s GOOD cyberpunk, I dont know. But they certainly shouldnt be judged (haha) too harshly because of lame hollywood-isms that arent as prevalent in the comics (though admittedly they are there, but it is that kind of comic).
So yes, I’d recommend you try and look at the comics separately.

Hi Master of Moloris, I’ll try to track the comic down.

Story wise Dredd stank. All they took was the basic premise of the comics and added a standard cop movie storyline.
Design wise this has to be one of the best movies out there. I highly suggest the making of books, Especially the art of Kev Walker who was an artist for the comic who also went on to design a lot of the movie. (coincedentally Kev was also a leading artist for Games Workshop which always had a heavy leaning towards cyberpunk)
The stories in the comics were usually either very comic or really dark (think Frank Millar)
It’s really just a shame that the hollywood machine was filtering all the movies of this period till they were shells of a concept. Bear in mind that this was of the same Era as Schumachers Batman movies.
I do have to say that I agree with the rating given here. This film had huge potential to be great but bad choices by the studios ruined it. At least nowadays studios have learned to respect the source material.

Check out all my videos You’ll find the best metal art sculptures of all your favorite characters. Robocop, Hellboy, Terminator, DarthVader, Alien, Predator…I have them all…8 feet tall and smaller…all made from recycled car truck and motorcycle parts…it’s worth the look.

Wayne

Sadly, those who didn’t like Judge Dredd have no idea how on the mark the film is. Having been a Dredd comic fan since ‘1984, the film captures the essence of what the Dredd universe is about. The one-liners, the outrageous villans, all are all part and parcel of Judge Dredd, the comic.

LIke most critics, unless you know the background of a film, then you should have the guts to say so that way you at least an excuse for your uninformed opinions.

I just wish an extended version of he film were available with the 20 plus minutes of extra footage Sly Stallone had removed so the film would get a “PG-13″ rating, instead of the “R” it did get and didn’t deserve. Again, a critic not doing his job and getting all the facts.

i don agree at all that this movie is so little cyberpunk, its cyberpunk almost all throught. the one big mistake in this movie is the music, which is a major drawback for the whole feeling of the movie. if it had the right music it would be a clear 9 stars for me, but now whit this crappy music i give it a 5.

Well I agree with both sides of the love / hate the Dredd movie debate. After reading William Gibson and Phillip Dick my whole life I was turned on to 2000ad comics by a friend. The Judge Dredd comics are classic brit humor stabbing out at futurism and fascism, not unlike V for Vendetta strikes out against Thatcherism. The Dredd movie is a great popcorn special effects yeah we had a few laughs kind of film, but really it sucks compared to the real Dredd. Stallone could be Dredd as long as he keeps the helmet on, but since Stallone is Stallone he could never really pull off Dredd. You will note in the comic Dredd never removes his helmet, he is not meant to be ‘human’ in the same respects as other super heros. He is not even a ’super’ he is a machine created by a police state, but he has a soul and a perfect understanding of right and wrong. The battle Dredd fights is between the law and his humanity and the law is always right. Dredd is a perfect law enforcer and he suffers for it. If the comics borrow from anyone it is Phillip Dick, you have Conapts, pre-cogs and battle droids that make Star Wars droids look like kindergarten lunch room punks. It is true, Diane Lane was the best thing about this movie. Don’t waste your time with this movie but do turn on to the 2000AD comics, there is much “cyberpunk” worthy material there.

Jess

The movie dont was a great thing, but some ingredients of it was so good. Maybe the comics about it, are more extensive than the movie. To dark, dont?