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Minority Report (Full Screen Edition)

Minority Report (Full Screen Edition)

List Price: $14.99
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Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Brilliant,epic,speilberg's best..........
Review: This is one of his best works,a top notch sci-fi in the highest order.Tom cruise (not a big fan of his but..) he gives an efective an beleivable performance,you feel his pain.this movie will keep you riveted till the end,a stunning work.go see it ,you'll not be disapointed

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Absolutely Great
Review: What makes Minority Report so great? Is it Cruises 'man on the run' acting? Spielberg's top notch directing? The 'well that could happen...' factor? It's all of these rolled into an enjoyable summer movie package. Not only does it look phenominal, but it provides an extremely great mix of action and food for thought. Some of the comedy seemed a bit silly, the eyeballs..., but it's very easy to overlook them. I must admit it was pushing the PG-13 rating and had a lot of squeemish thrills. Not a great summer movie, a great movie period.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Great Movie
Review: Personally, I am not the biggest fan of Spielberg movies. But this one really made a favorable impression on me. The futuristic plot and very cool gadgets make this movie worth you're while.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: A Fine Outing
Review: Just what if a foolproof prerecognition system was in place where you could predict who would commit a violent crime before it happened? This is 2054, and for the past five years, pre-recognition has been test sampled in Washington D.C. There are three young people who have proved their prophecies are 100% correct among the three of them. These predictions are flashed upon screens (in a most scientific manner), a wooden ball drops down a chute with the perpetrator's name on it and another with the name of the victim. The chief of detectives (Tom Cruise) analyzes these scenes (I thought he was conducting an orchestra!) until he has enough information and then using spectacular transportation machines, gets to the crime scene in time to preempt the crime. The perpetrator is "haloed" and put in some state of suspended animation under guard. There has not been a murder in D.C. for five years. Congress is ready to submit a bill to a national referendum to use this method nationwide.

The movie opens with a confident, ever-so competent Cruise reporting for duty through the labyrinth of a futuristic paranoia-inducing building. He quickly gets to work before we are quite aware of what he is doing. We get a sample of the how and the wherefore of a "precog" arrest. A wife and her lover are spared being brutally murdered by the enraged husband. End of task. The action is loud, quick and overwhelming. The scenes are shot in the harshest light or in grays and blacks.

Then to the crux of the matter. What if there is a mistake? A detective (Colin Farrell) by order of the Attorney General's office has orders to investigate the whole procedure. He comes on like a bad guy to high-minded Cruise and mentor Max van Sydow. But isn't he right? How can a person be convicted of a crime he didn't commit? Cruise himself is falsely accused, and the chase begins a la "Fugitive." At one point, he kidnaps one of the "precogs," powerfully and touchingly played by Samantha Morton, to help him prove his innocence.

"Minority Report" is a long movie (2 hours 20 minutes), but it didn't seem overly long to me. I was thoroughly engaged trying to keep up with the non-stop action and changing scenes. It definitely is a Spielberg movie; who else would have you chase your own eyeballs? I liked the moral questions that were part of the warp and weave of the movie. The special effects were not overdone and seemed realistic for a movie set 50 years in the future. Overall, "Minority Report" is about the best I have seen this year.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Brilliant, still darker than Blade Runner
Review: "Minority Report" and "Blade Runner" provide important contrasts.

Beginning again with AI, Steven Spielberg has become fixed on dark subjects. The difficulty with the telling of this story is similar to that with the second film in the "Raiders" series. The part where our hero needs to have his eyes replaced is so grotesque that, for me at least, it overwhelms the cathartic ending. "Blade Runner," while dark, would have admitted a less intimidating treatment of the problem. In spite of all of the other elegant, wonderful, facinating and thought provoking elements in this film, I am hesitant to see the film a second time because of this one part.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Bad Cinema
Review: This abysmal series of images lacks any coherent story, refuses to invoke sympathy for its characters, and is just generally boring. And why, oh why, has Spielberg decided that endings should make absolutely no sense, achieve nothing but the most shallow of resolutions, and feel completely tacked on? If you liked "AI," you'll hate this puerile long episode of "Outer Limits." If you liked "The Matrix," the slow camera work and uninventive fight and chase scenes will put you to sleep. Maybe Spielberg hasn't lost it for good, but he certainly seems to have misplaced it.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Find the Minority Report
Review: If you let a ball roll along a table top it will, without question, roll off the edge of the table and hit the floor. That is, unless, you intervene, and catch the ball before it hits the floor.

That is the way John Anderton (Tom Cruise) views the Pre-Crime world of 2054 Washington D.C. This futuristic setting has found a way to bring to fruition the end of murder altogether. Anderton is a member of an elite police force known as the Pre-Crime Unit, and they are on the verge of expanding their successful experiment to the rest of the nation. Washington D.C. has been the testing ground, and the unit has managed to reduce the murder rate to zero.

