JUDGE DREDD (1995)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTIONS: *sociological*

Regarded as just another high-octane summer blockbuster, JUDGE DREDD makes pretty good adventure-fare. However, it doesn't really come close to adapting its source material, except in terms of outward visuals. Stallone offended many fans by the number of times he doffed his Judge's-visor. But he looks great in full Judge regalia, and the scenes of him ordering his gun to fire this or that special ammo are good fun. His character has far too many sentimental notes for the real Dredd, who craps bricks bigger than Chuck Norris. Still, there are times when Stallone tapped into his Inner Cobra, when he shows personal outrage at the scumbags who are the bane (albeit also the justification) of his existence. Once or twice Sly even gets the Dredd sense of humor right.

Mega-City-One looks pretty good, too, even though the film's was helmed by one Danny Cannon, primarily a TV-director without much range, going from good formula like GOTHAM to dreck like GOTHAM KNIGHTS. The movie begins from the viewpoint of Fergee (Rob Schneider). a citizen returning to the City after a justified imprisonment for computer hacking. Cannon successfully gets across the grandeur and the chaos of Mega-City, which is something of an anti-Metropolis (Fritz Lang's, not Clark Kent's).

Whereas Metropolis was defined by a struggle between the ruling elite and a lower-class proletariat, trouble in Mega-City usually stems from various flavors of the middle class, crowded into a massive city that is their only hope of survival amidst a nuclear wasteland. The middle class makes the technocracy function, but their follies continually threaten the city's security. Thus in the comics the Judges are created to deal out rough justice to keep the burgeoning population in line at all times.

One will find no acknowledgement of this cold equation in the DREDD script by William Wisher Jr and Steven de Souza. To these writers, Judge Dredd is just an anal-retentive meanie who sentences minor offenders like Fergee to more jail time because he Dredd has no social life. Stallone's Dredd won't open up to the humanizing influence of fellow Judge Hershey (Diane Lane), nor will he take advice about ethics from his symbolic father-figure Fargo (Max Von Sydow). So Mister "I Am the Law" must find out the hard way that he too can be victimized by Blind Justice, when renegade Judge Rico (Armand Assante) successfully frames Dredd for murder. 

Fargo, through fatherly self-sacrifice, manages to get Dredd's sentence commuted to life imprisonment. Ironically, Dredd escapes this injustice thanks to vicious wasteland-criminals. Such is the Angel Family, whose scion "Mean" becomes one of Dredd's regular sparring-partners in the comics. These scavengers shoot down the prison transport-craft holding Dredd, Fergee, and other prisoners. Dredd survives to kick all the freaky criminals' butts, while Fergee survives to tag along making the usual one-liners of the standard comedy-relief for an action film. Then Dredd, with Fergee in tow, must return to Mega-City to clear his name and stop Rico's foul plans. He gets just a little additional help from Hershey as they face off against honest but misled Judges, crooked Judges, and a killer robot. Oh yeah, and Dredd must also learn that not only that Man was not made for the Sabbath, he must also learn that everything he thought about his origins is wrong, wrong, wrong.

Most of the dramatic beats of the Wisher-de Souza script are pedestrian and familiar. Yet I give the writers their due in another department: DREDD is never dull, zooming from one big action set-piece to another with very little down-time. In this DREDD is at least efficient formula in comparison to many of its bungled 1995 competitors, particularly BATMAN FOREVER. I could have lived without the whole Stallone-Assante conflict about who betrayed who and for what reason, and I didn't need to see Stallone bellow "I am The Law" with the demented fervor of a soccer-fan cheering on his team. Still, the makeup people did a fine job with Mean Angel, who has a rousing fight with Dredd, so I'm thankful for modest favors. Oh, yeah, and Diane Lane gets into a lively catfight with Joan Chen, just so the female lead is able to bring something to the table.