|
MINORITY
REPORT
7/10
USA
2002 : Steven Spielberg : 148 mins
Minority Report is essentially a pulpy, 85-minute eXistenZ story stretched out
to the 2 ½-hour length of Solaris,
Tarkovsky’s philosophical-sci-fi classic which Spielberg cheekily quotes
in his show-off final shot. Though the story combines many elements from
both the dire Vanilla Sky
and the so-so AI, Report
thankfully is much looser, more energetic and coherent than both –
not a difficult task, of course.
Massively expanding (but drastically dumbing-down) Philip K Dick’s 38-page 1955
story, Scott (Out of  Sight) Frank’s script delivers enough ‘whammo’ action set-pieces every
15 minutes or so to distract us from the various plot holes and deficiencies
of characterisation, while the outstanding production design and cinematography
mean the film is never less than striking to look at.
Only towards the end does the movie run out of steam, petering out in an increasingly
weak and increasingly Spielberg-sentimental series of multiple endings.
The result may be much closer to Mission Impossible 3 than anything
Dick might have dreamt up, but as a high-budget, high-concept slice of
multiplex-friendly Hollywood product, Minority Report does more
than enough to please a sizeable majority of viewers.
18th
June 2002
MULHOLLAND
DRIVE EXPLAINED
THE NEXT JAPANESE HORROR PHENOMENON : DARK
WATER
THE YEAR'S BEST THRILLER : READ
MY LIPS
THE YEAR'S BEST BRITISH FILM 24
HOUR PARTY PEOPLE
MINORITY
REPORT : A CLOSER LOOK
The
Spielberg-Cruise combo still counts as something of a Hollywood dream
ticket, even after the critical drubbing and disappointing box-office
reaped by A I Artificial Intelligence
and Vanilla Sky.
Minority Report at various stages so strongly recalls both those
movies that it certainly can’t be considered a drastic departure for either
director or star - but it is, thankfully, a decided improvement. There
are some really stunning things here, more than enough to make up for
the various problems of pacing and plotting that start to become noticeable
around the half-way mark.
Only
the basic elements of Philip K Dick’s original short story have been retained
in Scott (Out of Sight) Frank’s script: in the year 2054, murder
in Washington DC has been almost entirely wiped out thanks to an experimental
programme known as Precrime. The system interprets the dreams of three
‘precogs’ – mutants capable of seeing future murders – and arrests the
‘perpetrators’ before they can carry out their killings. Cruise is John
Anderton, a high-ranking Precrime cop forced to go on the run when the
precogs identify him as a future killer.
The
first hour is a knock-out – we’re transported into a coherent vision of
a cool, glassy, blue-grey-tinged future, then barrelled along on a slam-bang
series of action pieces that match anything in Cruise’s Mission Impossible
movies. The production design is outstanding from top to bottom, with
an array of technological gizmos and gadgets ranging from the amusingly
gross (the cops’ ‘sick stick’ that incapacitates felons by making them
projectile-vomit) to the delightfully elegant (snooping electronic ‘spiders’
that work in teams and can sneak under doors). The overall look of the
movie isn’t entirely original, however – the sleek, cool lines and sharp
retro tailoring are straight from Gattaca, while the scuzzier aspects
of this future Washington firmly adhere to standard Blade Runner conventions,
with a few Paul Verhoevenish touches and nods to eXistenZ.
eXistenZ, however, ran less than 90 minutes – Minority Report
is almost an hour longer, and still manages to give Samantha
Morton (as the most gifted precog) very little to do. The action sequences
keep things going but, dazzling as they are, they can’t match the understated,
perfectly judged (and subtly FX-enhanced) scene when the fugitive Anderton
visits the inventor of Precrime (forties noir veteran Lois Smith) in her
plant-lab conservatory. But there’s also much extraneous stuff that just
gets in the way, and you don’t need any precog talent to spot some of
the twists a long time before they happen.
It’s
almost impossible to make this kind of propulsive sci-fi thriller material
stretch even to two hours, and Spielberg doesn’t do himself any favours
by indulging in the same home-stretch sentimentality that afflicted A
I at the exact same stage. Ultimately Minority Report feels
like a very big song-and-dance about not very much – but there’s easily
enough here to make the ride worthwhile.
14th
June, 2002
For the pre
cog version of this review click here
by Neil
Young
-
|
