Minority Report (film)

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Minority Report
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Steven Spielberg
Produced by	Walter F. Parkes Jan de Bont Gary Goldman
Written by	Philip K. Dick Scott Frank Jon Cohen
Starring	Tom Cruise Colin Farrell Max von Sydow Steve Harris Neal McDonough
Music by	John Williams
Cinematography	Janusz Kaminski
Editing by	Michael Kahn
Distributed by	Worldwide Theatrical Non-USA DVD 20th Century Fox USA DVD DreamWorks
Release date(s)	June 21, 2002
Running time	145 min.
Country
Language	English Swedish
Budget	$102 million
Gross revenue	$132,014,112 (US) $353,600,000 (worldwide)
Allmovie profile
IMDb profile

Minority Report is a 2002 science fiction film directed by Steven Spielberg, loosely based on the Philip K. Dick short story of the same name. It is set in Washington, D.C. in the year 2054, where a special police department called "pre-crime" apprehends criminals based on foreknowledge, provided by three psychics termed "pre-cogs". The film stars Tom Cruise as John Anderton, a pre-crime officer, who heads the pre-crime police force. Colin Farrell plays Danny Witwer, an agent from the Department of Justice who is sent to observe the process, Samantha Morton portrays the senior pre-cog Agatha, and Max von Sydow plays Lamar Burgess, Anderton's superior. It is one of several films based on stories by Philip K. Dick.

The film cost over $100 million, though it made more than three times that in worldwide box office, and sold at least four million DVDs in its first few months of release.^[1][2] Minority Report was one of the best reviewed films of 2002,^[3] and was nominated for and won several awards.^[4] These included four Saturn Awards, including Best Science Fiction Film and Best Direction. Minority Report also earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Sound Editing. The film has a distinctive look, featuring desaturated colors which make it almost resemble a black-and-white film, yet the blacks and shadows have a high contrast, resembling film noir.

[edit] Plot

The film is set in Washington, D.C. and Arlington, Virginia in the year 2054. The film opens as Anderton (Tom Cruise) and his team are in the midst of apprehending a suspect. In this sequence, it is revealed that the pre-cogs only relate the time/date of the murder, the murderer's name, and the victim's name. All other facts of the crime, chiefly the location, can only be ascertained by clues given by the various images relayed around the time of murder. Images transfer from the pre-cogs' minds to a computer display, where Anderton manipulates the images in a manner similar to a virtual reality interface to better determine how the murders might or will happen. Anderton is observed during this process by Danny Witwer (Colin Farrell), an agent from the Department of Justice. Witwer is sent to evaluate the system because the country is about to vote on whether to expand the Pre-Crime program nationally.

Later that day Anderton goes to his apartment, where he watches home movies of his six-year old son. It becomes evident that he lost his son, and that he is now divorced. The next morning, Witwer is given a tour of the pre-cogs' chamber. The pre-cogs are seen floating in a translucent substance, which a technician explains helps enhance the images that the pre-cogs produce. After the tour, Anderton stays behind, and the pre-cog Agatha (Morton) emerges from the pool. She draws Anderton's attention to the ceiling, which also displays images from a precog's mind, that is displaying images of a woman being drowned by a masked man. Intrigued by a 'murder' which he's never seen before, Anderton decides to investigate. He learns that the woman, Anne Lively, was going to be drowned in a lake by a John Doe (retinal identification wasn't possible because he had his eyes surgically replaced with new ones). Anderton discovers that the other pre-cogs' images of the 'murder' are on record, but Agatha's recorded images are missing; additionally, the intended victim is no longer on record and is "missing". He then conveys this information to Burgess (Von Sydow), who appears unconcerned.

Anderton then returns to the pre-crime offices and investigates a new case. A murder is to take place in 36 hours. The murderer is revealed to be Anderton himself, and the victim a man named "Leo Crow". Believing that he is being set up since he doesn’t know the victim, Anderton takes it on the lam. He manages to escape Witwer and a team of pre-crime officers in a car factory. Shortly after a fight scene in which Anderton overpowers Witwer and escapes in a Lexus car, he seeks refuge in the country home of a woman named Iris Hineman, who was one of the pioneers of pre-crime. Hineman reveals that the pre-cogs were an accidental discovery. They are the very few surviving children of drug addicted women in a treatment program, whose violent dreams were found to be echoes of murders which had yet to occur. She tells him that the pre-cogs do not always agree in their opinions about the future; when this happens, the dissenting opinion is ignored. Thus, Anderton's only hope at proving his innocence is acquiring the hidden "minority report" from which the film takes its title.

