https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PifvRiHVSCY
In Jacobean dramas, it features over the top violence, strict following of class structures, sexual (deviance), corruption and power struggles. All of which are show cased in the dramas either as a characteristic of the plot or in the character themselves.
In the movie Dredd, it takes place in the future, the world population has bloomed to people living in Mega-Cities that has populations of around 800 million. With that many people, crime is out of control with tens of thousands reported daily. The only way to enforce order are taken by those called Judges, whom acts as judge, jury and executioner.
The movie follows Judge Dredd and his new recruit Anderson, a psychic, as they gets trapped into a 200 story slum tower by the drug lord Ma-Ma.
The plot and the characters of Dredd fits into the Jacobean drama quite well. There is violence right from the beginning, following Judge Dredd from the beginning, going about his routinely clean up of criminals. Guns, car chase, drugs and death right off the bat. Because there are just too many criminals out there, it’s a never ending job. The only way to enforce any semblance of order is thanks to the Judges who has complete power. This complete power, as the saying goes, can corrupt completely. In the movie, there are four Judges who obtains access into the locked down tower halfway through the movie, and it’s shortly shown that they are corrupt Judges. In such a world where Judges have absolute power, it’s very easy to see how they could get away with it. The only ones who can contain the corrupt Judges are other Judges, and that’s exactly what Dredd does.
Ma-Ma, a woman who’d worked her way to the top, is ruthless and cunning. She maintains her position by creating and controlling the distribution of the drug Slo-Mo. In one of the first scenes with her, she enforces her power through the killing of some rogue drug dealers in her territory and dropping them to their death from the top floor. She’d started out as a prostitute and killed her way up to the top, maintaining that position is a constant power struggle.
Another form of power struggle comes when Ma-Ma orders Dredd and Anderson killed. We, the viewer, obviously know who’s going to win, but it’s still a fun violent drama to watch.
