Last fall, when a new adaptation of the British comic book character Judge Dredd, titled simply Dredd, went into production, a picture was quickly released of Karl Urban in the title role of the futuristic law enforcement officer who also serves as judge, jury and very often executioner. But since then, word on the project has been fairly quiet until the release of this new picture of Urban this weekend. (Click on it for a bigger version.)
Granted both pictures are kind of dark, but if they reflect the film’s aesthetics, than I’m really looking forward to it.
When I showed the picture to my girlfriend, a Karl Urban fan, she asked why they were remaking a crappy Stallone movie anyway. I replied that I would rather see them take a second attempt to get a movie right rather than remake a story that was already done well once.
But that said, I don’t consider this new Judge Dredd movie a remake of Stallone’s ill-fated 1995 film. Sure they are both based on the same comic book character, they don’t share the same or even a similar story. (At least according to the read through I gave of the undated draft by scripter Alex Garland that has been floating around.) I would no more call this a remake anymore than I would call Billy Wilder’s The Private Life Of Sherlock Holmes a remake of the Basil Rathbone series.
Dredd will also star Olivia Thirlby as Judge Anderson and Lena Headey. It hits theaters in England on December 1, but Lionsgate, its distributor in the US, has yet to set a date for it.
Via BleedingCool.
