As a fan of the original comics upon which this movie was based, I have to say that I found this a major disappointment. The movie took the intelligent, satirical and unique ideas behind the comic and turned them into another production line science fiction action movie. The premise of the movie (and indeed the comics) is that in the future, most of the world has been wiped out by nuclear war, leaving the enormous Mega-Cities as the only major centres of population. To keep the peace in these overpopulated, high-crime, high unemployment cities, a new type of lawman has been introduced: the Judges. Possessing the right to try and execute criminals on the spot, the toughest of them all is the ice-cool Judge Joe Dredd. The story is the basic hero-accused-of-a-crime-he-didn't-commit with a science fiction twist. Potentially, this could have been a great movie. But issues that really needed to be examined, such as Dredd's character, are skipped over. The intelligent satire of the comics is abandoned in favour of pointless violence and a romantic ending is tacked on. As a brainless action movie it's fine, but as thought-provoking science fiction it's a failure.
Review of Judge Dredd