How is this accomplished? Three young and gifted persons with the ability to see certain events in the future (Pre-Cogs) are kept in careful containment within the innermost sanctum of Pre-Crime, and when one (or all) of them foresee a murder, it is recorded, played back, and the police search for clues so that they can stop it from taking place. The "murderers" are grabbed before they can kill their "victim", and are placed in a holding chamber that I found quite chilling. As the Pre-Cog / Pre-Crime success rate has been 100% thus far, Anderton is as faithful a believer in the system as anyone possibly could be.

Until one of the Pre-Cogs sees a murder commited by *him*.

That is when "Minority Report" kicks into hyper-gear and Anderton is on the run. We are given a whirlwind tour of 2054 Washington D.C. - a jarring hybrid of futuristic cityscapes and more modern, down to earth, cozy settings. There are also pop-up ads galore, as advertising in the future apparently knows exactly who you are, where you are, and what you like to buy. This all makes for an interesting, if somewhat amusing side-diversion from the main gist of the story.

Anderton is told to "find the Minority Report" in order to clear his name. As there are three Pre-Cogs, they may not always agree. If, for example, only two of them agree on future events, then the third's "differing" vision is what is known as the Minority Report. But that report is often hidden away fairly quickly. So Anderton needs to find it in order to clear himself. Or does it even exist?

I liked this movie, for the most part. There is more action (and blood) than I was expecting, but its core ideas give you pause for thought. Is it fair to incarcerate someone for something they were *going* to do? Was that their only, pre-determined future? Or are there other possibilities? Can we make a different choice? All are fascinating questions to me, and I enjoyed watching a movie that raised all those issues. There is, however, a major hole in the story's crucial plot point, which I found totally unforgivable. I won't give it away here. You'll have to decide for yourself if you agree.

Returning to Anderton's Pre-Crime view of a world where the ball rolls along the table until it will invariably roll off the edge and hit the floor unless it is stopped, I am given to think: Doesn't that mean that there are then TWO possible futures, at least? A ball rolling along the table (a person on a path to commiting murder) doesn't, in any way, predict that the ball will actually roll off the edge (the person will commit the murder). There are many different variables that could come in to play, many possible futures to choose from. And a ball is a far cry from a living, breathing, thinking human being - another mark against Anderton's analogy. So is it therefore right to forever lock-up a pre-murderer?

Stuff to ponder....

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Utter wowness
Review: Spielberg, ever the filmmaker to elicit responses of profound negativity or unabashed glee depending on which side of the artsy line you stood on, has shown why is the master of entertainment cinema. This movie shows Spielberg in higher than high form, his chops as a filmmaker have not dwindled and it just goes to show all the pretenders out there really don't match up. Of course some of the credit must go to cinematographer wonderboy Janusz Kaminski whose eloquence with images is awe-inspiring to say the least, and the rest of the production team, editor Michael Kahn, Art Director Alex McDowell, all of them do marvelous work here. But Spielberg fingerprints are all over this thing. From the vision of the future that seems weirdly possible, to his affinity for children and their effect on parents, and lets not forget the action sequences that he still does better than anyone. All this said, there is something afoot in this movie, mainly a streak of darkness and pervasiveness not present in most Spielberg. Witness Tom Cruises quasi-surgery and you'll be squirming and writhing more than you thought you would. On the acting side, Tom Cruise gives a wonderful performance and you really start to forget its Tom Cruise, which I never thought I would do in his films. Samantha Morton is wonderful and memorable as the Pre-Cog Agatha, she has an ethereal presence thats kind of hard to explain. The supporting actors are all excellent too, especially Colin Farrell who really gets to show why he was labeled a big up-and-comer. On the action side, you won't be bored, the action scenes are pure Spielberg, wonderfully edited, infinitely cool, and never over-the-top which seems to plaque quite a bit of Hollywood these days. Scott Frank's screenplay is rife with lines of wit and coolness, although a few cliches pop up here and there, but its hardly something to get worked up about. On the ending side, which pisses me off so much. It seems everyone wants a twist ending where everything doesn't work out, or everything falls apart and the main character dies or his family gets killed. It's like everything must end badly or its somehow illegitimate and fantasy and therefore disposable. I blame David Fincher, whose Seven and Fight Club have basically jaded moviegoers so much that anything other than a morbid twist makes a movie worthless. I love Fincher but he tainted everything. A little ramble, sorry. Anyway, this movie wraps up in a happy way, but its no cop-out, it makes sense with the screenplay and it keeps with the tone of the movie, so I don't find it sugary or cheesy. And my last point, this movie is like some horrible nightmare that is inescapable and really hits a cord, and the eerie parallels between the movie and today are basically liberal wet-dreams, but its still interesting to note. Anyway, get off your sweaty behind and drive to the theatre and plop down again and absorb the wonderous movie world of twists, deception, and consumerism that is Minority Report.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Wait just a minute, NOT that good
Review: Let me just start by saying that I love sci-fi. However, this movie missed the mark.

