It has been confirmed that 'Star Trek' star Karl Urban is to play lawman Judge Dredd in the next big screen outing for the classic '2000 AD' comic character.
Empire Online reports that at a Q&A session at the British Film Institute's Movie-Con III, one of the film's producers, Andrew MacDonald, confirmed the casting.
Of the upcoming movie, he said: "Our idea is to make a very hard, R-rated, gritty, realistic movie of Dredd in Megacity, so we've got to get the tone right.
"He's not going to take off his helmet [unlike Sylvester Stallone in 1995 movie]. His bike is going to feel real. He's going to hit people and it's going to feel real.
"There's been a change in comic-book movies; they were treated unseriously [sic] and now they're treated seriously."
'Judge Dredd' will be directed by 'Vantage Point' and 'Omagh' director Pete Travis.
It will begin shooting in Johannesburg, South Africa later this year.
