DREDD | How to Reveal Character through Action | EXPLORED

inhabitants of peach trees this is judge dredd mama is not the law i am the law you for many people the pete travis directed alex garland's scripted dread arrived and departed with little fanfare and even less interest in a summer pack to the gills with blockbusters faced with mega opposition in the form of the avengers the dark knight rises the amazing spider-man men in black three and the bourne legacy a mega city set cyberpunk thriller based on a niche comic book still suffering from the stink of its previous movie adaptation was always going to be a tough sell but for those who ventured into their local cinema they were certainly in for a treat dread is a violent brutal and harsh film that abdulles the trend for family-friendly summer fair in favour of brain-splatted floors and hollow-point entry wounds supported by cutthroat killer soundtrack that's bound to keep the heart rate up the level of violence and dread is impressive and led to a number of cuts having to be made in the us to get an r rating and sensors elsewhere in the world slapping the highest ratings they could on a film it's this total disregard for movie trends that made the film a breath of fresh air when it was first released and allowed it to develop a feverish cult following whose demands for a dread 2 still echo on social media today in terms of script dread is a simplistic movie set around action set pieces similar to garth evans the raid set in the new future after a nuclear war has destroyed much of the planet the remaining inhabitants are crammed into sprawling metropolises called mega cities outside of these vast concrete jungles lies a wasteland filled with mutants and death the mega cities themselves don't fare much better with violence and crime running rife in part due to the squalid conditions and average unemployment rates of above 90 percent the only thing stopping a total dystopian meltdown are the judges a brutal form of law and order who serve as judge jury and executioner to society's ills the movie dread follows a day in the life of legendary judge dredd played by carl urban as he's tasked with training the borderline failure new recruit and mutant judge anderson played by olivia thirdly things become tricky for the two protagonists when they respond to a series of murders and peach trees a 200-story slum and find themselves trapped by lena headey's vicious mama and a clan with only one way to go up as i said the script is simplistic but the film shines due to excellent casting carl urban is and always will be the law in my book save me a lot of paperwork if you just confess right now an aesthetic that captures the look and feel of the comic books and fantastic action sequences that drive the film and reveal the story and characters without the need for expansive exposition or dialogue it's this use of action that i'm going to delve into by exploring the opening and final scenes of this underrated masterpiece i should also point out that much like his comic book counterpart we never see dred's face in the film his face is either in shadow or the top half of his face is obstructed by his helmet which meant that urban had to showcase his character with his hands tied behind his back yet we learn more about who he is and often what he's thinking from a few reactionary grimaces in this film than we do with sylvester stallone in the entirety of the awful 90s adaptation so what happened in there drug bust looked like you've been through it perps were uncooperative how many times have you watched a film only to see a character lazily introduced by lengthy exposition or dialogue that tells you little about who they are or what motivates them being told that somebody is the best at what they do or are pure evil or whatever the filmmakers want you to believe about the character doesn't make you believe that about the character dread is a cold and unrelenting badass but the film doesn't need to tell us that in fact excluding a small nod to how the other judges see him later in the movie nobody bangs the dread drum or extols his virtues one million credits you have a problem with the judge you know who he is no i do we don't need to be told that dred is a badass because we see it within the first few minutes of the film the bike chased through the vast metropolitan sprawl of mega city one culminating in the shopping mall shootout and one hotshot losing his head is all we need to understand who dread is a good action sequence like the dread bike chase and more confrontation allows the filmmakers to stay away from boring exposition and revealed dread through action this sequence introduces the audience to his character and reveals his traits and flaws and how these determine his decisions in the opening scene of the film we're introduced to the bad guys driving recklessly and taking drugs with dread and relentless pursuit dred is immediately shown as a tough mother as he speeds through the streets as bullets ran in from in front of him the reaction of the criminals when they see his bike bearing down on them tells us all we need to know about the dynamic between them they're scared and they understand how high the stakes have become dread is determined unflinching and brutal when asked if he needs backup he replies with no he's not a hero in the typical sense and shows a little in the way of emotion this leads into the confrontation as the bad guys in dread tear across the city with little regard for those around them even when innocent bystanders are mowed down dread doesn't stop and plows on in a single-minded quest for justice his character is shown to be both unflinching and relentless as he reports to deaths with little emotion just a determined perp's just wiped out an innocent i'm taking him down the confrontation continues on foot as the last surviving perp takes a more worker hostage dreading the criminal trade verbal blows with the purp insisting that he has the upper hand we know that he doesn't the look on dred's face and his flippant words of yeah i heard your heart shot when the hostage is threatened tells us everything we need to know dred isn't going to lose the situation he's too tough and too experienced one well-placed incendiary round to the bad guy's mouth later and the payoff is complete and dred is cemented in the audience's minds as a character of an uncompromising nature who is both brutal and single-minded in his moral code when the woman thanks him for saving her life he doesn't care saving her life wasn't his call stopping the bad guy was because he was breaking the law by saving the woman dredd isn't being compassionate or heroic he is fulfilling his duty as a judge the same way that shooting the purple the hotshot was when the woman thanks him you can see that she's just as scared of dread as she was of the man who held a gun to her head the purpose of the law in the future isn't to save people it's to punish wrongdoers dread is fantastic at his job and punishment is what he excels at his relentless nature and single-minded vision of justice are set up within these first few action-packed minutes