This maybe the entire collection of Dredd videos around, but I think most of you will really enjoy this information before you go out this weekend. Got Features on the gear used in Dredd, Slo mo filming, interviews with the cast and crew. Got the best trailers and clips I could find which will really get you hooked on Dredd. They also made a Prequel Motion comic which really helps to understand what happens in the film. So watch the videos down below and check out Dredd this weekend.
The Best of Dredd Features
This has a great selection of features on the film. The Gear one in particular is fascinating to anyone who is interested in how they made all of Dredd‘s stuff (No CGI) I really want the law master. Great look at how they used some really good camera tech, 4000 FPS Cameras which is amazingly fast. The Prequel Comic is the what happens to MA-MA before the events in the film and help to explain why she does what she does.
Dredd’s Gear
Dredd – From the People Who Made Him
Dredd 3D – How They Make Slo-Mo Scenes
Dredd 3D – Prequel Motion Comic
The Best Trailers
I really liked the first trailer that came out, and we had quite a bit of excitement over its release. The next trailer though is my favorite trailer around, got some great lines from Dredd and the music really works well, plus it is super action packed which demonstrates Dredd really well. And lets face it “Perps were uncooperative” is just really funny…
Dredd 3D Official Trailer #1
Dredd 3D Official Trailer #2
The Best Clips
I promise these are the last videos. We have the clip of Karl Urban saying the famous line “I am the Law” and does it rather well. Got that Red Band scene where people’s faces get shot up (Warning might be graphic). Lastly a scene which I think helps to understand Anderson, plus another deadpan line from Dredd.
Yeah, the banner isn’t what RoboCop will look like, sorry. I actually rather like the banner one.
But we do know what Robocop will look like now and yeah, it’s pretty bad. The original film had a great deal of originality to its look, from the Robocop suit to the ED-209. Granted these needed to be updated for a remake of the film but I still think that what we have seen so far has been done before. ED-209 looks like a small Transformer and the RoboCop suit, well… I will go over what I think of the new suit and do some comparisons after you look at the images below for yourselves.
First off let’s have a quick look at the suit from a non-comparison stand point. The suit looks a little clunky in the second picture which should really be better in 21st century film robots. Then there is the fact that it doesn’t look like he is a cyborg. Granted there is just a man in a suit in filming but I was expecting a half man half machine look at least. The only evidence that might suggest this would be the right hand not being covered by the suit (really! Is that it?).
GI Joe Suits
Now is the comparison part. This suit looks like a combination of at least 5 different suits from film and games in the last 10 years. Why is this a problem? Well, apart from the complete lack of originality this proves it also makes the film start to blend into the fabric of those films rather than stand out as its own. Remember all of those comparisons made between the look of the alien ships in Battleship and the robot aliens of Transformers? People kept saying it’s a total rip off of Transformers, and that’s how it starts. People have seen it before which makes them think they are watching the same film over and over rather than a new film, and can seriously piss ’em off.
Here is a collection of the Grizzly Staff’s reactions to first seeing the new RoboCop suit:
Tim The Film Guy: “haha oh no that’s not right, thought I just saw Batman’s motor bike suit”
Dr. Kronner: “This looks turrible.”
Supascoot: “Motocross mixed with Tron and aspects of the Bat suit do not make a good Robocop.”
CTan: “Did they dig out the GI Joe suit?”
Brucewalken: “I actually laughed when I saw it. It’s hilarious. That film I reviewed, Robowar. The costume the cyborg has in that flick is better than the RoboCop costume! Maybe they have played too much Halo as it looks to me like a biker helmet stuck on a Halo costume painted black. Unimpressed.“
Cheesebadger: “I’m…. Just really gonna keep hope that it’ll work in the movie.”
So basically it’s a collection of all black armored suits in films and games. We’ll have to wait to see more before I, or any of the staff apparently, will be convinced that this is a good look for RoboCop.
Dredd 3D is fantastic and beautifully brutal from the visuals to the sound. This film clearly learned from past failures and started with a very simple plot that is hard to screw up, this being done with people who clearly knew the source material and from that knew that this was the best way to start a film about Judge Dredd. The only problems with this film is that it would need a more complex story out of the comics and an increased budget but apart from that I can’t find faults. So I would love to see a sequel which could easily fix the problems I found with this film and would love to see a Batman begins to the Dark Knight Style turn around. In other words it’s a great start.
The future America is an irradiated waste land. On its East Coast, running from Boston to Washington DC, lies Mega City One- a vast, violent metropolis where criminals rule the chaotic streets. The only force of order lies with the urban cops called “Judges” who possess the combined powers of judge, jury and instant executioner. Known and feared throughout the city, Dredd (Karl Urban) is the ultimate Judge, challenged with ridding the city of its latest scourge – a dangerous drug epidemic that has users of “Slo-Mo” experiencing reality at a fraction of its normal speed.
Just as always I will not be giving away any spoilers so you don’t have to worry about reading this review before seeing the film. To start off let’s talk about the acting. The acting was very good for the most part but in saying that there weren’t many situations that required it although the actors played the parts they were playing as the characters so I don’t have any faults in that area, but there would have to be more of the film to really tell. The main character Judge Dredd (Karl Urban) was really top-notch for portraying a comic book character in a real world environment, credit to him a great performance (the chin was particularly impressive).