Here are my complaints:
1. The colors in the movie were all dull and muted. The cinematography was not that great.
2. Many of the scenes were OVER acted, too melodramatic.
3. Typical Spielberg: he loves to try to manipulate the audiences' emotions. This is detrimental to the movie I think. It just annoys me when I feel the director trying to be manipulative with over acting and melodramatic music.(Look for the scene where all three actors have tears in their eyes at the same time.)
4. The science fiction premise of the "pre-cogs" sleeping in the milky pool was kind of corny.
5. The movie dragged on because it had a complicated plot that made it boring. (the movie was entirely plot driven, with a few funny "one liners" thrown in for comedic measure.)
6. It had hardly any character development.

Here is what I liked:
1. I liked the concept cars and the vertical streets that went up the sides of buildings.
2. Hmm. I guess that's it.

Definitely not intersting enough to watch a second time. This movie is a "renter".

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Net effect: Minority Report ends up mostly minor.
Review: Read the short story first. It won't give anything away in the movie as they diverge after the starting premise. It is only 30 pages and it does explain the concept of a minority report. Basically, it's a longstanding computer principle that to check data processed by a computer is accurate, run it through 3 identical machines. Two computers are unlikely to be identically incorrect as based on statistical analysis; concurrence of 2 out of 3 is accurate, forming a majority report. The minority report tends to be a minor variant on the majority. This fact turns out to not be so significant in the movie as the short story but at least I hope that the term makes more sense now.

Where the film really shines is how they expand on the book. The film starts with a dramatic demonstration of how the future visions of murder are combined with regular computer databases, clues from the visions such as names, faces and surroundings are used to intercept the crime. The visual representation of how the recordings of future are used to find clues to prevent the crime is brilliant. The following race against time is action packed and very dramatic. The next major act is the scene of Cruise's mounting horror as the next future murder scene he examines shows that he commits it is visually presented and musically scored to perfection. The following run from Pre-Crime headquarters and fighting his way through his former teammates and federal agents is great action. The next hour is very good. Less action but more cerebral. The spiders were fantastic, I wish there was more seen of them. A classic theme of the author (Philip K. Dick), the spiders are technology that is methodical, determined and ultimately fundamentally stupid where it counts. Technology rarely makes the world a better place in PKD's universe. Often it makes it worse.

Unfortunately it's long been obvious by now who is meant to decoy our attention and who is really behind the conspiracy. Also, the reason Cruise will want to murder his future victim is obvious from the moment we see him unlike in the original story. None of this is fatal to the film but it would have been much nicer if this wasn't the case. Still, so far so good. There are some good humourous moments as well but not the sort which overshadow the fact that this is an essentially serious film. For a man who made Ray-Bans famous in Top Gun, there is a very funny scene involving a corridor and some items also involving vision.

The last 22 minutes are just awful. It is so bad that all the good work of the film that went beforehand is completely ruined. After a grotesquely sentimental soliloquy by Agatha about Cruise's son that is just hideous, the run that Cruise has been so dynamically been on is brought to a totally anticlimactic halt. Having needlessly boxed themselves into a corner, they have to use a slip by the villain that is really stupid to kickstart things again. The villain has been revealed in a scene a little earlier (though if you hadn't worked it out by now, you'd have to really have not been paying attention) in a scene stolen shot for shot from L.A Confidential. They then end the film where the villain is literally unmasked with a scene you wish had been stolen shot for shot from The Fugitive as at least it would have been better than the third rate copy of the end of the Fugitive it actually was. Then, to kick over whatever rubble is left standing, instead of ending it at that point, they add an epilogue that kills off what's left. Having danced around the point of the original story and implying that they understood what the original was about, which is "does an individual sacrifice himself for the greater good, for a system proven to prevent murder in its entirety" the epilogue shows the film makers actually missed it entirely.
Also, the movie was riddled with errors. Retinal scanners use the unique positions of blood vessels in people's eyes. Without circulation, they are invisible. Also, within a couple of hours, the corneas would go opaque, also making the retina not viewable. A point clearly lost in the script.

How to make this a better film simply by cutting footage.

First 55 minutes:
Cut the scene where Cruise watches his home movies. We get the point from conversations and scenes before and after, as well as the flashback. Slows things down, needlessly labours the point.

Next 60 minutes:
Cut the scene where Farrell talks to Cruise's wife. Slows pace, doesn't add anything.

Last 22 minutes:
Cut the phone call Cruise's wife makes to Max von Sydow (for continuity).
Cut absolutely everything from when it suddenly dawns on Cruise why he's been set up and he walks back to the house to the start of the scene which has the speaker at the podium talking about the history of the civil war pistol. This eliminates the really anticlimactic end to Cruise's run, the corner they've boxed themselves into as a result and the really stupid way that they get out of it. Also, the really horrible dialogue by Agatha in there will be gone! It will seem to jump a bit but believe me, it's better. Then chop off the entire epilogue, ending the movie with the aerial receding shot on the roof. This 'version' of mine with no new scenes added and a lot of stuff jettisoned would be a lot better paced and worth 3/5 to me.

Cameos: Cameron Crowe reading newspaper, Cameron Diaz behind him and to viewer's right. Hotel clerk Cruise's cousin.

In summary, I would actually recommend seeing this film. When it's good, it's very good and that's most of the first 2 hours. Unfortunately when it's bad, it's just awful. Use the edits I suggested in your head when watching it.


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