Minority Report

[innerSpaceman]

Where did they establish the range of the precogs in Minority Report???

They established their "jurisdiction," not their range. In fact, the system was all set to go national. Um, but there were no more precogs. Seems the 3 would have to expand their range considerably.


And, of course, I think it makes perfect sense that the precogs have such a psychic connection with their own mother that you couldn't murder her on Mars without them knowing about it.





(And of course, if something bugs you, it just does. I can certainly see how it seems off kilter in WotW for the ending to be quite so sappy, and slightly less but still off kilter in MR for things to wrap up so neatly. It's the connection to the general and specific source material that make those elements work for me in both those movies. But I'll admit, that kind of thing should not be necessary .... audiences should not have to be aware of source material or genres.)

[Alex]

Originally Posted by innerSpaceman

They established their "jurisdiction," not their range. In fact, the system was all set to go national. Um, but there were no more precogs. Seems the 3 would have to expand their range considerably.

Like I said, I would have to rewatch the movie to rebuild my case against the ending. But it was established that somehow the crimes detected (or maybe just the crimes reported) were filtered to just the test area. So even if it technically would have been known of outside the area, if no alarm goes off, it still doesn't matter.

But, that's the best I can do at a several year remove from seeing it. All I know is that was the general of it, that I explained to quite a few people at the time, all of whom said something "yeah, that makes sense." I also recall that I generally had a lot of problems with the nature and weirdly arbitrary nature in which the crimes were detected and reported but that gets more into the "general difficulties of time travel" issues and I ignored them more easily as a movie creating its own rules. I'm fine with that, I just remember thinking that the logic of needing the complex cover-up didn't make sense even within the framework of the arbitrary rules the movie had established.

I'd consider watching it again to better hold up my end of the discussion but by the time I got my hands on it and was prepared I'm sure this thread will be well dead.

[Pirate Bill]

I liked Minority Report. I only saw it once though and don't recall catching any plot holes. I enjoyed the action, the acting, the plot, the scifi-ness. Now you've all got me wanting to watch it again, but my Netflix queue is so full of things I haven't watched yet... ah, I'll add it anyway but not at the top.

I'm not a big fan of Tom Cruise, the man. But Tom Cruise the actor is awesome. No man crush (I'm saving that for Nathan Fillion). I like every movie I've seen him in, and in a large part because of him.

I loved AI, but probably because I was so hooked on the internet game that preceded the movie. That game had a great story that really sucked me in. So when the movie came out I was already engrossed in the AI universe. I just watched it again a few weeks ago and still really like the movie.

[Alex]

Where the hell did that cake come from?

[innerSpaceman]

I'll really have to give AI another shot. But I cringe even just thinking of watching it.

Perhaps I should have a weekend of the films I've supposed to give another shot to.



If I hadn't done that for Minority Report, I would still not like it. And truly I can see the logic in Alex's dislike for the ending. Logically, it seems that it would be easier to hide the murder from the precogs. But I think the key here is that it's the murder of a precog's mom ... and that's just going to be real difficult to hide. That's why I give it a pass, but individual mileage may always vary.

[Cadaverous Pallor]

When the son showed up at the end of WotW I actually uttered an "oof" as if someone had punched me in the stomach. Even though it was totally expected, I was hoping against hope that the kid would die. I mean, come on, he ran into a hoary battlefield unarmed "to help out", right? Ridiculous. Even if you want to root for him, his actions were retarded, so I was rooting for his death.

The rest of that film was rather good, I thought. I know I'll get riddled for this but I LOVED the 9/11 imagery. I fully believe that scary movies should reflect the fears of society. What's more scary these days (and especially back then) than a crashed plane, ashy remains, etc? Part of the point of the movie is to scare you, and it did it's job.

[Alex]

Did it win any sound related Oscars? Several years on the noise the aliens made still rings in my mind, even as many of the details have faded from memory.

[mousepod]

I didn't have any problem with the way the murder was committed in Minority Report. Had he taken the woman out of the precogs jurisdiction, he would have had to deal with a potential murder investigation. By doing it the way he did, there's no trial, therefore no investigation. Plus, his hubris would have led him to believe that he could easily fake a system that he basically controlled and created.

The only thing that troubled me plot-wise about the flick was the way Anderton's character gets into the "Temple" again and again. Initially, he makes a point of telling Witwer that no officer ever goes into the Temple because "We keep a strict separation so that no one can accuse us of tampering." Moments later, Anderton's iris scan gets him right in.
Then later in the movie, once Anderton being pursued as a pre-murderer, his irises still work to open the door. In such a high-tech world, you'd think they'd do a better job of protecting their only pre-cogs.

[mousepod]

I also wondered how they were planning on creating more pre-cogs once these three became ineffective (i.e. died).

[Gn2Dlnd]

I should probably watch Minority Report. It seems to me that I did, but remember nothing of it except a really cool magnetic "highway in the sky," or I'm confusing it with something else, or I saw an extended trailer. Oh and Tom Cruise manipulating an holographic computer screen. Maybe I did see it.