 On the streets of Mega City One the finest officer of the law is framed for murder by his evil clone brother. Starring Sylvester Stallone. |
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So what is this film all about? How did it get started?
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The film was made in the United Kingdom and based loosely on the 2000 AD stories, although set slightly later in time than the comic. The main star, Judge Dredd, is played by Sylvester Stallone. In the comic he never showed his face, it was always covered by his helmet, bandages, whatever, but in the film we do see his face, at last! |
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 The Plot: The film starts out showing us Judge Dredd at work on the streets of the city. He arrests people for minor petty crimes and gives them the punishments required uder sometimes rather harsh laws. People are not too pleased with that kind of strictness. His catchphrase is “I AM THE LAW”. Meanwhile, a prisoner escapes from a top-security prison and goes to Mega City One and meets a criminal contact. This person then gives the prisoner, called Rico, a judge gun and a badge labelled Dredd. Rico picks up the gun. The man says, good job you’re not a judge as only judges can fire those guns. (fingerprint recognition). Rico points the gun at him and shoots, saying that he is a judge after all. He is in fact, Dredd’s clone brother. Thus he has the same fingerprints as Dredd, and can pass for Dredd on the fingerprint recognition, even though he is not identical in appearance to Dredd. Then Rico uses the gun to shoot someone, making sure it is filmed on security cameras. He is wearing a judge uniform and the Dredd badge, and the camera thus sees “Judge Dredd” murder an innocent victim. Dredd is arrested. The evidence is overwhelming, the gun’s bullet records the data and DNA of whose fingerprint pulled the gun’s trigger — the print is Dredd’s! He is sentenced to life imprisonment, and flown off to the prison. The Chief Judge believes Dredd is innocent, along with Judge Hershey (his female judge partner). The Chief Judge retires and his enemy takes over. He leaves the city for the Cursed Earth, a barren wilderness caused by the atomic wars. As Dredd is being transported over the Cursed Earth, it is attacked by the Fink gang. Dredd survives the crash but is taken prisoner along with another man (whom he himself had arrested earlier) but they are taken captive by the Fink gang. The Finks are cannibals and intend on eating the two, but Dredd manages to escape along with his new companion, Fergie. Back to the City! Dredd and
Fergie manage to get back into the city, and find that
chaos now rules. Rico is manipulating the new Chief
Judge, he is secretly assassinating all the judges on the
streets, in order to implement his master plan: to clone
himself and make the clones into judges who will do his
will only. Without Dredd the city is falling apart, with no law and order in place. Eventually Dredd manages to confront Rico and his team, destroy the clones and save the city. Rico is killed and order is restored. The remaining members of the Council praise Dredd for saving them. They offer to make him Chief Judge but he declines, saying that his role is out on the streets. |
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| Analysis: When I saw this film it was a pleasure to see what they did to the old 2000 AD character, having read 2000 AD as a boy. Dredd personifies the Law, however the law is very strict and without mercy. By the end of the film he is much more merciful though. While he is away there is no Law in the city and judges are being killed, there is chaos and no order. This is what happens when you do away with the Law (especially if you say the Law of God is not valid). The Law is needed, and it had to come back to rescue the people from lawlessness. But when order was restored, then the Law (Dredd) learnt the need to love also. Law without love is harsh, Law with love is perfect. Mercy is needed rather than the harsh approach. We need Law but also mercy and love. A good film which demonstrates our requirement for Law, strong moral leadership and mercy and love. The only thing that let the film down was the poor soundtrack.
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Well, it was back
in the 1970’s that a science fiction comic was
launced, called 2000 AD. It featured a story based in the
future, in a futuristic mega city, where New York and the
east coast of the USA are today. The city is run by
Judges, who act as police, army, judge, jury and
executioner, all rolled into one. After atomic wars it
was up to the judges to keep law and order in the new
mega cities that were being built. The most feared judge
of them all to ever walk the streets of Mega City One was
Judge Dredd.