Traveling undetected is difficult, since everyone is subjected to Eye-Dent iris recognition scans at all times. Therefore, Anderton visits a shady doctor (played by Peter Stormare) and receives an eye transplant. While sleeping to recover from the surgery, he has a dream where it is revealed that his son was abducted. He awakens to discover that the pre-crime team is investigating the building he is in. The team dispatches "spyders", robotic eye scanners, to the various rooms to find and ID Anderton. Anderton tries to hide but is scanned. The surgery proves successful and he is not identified as John Anderton. Later, he manages to reach the pre-crime offices. He takes Agatha out of the nutrient water—temporarily disrupting the pre-cog hive mind that makes pre-crime work—and escapes again. Anderton then finds a hacker friend who accesses Agatha's vision of the murder. The vision appears identical to the one Anderton intercepted himself.

Anderton then goes to Leo Crow’s apartment where Crow is not present. While searching the room, he finds a pile of photos of children, one of which is a photo of his son. Anderton suddenly comes to the realization that there is no minority report for himself, and that Leo Crow is responsible for kidnapping his son. Anderton had pre-planned this murder, a long standing wish to kill the previously anonymous person who took his son. Then, Crow enters his apartment and Anderton attacks him eliciting a confession. While this is going on, Agatha tries to convince Anderton that he does not have to kill Crow, saying "You can choose...". Anderton reconsiders, and the predicted time of the murder passes, showing conclusively that the pre-cog predictions are not infallible. Anderton decides to arrest Crow instead, and reads him his Miranda rights. Crow then says that if Anderton doesn’t kill him, Crow’s family will get nothing: the entire murder was a set up. Crow then grabs Anderton’s gun to point it at his own chest and pushes on Anderton's fingers so that the trigger is pulled, killing him. Anderton and Agatha then leave the apartment.

Witwer and the pre-crime unit arrive and investigate the crime scene. Witwer sees the photos and becomes skeptical of what happened, referring to the pile of photos as an "orgy of evidence" (i.e. too convenient to be believable) Witwer then meets with Burgess to discuss his doubts with him. He shows Burgess the Anne Lively pre-vision, but two different ones; one from Art and Dash taken from pre-crime, the other, a minority report from Agatha, the same one Anderton had downloaded with his hacker friend. He shows Burgess that the two images have slight differences, such as water lapping in opposite directions. Witwer realizes that the two images actually depict separate murder attempts. The pre-crime team had prevented the first murder and left with the murderer. Immediately afterwards, Witwer suggests, another man arrived and drowned her in the exact way depicted in the pre-vision. Since the pre-cogs often experienced "echoes" of particularly violent murders, the techs would have dismissed the second pre-vision, and the murderer would have escaped. Witwer then adds that the murderer must have had access to the pre-cogs visions, at which point Burgess interrupts and shoots him in the chest. Since the hive mind is not functioning (Agatha is with Anderton), pre-crime is not able to forecast and prevent Witwer's murder.

Anderton then hides out in his ex-wife Lara’s house. While there, he comes to realize that he was set up because of his discovery of the Ann Lively murder. Lively is revealed to be Agatha's mother, killed because she got clean and wanted to re-unite with Agatha. The police then arrive and arrest Anderton for the murders of Crow and Witwer. The guard says that with the halo on it feels like all your dreams feel real. Later, Burgess accidentally reveals to Lara that he killed Ann Lively. Lara releases Anderton from prison, and as Burgess is giving a speech, Anderton confronts him on his crime by showing everyone in attendance the Agatha pre-vision which reveals the masked killer of Anne Lively was Burgess himself. Burgess takes a gun and starts after Anderton; he eventually decides to commit suicide instead, as killing Anderton would prove Precrime's infallibility but result in his lifetime imprisonment, while not killing him would undermine the program itself.

In the final sequence, Anderton narrates that pre-crime was shut down. All of the pre-criminals who were imprisoned by pre-crime were unconditionally pardoned and released, though monitored for a long period of time, according to the narration. The pre-cogs were taken to a secret location to live in seclusion. Anderton is shown reconciled with Lara who is visibly pregnant.

