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Rating: 4.25 out of 5
What would the United States look like with absolutely no murder? Can you even imagine it? Cities like Chicago, Baltimore, and New Orleans that have high murder rates suddenly have no murders. How do you think society would react to all of this? What if a program was introduced to stop murder before it happened? Do you think the world would be ready for all of that?
The genius of Stephen Spielberg is back with a film that combines the elements of tech noir, whodunit, thriller, and science fiction genres as well as an entertaining chase scene. The film is so good and entertaining where the main character is accused of a murder crime he has not committed and one he should predict.
In the year 2054, the United States finally look like the Jetsons with high rising skyscrapers and flying cars. The world has become technologically advanced with some crazy stuff. When your eyes get scanned, it is like an automated google advertisement coming up. Crime is at an all-time high in the United States. To combat crime and especially murder, the Metropolitan Police Department of Washington, DC, has founded a new task force called PreCrime. The task force is led by John Anderton (Cruise) with the use of PreCogs- three mentally-altered humans capable of seeing the future. The PreCogs receive a vision of murder where a red ball comes down. Anderson uses a process called scrubbing while looking through images to pinpoint the location of the victim and murder. Once the location is known, his team swoops in and captures the killer before the crime happens. The suspect is haloed with a device that puts them in a dream state and then placed in a virtual reality prison. In the past six years, Anderton and his team have brought murder down to zero. The federal government wants to employ the program across the country.
As usual, with politics, with success comes people who want to know how things are done and a way to get their slimy fingers on the program. Anderton’s superior, bureau director Burgess (Sydow), takes pride in him and shields him from bureaucrats like Danny Witwer (Farrell), from the Justice Department. Witwer comes in and wants to know all about the program. He has researched Anderton and learned that he has a nasty drug habit, and his wife has left him after the loss of their son. As the precrime strategy prepares to go national, a slight hiccup happens. The PreCogs receive their latest vision. They see Anderton shooting a man in cold blood. Now Anderton must race against the clock to prove that the PreCogs were wrong while also avoiding the very team he leads. Finding himself now a fugitive, Anderton teams up with Agatha (Morton), one of the Pre-Cogs, who seemed to be trying to warn him of his danger.
I don’t know what else to say about Spielberg. I have said it repeatedly that the man is a literal genius when it comes to film and storytelling. We all have seen movies where the main character needs to race against time to clear their name. That is nothing new. What Spielberg does is create a world and story that seems so real and futuristic. What makes this story so great is that Spielberg plays on the human element of the PreCogs. You hear people say that the human element makes mistakes and is never perfect. The central theme in the story is that the PreCogs are NEVER wrong. Yet, the three might, in small cases, disagree on what they see. This one disagreement/glitch in the system can lead to outsmarting the system if you really know how to do it. How can one outsmart this perfect system? Maybe you can commit a murder precisely like the one seen but a few minutes after the original crime.
The science and technological advances that were displayed were truly amazing in this film. They would make any Jetson’s fan blush with joy. The first one I could think of was when Cruise’s character first tried to solve the precrime before it happened. As the images flowed it, he looked like a music conductor. With each wave of his hand, a new image came into view, or he spun it around to get a better look at it. I really liked how everyone could be identified by their eyes. Everywhere had eye scanners that were literally using an algorithm to show you products that you might like. Every screen you saw was an advertisement specifically for them. How about the scene with the robotic spiders? That was a crazy and intense scene. Those little shits can search a whole building in a matter of minutes by performing retinal scans. The film showed that somethings might be so close to reality.
Also, Spielberg does a fantastic job with the pacing of this film. It starts off a little slow, but when shit hits the fan, it picks up. First, we get the chase scene that was intense in itself. Being chased through a car factory and trying to dip and dodge while a car being put together around you was fun to watch and had the heart pumping. Another great pacing scene like before is when Anderton tries to evade the spiders. He had an eye transplant and hears the dudes coming. He gets in a tub of ice water and holds his breath. As the spiders move around and sense nothing, an air bubble comes up and alerts them. A FREAKIN AIR BUBBLE!! This is what Spielberg does so well.
Tom Cruise did an outstanding job in this film. Pulling back a little bit from his Mission Impossible films, he made you care about his character and even worry about him. You think he was so dedicated to his job that his family left, but it makes you feel sad for what he has been through when you see the real reason. He lost a kid and got a drug addiction to cope with the loss.
Samantha Morton, as Agatha, was actually entertaining. She had very few words, but she was truly like a scared little kitten when she was truly on screen and in the world. She could see so many things and processed them. One scene was when she and Anderton were trying to escape through the mall. You think they were going to get caught, but she threw out commands and saved the day.
Minority Report is a great movie to watch. If you need a fast-paced, futuristic thriller, then this is the film for you. The technology in this film is out of this world. Spielberg seems to make some of the best movies in film.
