A Scientist at the Movies Reviews by Greg Paris

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Title: Minority Report

Date Viewed: 6/23/02

Details:

Tom Cruise (Detective John Anderton)

Max von Sydow (Director Lamar Burgess)

Colin Farrell (Detective Ed Witwer)

Samantha Morton (Agatha)

Kathryn Morris (Lara Anderton)

Director: Steven Spielberg

Score: John Williams

Score: +

The Review: It's the near future. In the five years since the Department of PreCrime was established in Washington DC, there have been no murders -- these events are instead viewed precognitively by a trio of cloistered human mutants, and the to-be-perpetrators are arrested and confined before the crime is committed. The logic is impeccable, but the ethics are questionable -- and The Minority Report takes us down the path of discovery as these ethics are debated. It's time to consider establishing a National Department of PreCrime, and the system therefore is due for deep scrutiny.

Part of the ethical dilemma comes from the lack of determinism in the system -- Was a crime really committed? Is there any free will? What are the rights of the to-be-perpetrator? Do they deserve to be punished and sentenced to life imprisonment? These questions come to the fore when Cruise's character (Anderton) himself becomes accused of the pre-crime of murder ("Everybody runs" is the tag-line of the movie). The other part of the dilemma comes from the crisis of creation of the precog mutants in the first place, a topic addressed only near the end of the movie. As the plot turns, Anderton is seen to be flawed, as is the future.

Our introduction to Anderton is in "blast crisis" (to borrow a phrase from leukemia diagnosis), rapidly scanning images produced by the precogs, coupling it with what minimal information can be derived from the names of the to-be-murderer and his victims, trying to find the exact site so his team can intervene. The tension of suspense is overlaid with the elegance of method. This scene is an excellent and compelling portrayal of pattern-seeking and data-mining at its best, a practice exhibited by both scientists and police detectives (not often coupled in the same sentence, are they?), both in the natural execution of their daily tasks. Anderton is performing on an enhanced set of computer visualization screens almost as a musician or conductor, and this feeling is enhanced by the symphonic music Williams has scored as background for this scene.

The pacing is taut, well-edited, with (almost) nary a false turn. The one niggling point not explained here (nor in the original short story) is how the precog mutants obtain the name of the perpetrator -- or of the victims, for that matter. There are several very interesting characters scattered around the plot (Agatha, the precog; Dr. Hineman, their creator; Anderton's drug dealer sans eyes, etc.). There's a good match of actors to roles. Both Anderton and Witwer are cocky, but while the former is a gloss over intensely private pain, the latter is truly driven. The PreCrime team with which Anderton works transforms rapidly, when giving chase, into a group of thugs, even though (or perhaps because) they're after one of their own. Agatha, one of the precogs (Morton), does an excellent job spanning bewilderment, confusion, fear, and sensory overload; her precog experience of the depths of human possibilities contrasts starkly with her wide-eyed almost waif-like encounter with the real world of the future, and she becomes strangely attractive for all that. She's fragile: you want to reach out and protect her.

The world-design has been drafted by Philip K. Dick, but it has been fleshed out quite well by Spielberg and his set designers and SFX teams. The omnipresent ID checks ("the eyes are the window of the soul"), the transit system that converts from vertical to horizontal, the almost Metropolis-like urban landscape contrasting with the down-home cabin on the coast, the biological engineering encircling and protecting the home of the reclusive Dr. Hineman -- all these work, and suspension of disbelief is not a difficulty.

For any number of reasons, this should indeed be characterized as "inspired by a short story by Philip K. Dick," as opposed to "taken from" -- because the two are almost totally different, aside from some character names. This is not a complaint, because the movie works well in a standalone fashion, substantially enhanced by Spielberg. Irrespective of the director, I have enjoyed many of those stories of Philip K. Dick that have been turned into film (e.g., Ridley Scott's Bladerunner; and Paul Verhoeven's Total Recall); but I cannot give equally high ratings to Screamers (Christian Duguay) and definitely did not to The Imposter (Gary Fleder). This may be all the more surprising when I admit that I've never been able to finish any of his novels. It would appear that Dick's oeuvre remains a good source for dark and paranoid futures, and I look forward to other directors mining this resource.

Although it has the flavor of some of the more remote Gulf of Maine islands, some of the filming was done in the islands of the Chesapeake off the coast of Virginia.

Another reviewer said, "Minority Report is what A.I. should have been." I envy the author that turn of phrase, and wholeheartedly agree.

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