Minority Report

[polymorphikos]

Warning: This review will probably contain spoilers, though i'm unsure as i haven't written it yet.

The Minority Report (2002)

Directed by Steven Spielberg.



Thi Minority Report is two films in one, hinging upon two seperate endings. For the first two thirds, it runs as a visually-gorgeous, advertising-laden look into the bizzare world of tomorrow, where all the murders in the District of Columbia are stopped before they happen, using the abilities of precognitive mutants ('Precogs') to predict and prevent such crimes.

The Precog division comes under review by the FBI as a possible method of crime control in the rest of the nation, and at the same time Detective John Anderton (Tom Cruise, in an actually okay performance), a man haunted by the abduction of his young son, is marked by the Precogs as the next perpertrator, but with one minor disagreement amongst the mutants, the eponymous 'minority report'.

As Anderton runs, knowing he can't escape, and attempts to prove his innocence in a world where all privacy is second to crime control, he begins uncovering the vagaries of something amiss. Finally, he steals one of the precogs (the leader, Agatha (Samantha Morton)) and attempts to tap her mind. Finally he tracks-down the man he is supposed to kill, despite urgings to the contrary by Agatha, and discovers that this is the man who supposedly stole his son. Anderton goes to kill him, Agatha begging him not to, and then doesn't. The entire validity of the Precog method is shattered. Crimes can be averted. The thousands of would-be criminals locked inside their own personal hells in the prison may in fact be innoncent. What a thought-provoking and intelligent ending, and not even over-long.

Except that it's a thought-provoking and intelligent ending, and not even over-long.



Here is where the makers, either because they thought it would be clever or were afraid this would be another cripplingly-expensive succes d'estime like Bladerunner, go all Mission Impossible on us. The criminal didn't kill Anderton's son. There's some conspiracy by which Director Lamar Burgess (Max von Sydow) has been concealing some icky murders, and the entire film dissolves from a tightly-wound civil liberties paranoia flick to a very average bit of espionage so unremarkable I can't even remember it (although the rest is quite clear).

So it is my recommendation that you watch Minority Report end to end the first time, and then just watch it to the scene in the hotel room from then on in. Whether they choked on their own cleverness or what, they really should have wound it up there. This tacked-on ending is the one thing stopping Minority Report from rivalling even Bladerunner as a film.

***1/2

 

[Brian G Turner]

Absolutely right - it died after the hotel scene.

Just became tiresone and over-long after that.

Not read the original Dick story, but there seemed a lot missing from the film in terms of potential vs what was actually developed.

 

[Circus Cranium]

Good review. I would give the film a 7 out of 10. Which is pretty good; my biggest complaint is that there aren't enough scifi films made, so when one is even HALF way decent, I'm happy.

 

[Neon]

I feel you are maybe missing the point of the ending. Let's assume that the movie ended at the hotel scene. There are still too many loose ends that need to be tied up, namely the entire story surrounding Burgess and what happens to the precog program. The whole precog idea was what Burgess had worked a large amount of his life for. When Anderton discovered that the entire concept of future murders is something that can be impacted by one's choice, it would completely dissolve the entire program. Burgess had shown before that he was willing to goto any means to keep this program, his "baby", alive and going. So with Anderton uncovering the secret, Burgess had to take measures to take him out of the picture. The point, I feel, was a continuation of the plot to show how the entire program would be impacted. Burgess wanted it to stay while Anderton knew it was faulty and should be disbanded. And furthermore, it heightens the moral dilemma ever-present throughout the movie since the program has effectively achieved a 0% murder rate.... yet now should we eliminate the program and get deaths again?

 

[Leto]

three words : read the novella. For once with K Dick, all is explained in it.
And, oh yes, the movie was pretty good (yet the end is in the book).

 

[polymorphikos]

I feel you are maybe missing the point of the ending. Let's assume that the movie ended at the hotel scene. There are still too many loose ends that need to be tied up, namely the entire story surrounding Burgess and what happens to the precog program. The whole precog idea was what Burgess had worked a large amount of his life for. When Anderton discovered that the entire concept of future murders is something that can be impacted by one's choice, it would completely dissolve the entire program. Burgess had shown before that he was willing to goto any means to keep this program, his "baby", alive and going. So with Anderton uncovering the secret, Burgess had to take measures to take him out of the picture. The point, I feel, was a continuation of the plot to show how the entire program would be impacted. Burgess wanted it to stay while Anderton knew it was faulty and should be disbanded. And furthermore, it heightens the moral dilemma ever-present throughout the movie since the program has effectively achieved a 0% murder rate.... yet now should we eliminate the program and get deaths again?

Burgess perverted the system to set Anderton up for his own crime. It's nothing about him wanting to keep it the system alive.

 

[hodor]

Oh give me a break... it's an american movie. There is no deep contemplation about this. It's supposed to make people stay whaaaaa, you know. Think what you want but I think the movie is very self explanatory, action and mystery and solved at the end. What you see is what you get. No sequel no contemplation.

 

[polymorphikos]

It would have been if it had ended in the hotel

 

[Neon]

Burgess perverted the system to set Anderton up for his own crime. It's nothing about him wanting to keep it the system alive.

His own crime meaning when he killed the woman? Yes that's true, but I still maintain part of his motive was to keep the entire program alive.

 

[hodor]

Yes, I concur, hence the title to the movie Minority Report. He abviously wanted to keep the program alive by hiding this.

 

[stencyl]

The movie was Hollywoodized and Spielbergified, in my opinion.

The Dick story develops Anderton as a much more complex and interesting character. If I can remember correctly, he commits murder in the end to keep the system in place. I think that we are meant to question his character throughout, especially in his final action, which leaves a system with questionable moral implications in place at the cost of the character's liberty.

The film breaks off the questionable parts of Anderton's character into a whole new "bad guy" via Burgess. That way we can watch Tom Cruise make all the right choices; come to terms with the loss of his son, even watch his restraint at not technically killing the guy who kidnapped and killed the kid; save the now humanized pre-cog girl; and beat the bad guy in the end.

I actually did like the spectacle of the film, I liked the pre-cog "mysticism in the machine" idea that was developed, and I liked the idea of religion played out even in the punishment (i.e. the "halos" the criminals wore).

However, like with the movie AI, it just seems like Spielberg can't see when he should leave a moment, a scene, a character, or an ending alone.

Or maybe the over-the-top, no moral ambiguity, hero wins, audience feels warm and fuzzy stuff is just standard in big budget films.

 

[steve12553]

I enjoyed the movie and will have to track down the novella at some point. This was probably the last Tom Cruise movie that I will ever enjoy. (I saw War of the Worlds and thought it was pretty pathetic with all the talent involved in it). Cruise using his celebrity to encourage depressed people to throw away their medications may cause a fair amount of suicides just because people believe what they see on TV. Regardless, I dis enjoy the movie. It was very atmospheric and made decent use of sophisticated special effects.