[edit] Cast and characters

• Tom Cruise as Chief John Anderton. Anderton is a middle-aged divorced head of the pre-crime department in Washington, D.C. He has been emotionally impacted by the disappearance of his son.
• Max Von Sydow as Director Lamar Burgess. Burgess is an elderly official in the Washington, D.C. crime department and Anderton's superior.
• Colin Farrell as Danny Witwer. Witwer is a cocky Department of Justice agent sent to observe and evaluate the pre-crime process.
• Steve Harris as Jad. Jad oversees the pre-cogs and helps Anderton interpret their visions.
• Neal McDonough as Fletcher. Fletcher is a Pre-crime officer who works alongside Anderton.
• Samantha Morton as Agatha. Agatha is the lead pre-cog and has the most powerful psychic abilities of the three.
• Lois Smith as Dr. Iris Hineman. Hineman is one of the pioneers of the pre-crime program, but is currently retired.
• Kathryn Morris as Lara. Lara is Anderton's ex-wife and the mother of his missing child.

[edit] Production

The original story by Philip K. Dick was previously adapted as a potential sequel to Total Recall by writers Ronald Shusett and Gary Goldman (later joined by Robert Goethals).^[5] The setting was changed to Mars with the pre-cogs being people mutated by the Martian atmosphere, as established in the first film. The main character was also changed to Douglas Quaid, the man played by Arnold Schwarzenegger.^[5] The project eventually dissolved but the writers, who still owned the rights to the original story, rewrote the script, removing the elements from Total Recall. This script was eventually discarded when writer Jon Cohen was hired in 1997 to start the project over from the beginning.^[5]

Spielberg, Cruise, and Samantha Morton on the set of Minority Report.

In 1998, Steven Spielberg and Tom Cruise joined Minority Report and announced its production, in a joint venture of 20th Century Fox, Spielberg's DreamWorks SKG, Cruise's Cruise-Wagner Productions and Jan de Bont's production company, Blue Tulip.^[6] Production for Minority Report was delayed for several years. It was originally planned to begin filming after Cruise's Mission: Impossible II was finished,^[6] but the film ran over schedule, which also allowed screenwriter Scott Frank to rework Cohen's script.^[7] Then, after the death of Spielberg's friend Stanley Kubrick, Spielberg finished Kubrick's project A.I., postponing Minority Report,^[8] that later started its shooting on March 22, 2001.^[9] When Spielberg originally signed on to direct, he planned to have an entirely different supporting cast. He originally offered the role of Witwer to Matt Damon, Iris Hineman to Meryl Streep, Burgess to Ian McKellen and Agatha to Cate Blanchett and Jenna Elfman.^[9] However owing to the delays, all the roles other than Cruise had to be recast.

In 1999, Spielberg invited fifteen experts convened by Global Business Network and its chairman, Peter Schwartz (and the demographer and journalist Joel Garreau),^[10] to a hotel in Santa Monica, California to brainstorm and flesh out details of a possible "future reality" for the year 2054. The experts included Stewart Brand, Peter Calthorpe, Douglas Coupland, Neil Gershenfeld, biomedical researcher Shaun Jones, Jaron Lanier, and former MIT architecture dean William J. Mitchell.^[11] While the discussions did not change key elements needed for the film's action sequences, they were influential in introducing some of the more utopian aspects of the film, though John Underkoffler, the science and technology advisor for the film, described the film as "much grayer and more ambiguous" than what we envisioned in 1999.^[12]

Much of the filming took place in Washington, D.C. where the story takes place. Film locations included Georgetown and the Ronald Reagan Building.

[edit] Themes

The main theme of Minority Report is the classical philosophical question of free will vs. determinism.^[13][14] One of the main questions the film raises is whether the future is set or whether free will can alter the future.^[15] As critic C.A. Wolski commented, "At the outset, Minority Report... promises to mine some deep subject matter, to wit do we possess free will or are we predestined to our fate?"^[13] However, there is also the added question of whether the pre-cogs visions are correct.^[15] As James Berardinelli commented in his review of the film "is the Precogs' vision accurate, or has it in some way been tampered with? Perhaps Anderton isn't actually going to kill, but has been set up by a clever and knowledgeable criminal who wants him out of the way."^[15] The pre-cog Agatha also states that since Anderton knows his future, he can change it. However, the film also indicates that Anderton's knowledge of the future may actually be the factor that causes Leo Crow's death. Berardinelli describes this as the main paradox regarding free will vs. determinism in the film,^[15] "[h]ere's the biggest one of all: Is it possible that the act of accusing someone of a murder could begin a chain of events that leads to the slaying. In Anderton's situation, he runs because he is accused. The only reason he ends up in circumstances where he might be forced to kill is because he is a hunted man. Take away the accusation, and there would be no question of him committing a criminal act. The prediction drives the act – a self-fulfilling prophecy. You can see the vicious circle, and it's delicious (if a little maddening) to ponder."^[15] Most critics gave this element of the film positive reviews,^[16] with many ranking it as the main strength of the film.^[14][15][17] Other reviewers however, felt that Spielberg did not adequately deal with the issues that he raised.^[13][18] Especially problematic is the fact that in the beginning of the movie, it is established that pre-cogs do not actually predict the future, but rather what the future would have been without the pre-cogs' intervention. The conclusion of the film, however, hinges on the pre-cogs' vision being specifically the future that does result from their intervention.