I would like to see more characters to interact with in a sequel because that’s what is needed to get a better feel of Dredd. Cassandra Anderson (Olivia Thirlby) was actually much better than I thought she would be and although not quite the same as the comic character she still gives the character justice (she kicks ass basically). Ma-Ma was an interesting character who I would have like to have seen more of but there is a prequel comic to the film which explains her back story which is free here if you would like to read that before seeing the film. Good strong female leads in this though which I like to see and the best is that it didn’t feel forced.
So let’s talk about something more fun like the visuals. The special effects, physical props and visual landscape shots where both excellent viewing and brilliantly immersive to the world that Judge Dredd lives in, very repressive and cramped with too many people in one place. The best thing I thought about this film’s visuals was that even though the budget was relatively low they didn’t use too much CGI but instead went for real props and building which means it didn’t feel cheap and felt more like a big budget film because of the detail put into everything from the judges uniforms to the blending of real world building and futuristic mega blocks.
I wouldn’t necessarily recommend the 3D but I am a bit biased because I tend to get used to the 3D effect within the first 10 minutes of films and find that it might as well be in 2D because of the length of a full movie, but if you like 3D there were some good 3D shots. I loved the Lawmaster chase scene and would really like to see more of the city itself in a sequel but I understand with the budget that’s the most they could do (I want a Lawmaster and the Lawgiver, screw it I just want to be a Judge). Oh and I should warn people that it’s really violent but insanely fun with brilliant music, the soundtrack with this film really worked well and it was massively adrenaline pumped from start to finish with no time for boring.
My favourite scene without giving anything away would be anything with Dredd kicking ass or maybe Mini gun bit, this doesn’t make sense really until you see the film but I won’t be ruining it for you so if you have seen the film then comment below and we can discuss. The Slow Mo scenes are good and the Deadpan acting of Urban is perfect.
Finally I would like to say that a sequel would be great to see and I would be sad if one didn’t get made. The possibilities are endless in the Dredd universe and could easily expand. I really liked the relationship between Judge Dredd and Cassandra Anderson because I got the feeling like it was kind of a buddy cop style connection with a rookie but because of her Psychic ability she is probably the only person who Dredd could have that partnership with, no romantic connection at all and there shouldn’t be, I actually think that would be the easiest way to ruin this film (or bring back rob Schneider). So go watch it because the film is a great viewing.
Wow…has it really been 9 years since his last leading role in Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines – oh right, yeah that’s why. Seriously I think I speak for all of us when I say he needs to come back and kick ass. This new acting chapter should be fun to see, and we know there is more of him to come in the next few years (please be good). Will he be the same action icon with one liners or something more serious? I would like to see something more serious, but I also don’t want him to lose his personality (Batman and Robin was too far). The picture below shows the main characters in his latest film – Last Stand. This is director Kim Ji-Woon‘s first American film.
Premium Rush kind of looks like one those films that I would normally pass over, but with a cast including Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Michael Shannon, I will actually give this a chance and I hope it does well. I haven’t seen a bad film which stars Joseph so my hopes are high there. The film centers on a New York City bicycle messenger (JGL) who picks up an envelope from Columbia University. A dirty cop (Shannon), desperate to get his hands on the envelope, chases the messenger around the city. It’s sounds basically like Citizen Kane with bikes!
Here’s the trailer:
Its looks like high-octane fun on bikes. “Got a name, got family…people who care if they see you again?” That’s what we like to hear from a bad guy, and I think Michael Shannon will easily do a great job as a corrupt cop (see his work on Boardwalk Empire).
Here’s a Behind the Scenes Featurette
All I can say is that director David Koepp has some balls letting his main actors do some of that stuff, because I mean look at Josephs arm at the end of that video. I didn’t expect this film to feature so many of the actors doing their own stunts, especially when it was shot using real traffic, because that seems to be insanely dangerous. On the other hand…if they die for the entertainment of the viewing public, that would show great devotion to their craft.
Cloud Atlas, in case you haven’t heard of it yet, is an upcoming (allegedly) epic Adventure/Drama written and directed by Lana Wachowski, Tom Tykwer, and Andy Wachowski. The film is based on the 2004 novel of the same name by David Mitchell (the author, not the comedian). With an ensemble cast to cover the film’s multiple story lines, Cloud Atlas is currently scheduled to be released on October 26, 2012.
Here’s the really long trailer:
Here’s the official synopsis:
“An epic story of humankind in which the actions and consequences of our lives impact one another throughout the past, present and future as one soul is shaped from a murderer into a savior and a single act of kindness ripples out for centuries to inspire a revolution.”
I tend to joke about trailers which are different, but I actually really like the look of this, and the sheer ambition that it demonstrates gives me hope for other films of its kind. It’s truly unique, and as complicated as a Steven Hawking documentary on black holes. I expect that it won’t do well in terms of money, but I hope it will be good for cult status as that really long movie that confused most who watch it, that’s all I ask.
Got a butt load of images for you now which range from wow! to really?
The film might be a new experience for some of these actors as each one has to play multiple roles, and as you just saw many different races and even futuristic people. This will either be fun in the bun, or be too much to handle we will soon be able to decide for ourselves this October. There’s been a little bit of debate over the length of the film, but it has now been confirmed as 160 minutes, which is interesting because it was apparently 230 minutes long – which is a significant cut for the new time and I hope it doesn’t affect the film negatively.
So finally what are your thoughts? Did you like the book? Do you think this adaptation will be as good as the book? Or, do you think it will ruin it like so many adaptation have before? All views are welcome.
Grizzly Bomb 