and his character never wavers as the film progresses the violence that we see in the opening and the violence that is yet to come carries weight as it's grounded in character and services the world building we immediately understand the harsh realities of the world he lives in are the reason dread is the way that he is dread doesn't go through massive changes in the film and is relatively the same throughout but he anderson and mama are also well defined that when they're thrown in the meat grinder together their interactions drive the compelling action as the narrative unfolds dredd and anderson are both physically and psychologically pushed to their limits they take on a literal army of gangs judges that have been corrupted and must scale over 200 floors to reach their target and as for you mama judgment time it might seem weird to spend the majority of this article talking about an opening action sequence and then to skip to the end but dred's final confrontation with mama is where we finally get to see the payoff for all of dred's actions i could probably pick out dozens of other action sequences in the movie that highlight treads character but in the final few minutes as he fights his way to floor 200 his relentless dedication to serving justice is hammered home and his final confrontation with mama has only one possible outcome mama is in many ways very similar to dread she's just as ruthless and uncompromising as he is but through a twist of fate is on the other side of the law they exist in a brutal world where bad things happen to everyone whether they're perpetrated by drug dealers or the law dread represents control and mama reckless abandon both dred and mama also dispense what they perceive as justice and function as judges in their own right as i mentioned in my video last week and why the joker is the perfect antagonist for batman both the protagonist and antagonist need to be fighting for the same thing we see this at play here again with dread and mama fighting for control over peach trees and its 75 000 inhabitants in this case dread is the unstoppable force to mama's immovable object mama similarly to dread is revealed by her actions let's compare the introductory scenes to both characters while dread is focused angry ruthless and most importantly in control probably the only thing holding him back from going ape [ __ ] mama is first seen enjoying a hit of slo-mo encapsulating the very essence of reckless abandon she is the fearless and carefree ying to his draconian yang admittedly we have a little bit more exposition spoken about her in respect to how she became the kingpin of peach treats but her ruthlessness is mostly shown to us through what she does she never flinches when ordering people to be skinned alive and her lack of care for the people around her is cemented when she destroys a large part of peach trees in a failed attempt to kill the two judges with high caliber mounted machine guns by the end of the film we understand that neither mama nor dread are capable of relenting and only one of them is going to walk away when dredd finally reaches mama she informs him that a device has been attached to her wrist monitoring her vital signs and if her heartbeat were to cease beating the entire top complex rigged with explosives would detonate in response to this dread simply shoots mama forces her to consume slow-mo and throws her off the top floor reasoning that by the time she'd reached the ground and died the sensor would be out of range for the explosives did dread really know the bomb wouldn't go off probably not but were we ever in any doubt that mama was going to fly dred had his target and he wasn't going to let a little thing like her blowing them all up stop him from dispensing justice by this stage in the proceedings dread had shown time and time again that justice was his only driving force his actions and reactions to the things that happened around him were focused on one thing bringing mama and a clan to justice nothing else mattered he wouldn't be reasoned within the opening mole standoff and he sure as hell wasn't going to be reasoned with now you ready yes sir [Music] you don't look ready just adrenaline sir while the addition of anderson made sense from an adaptation standpoint with anderson often featured as a trusted sidekick of dread in the comics her role in the film also structurally complements his character she's almost the exact polar opposite of him in every way imaginable while dred's face is covered by his helmet she removes hers for the entirety of the film as it interferes with her psychic ability she is short while he's tall she's petite and he's broad and she's also brand new to being a judge functioning as an audience surrogate to the proceedings that is taken aback by the ruthless and callous nature of the role she's been thrust into while dred is a seasoned professional that isn't bothered by the work he does during the beginning she follows his every move fearing the failure of her assessment she often dispenses judgments that align with his cold world view instead of what she herself believes to be right but by the end when she loses her gun and technically fails the assessment she is freed from the constraints of the mentor-mentee relationship she develops some agency of her own and goes against his recommended judgment to enact compassionate justice that takes more of the circumstances into consideration and i don't need to be a mind reader to know it he's a victim not a perp by the rule set out by dread when he first took anderson under his wing there is no doubt that the rookie judge failed so why did dred give her a pass dredd was single-minded in his pursuit of dispensing judgment but anderson wasn't a criminal she was his partner and she'd also saved his life giving her a pass wasn't against his coat it was a reward for her work during the assault on mama's fortress and his way of acknowledging that she would be a powerful ally as she is in the comics anderson was a talented psychic that was tough in her own right and she actually led the final charge into mama's stronghold much to the surprise of dread passing her would arguably have aided with the pursuit of justice in fact having the power to read people's minds gives her a unique ability to dispense true justice something that dread could never truly do this is why at the end when asked what his assessment of her was he simply answers with she's a purse anderson shows him that there is a way to be a better judge and changes him although ever so slightly for the better ready yeah you look ready with that having been said that's all for today folks don't forget to hit subscribe and click the notification icon to stay up to date on all my content and if there's anything else you'd like to request please don't hesitate to ask as always it's been a pleasure niath here with film comics explained thanks for stopping by [Music] [Music] you

Channel: FilmComicsExplained

Views: 425,191

Keywords: Karl Urban, Judge Dredd, Dredd, Pete Travis, Alex Garland, Lena Headey

Id: x3PhM7GVMQ8

Length: 13min 45sec (825 seconds)

Published: Sun Aug 30 2020