Another theme touched on but not fully explored is the issue of thought crimes. The pre-crime program does not merely prevent crimes; it also takes punitive measures against prospective murderers. Thus, pre-murderers are punished not for what they actually do, but for what they would have done. The film does not discuss what judicial process the pre-murderers go through; no mention of them having recourse to a trial or other due process is made.

[edit] Style

Minority Report's unique visual style: It was overlit, and the negatives were bleach-bypassed in post-production to desaturate the colors in the film.

Minority Report is a futuristic film which portrays both elements of a dystopian and utopian future. The film renders a much more detailed view of a near-term future world than that present in the original short story, with depictions of a number of technologies related to the film's themes.

From a stylistic standpoint, Minority Report resembles A.I., its immediate Spielberg-directed predecessor.^[19] The picture was deliberately overlit, and the negative was bleach-bypassed during post-production.^[20] This gave the film a distinctive look, with colors severely desaturated, almost to the point where the film looked like a black-and-white film, yet the blacks and shadows have a high contrast, looking almost like a film noir picture.^[20] Elvis Mitchell, formerly of the The New York Times, commented that, "[t]he picture looks as if it were shot on chrome, caught on the fleeing bumper of a late 70's car."^[21]

[edit] Music

Franz Schubert's Symphony No. 8 (commonly known as the Unfinished Symphony) features prominently in the film. The score was composed and conducted by John Williams and orchestrated by John Neufeld, with vocals by Deborah Dietrich. The soundtrack takes much inspiration from Bernard Hermann's work.^[22]

[edit] Storyline differences

Further information: Differences from Minority Report short story and film

Minority Report had many adaptations in its film transition, such as the addition of Lamar Burgess and changing of the setting from New York City to Washington, D.C., Baltimore, and Northern Virginia. To fit its portrayer and the action scenes, John Anderton was turned from old, balding, and out-of-shape to an athletic officer in his 40s.^[19] The pre-cogs were turned from the retarded and deformed to descendants of drug addicts. Anderton's future murder and reasons of the conspiracy were changed from a general who wants to discredit Pre-Crime in order to get more military financing back, to a man who murdered a pre-cog's mother in order to get Pre-Crime going, and subsequent murders and plot because of this. Other aspects were updated to include current technology. For instance in the story, Anderton uses a punch card machine to interpret the pre-cogs visions; in the movie, he uses a virtual reality interface.^[23]

[edit] Reception

The film received highly positive reviews, being considered "an intelligent and visually imaginative film that ranks among Spielberg's best"^[24] and gathering high scores in review tallying websites: 92% on Rotten Tomatoes^[25] and 80 out of a possible 100 in Metacritic.^[26] Roger Ebert gave the film four stars and listed it as the best film of 2002. In his review he described it as "...a triumph--a film that works on our minds and our emotions."^[17] Some criticisms were also raised—Peter Travers of Rolling Stone magazine felt that "the script raises moral questions it doesn't probe"^[18] and Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times considered the plot "too intricate and difficult to follow."^[27] The film debuted at first place in the U.S. box office, with $35.677 million^[28] and collected $132 million in the United States and $226.3 million overseas.^[1] It was also successful in the home video market, selling at least four million copies in its first few months of release on DVD.^[2]

The film earned nominations for many awards, including Best Sound Editing in the Academy Awards and Best Visual Effects in the BAFTAs. Among the awards won were four Saturn Awards (Best Science Fiction Film, Best Direction, Best Screenplay and Supporting Actress for Samantha Morton), the BMI Film Music Award, the Online Film Critics Society for Supporting Actress and the Empire Awards for Actor, Director and British Actress.^[4]

[edit] See also

• Able Danger, a data mining program intended to predict crime.
• Inchoate offense
• Minority Report: Everybody Runs, a video game based on the movie

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Minority Report at the Internet Movie Database
• Minority Report at Allmovie
• Minority Report at Rotten Tomatoes