Review of Minority Report (2002) by Harpreet S — 14 Aug 2012

Steven Spielberg has to be the most overvalued director since Orson Welles. Spielberg's Tom Cruise starrer "Minority Report" is a neo-noir science fiction picture set in the year 2054, where the police are able to arrest "murderers" before they actually commit the crime. I do not deny Spielberg's technical achievements, there are some exceptional sequences; one involving mechanical spiders, and the other one being a Cruise and Morton's characters dodging the police, Agatha(Morton) is able to foretell the future, thus helps Anderton(Cruise) escape, who himself is a police officer. While it being entertaining for the most part, it could have been significantly better, if Spielberg had not succumbed to his usual tactics. For whatever reason, he seems to exaggerate or over-dramatize situations. The answers he gives in the end are fairly easy to decipher, having little surprise, and clearly not satisfying. I suspect he does this to appease the general public or simply does not know how to create complex and daring screenplays. (It says he was not one of the writers of the screenplay. Doesn't matter, he chose to direct the project.) I also was not too fond of the acting; having only seen Tom Cruise before in "Eyes Wide Shut," I've realized that he is not such a good actor, along with any of the other major characters, of course; generally, I don't expect a Spielberg film to show case profound acting skills. I mainly question his methods of telling a story. The futuristic world is stunning, yet artificial. "Minority Report" is nothing more than a fine thriller; however it sure could have been a great one with a different director, David Fincher maybe?

"Schindler's List" is probably the best of Spielberg I've seen so far, which I need to see again, but I suspect it isn't a great one also. "Munich" is good one, yet nothing more than satisfactory. "Jaws" and "Saving Private Ryan" are mediocre films. No different than any other "okay" pictures. I could care less about a director creating or being part of the modern Hollywood blockbuster filmmaking, I actually would argue that there are better mainstream films out there or films in general that live up to their full potential.