Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #8057 in DVD
• Released on: 2004-05-03
• Rating: Suitable for 12 years and over
• Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
• Number of discs: 2
• Formats: Box set, PAL, Widescreen
• Original language: English, French
• Subtitled in: Danish, Finnish, Icelandic, Norwegian
• Number of discs: 2
• Running time: 142 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
Full of flawed characters and shot in grainy de-saturated colours, Steven Spielberg's Minority Report is futuristic film noir with a far-fetched B-movie plot that's so feverishly presented the audience never gets a chance to ponder its many improbabilities. Based on a short story by Philip K Dick, Minority Report is set in the Orwellian near-future of 2054, where a trio of genetically modified "pre-cogs" warn of murders before they happen. In a sci-fi twist on the classic Hitchcockian wrong man scenario, Detective John Anderton (Tom Cruise) is the zealous precrime cop who is himself revealed as a future-killer. Plot twists and red herrings drive the action forward and complications abound, not least Anderton's crippling emotional state, his drug habit, his avuncular-yet-sinister boss (Max Von Sydow), and the ambitious FBI agent Witwer (Colin Farrell) snapping at his heels.

Though the film toys with the notion of free will in a deterministic universe, this is not so much a movie of grand ideas as forward-looking ones. Its depiction of a near-future filled with personalised advertising and intrusive security devices that relentlessly violate the right of anonymity is disturbingly believable. Ultimately, though, it's a chase movie and the innovative set-piece sequences reveal Spielberg's flair for staging action. As with A.I. before it, there's a nagging feeling that the all-too-neat resolution is a Spielbergian touch too far: the movie could satisfactorily have ended several minutes earlier. Though this is superior SF from one of Hollywood's greatest craftsmen, it would have been more in the spirit of Philip K Dick to leave a few tantalisingly untidy plot threads dangling.

On the DVD: Minority Report on disc brings up Janusz Kaminski's wonderfully subdued cinematography in an ideal anamorphic widescreen print. John Williams's Bernard Herrmann-esque score is the major beneficiary of Dolby Digital 5.1 and DTS sound options. There is no commentary, and the movie plus everything on the second disc, which contains five short featurettes and an archive of text and visual material, could probably have been squeezed onto just one disc. The featurettes are: "From Story to Screen", "Deconstructing Minority Report", "The Stunts of Minority Report", "ILM and Minority Report" and "Final Report: Steven Spielberg and Tom Cruise". There are subtitles in English and Scandinavian languages. --Mark Walker

DVD Description
DVD Special Features (To Be Confirmed):

Minority Report: From Story to Screen
Deconstructing Minority Report
The Stunts of Minority Report
ILM and Minority Report: Visual effects
Final Report: Conversation with Spielberg and Cruise
Minority Report Archives: A virtual Gallery
Sound: 5.1 DTS
Aspect Ratio: 16x9 and 2.40:1 Letterbox

Synopsis
The science-fiction thriller MINORITY REPORT, directed by Steven Spielberg and starring Tom Cruise, is based on a short story by renowned writer Philip K. Dick. In the year 2054, in Washington, D.C., murder has been eliminated thanks to Precrime, a program that uses the visions of three psychics, called Precogs (an abbreviation for precognitive thinkers), to arrest and imprison would-be murderers before they have a chance to kill. Tom Cruise plays John Anderton, a Precrime enforcer who believes in the system for his own personal reasons--years back his young son was abducted, and he has dealt with the loss by becoming a high-strung Precrime officer. The director of Precrime (Max von Sydow) is eager to take the program national, and feels threatened by an ambitious federal agent (Colin Farrell) who is bent on finding a flaw in the system. When Anderton finds himself accused of the future murder of a man he's never met, his faith in Precrime is instantly shaken. He goes on the run, and is trailed by the relentless Precrime police. In the tradition of BLADE RUNNER (also based on a Dick story), MINORITY REPORT is a dark, brooding vision of the future. Spielberg expertly mixes thrilling chase and suspense sequences (the best of which involves Anderton being pursued by eye-scanning mechanical spiders) and stunning special effects with a challenging look at society's willingness to sacrifice privacy and the notion of free will for convenience and security. MINORITY REPORT is a thought-provoking and exciting film that ranks with Spielberg's best.

Customer Reviews

Not bad really
I'm not a Tom Cruise fan, I need to say that from the start.

I look at his films with a degree of trepidation. This one, however, isn't bad at all.

Cruise plays John Anderton, a drug using pre-crimes cop who is forced to go on the run after the pre-cogs show that he will commit the premeditated murder of a man he doesn't know. The film follows Andertons attempts to discover who the man is and why he's going to kill him. Once he has discovered who and why, he has to decide what to do next.

Yes, it raises the obvious question over free will, there is always a point in crime when you make the decision to continue or to stop. Which reminds me of the UK Government's intention to look for the "evil" gene so it that criminals can be institutionalised before they commit crimes. Such preemption can only cause problems, no matter the reasoning behind it, it assumes that all people will act to type, that children born into a family of criminals will become criminals, that children of murderers will murder, and so on. Free will isn't just the right of the politicians or the rich, it is a basic right of all. This film touches on that.

Overall, it was an interesting film about an interesting idea.

One of the best Spielberg films
If you've read the other reviews which are quite critical towards this film, and seem perturbed, don't. It's a highly underated movie and should have been a box ofice hit. Maybe the real reason some people don't rate it highly is because Tom Cruise is in it, aka Vanilla Sky, or because people have such greater expectations for a Spielberg film than any other it causes them to lose focus on the real qualities of a film.

The plot, effects, and acting are all top notch, and I must praise Spielerg for realism. It's one of those movies that doesn't leave you there thinking about how well the actors are acting, or how well the effects have been done, or why has the storyline been done like this etc. You'll be sitting there watching the movie and have the upmost interest in what happens.

The length of the movie is just about perfect. If you're one of those people who thinks a good movie should be a long one, such as 'The Deer Hunter', or 'The Godfather', then you'll appreciate the length of Minority Report. It got to a point about half-way through the movie where it was threatening to end, and did so several times there onwards, but Steve didn't fail us, I was enjoying the movie so much I was only happy to see the movie carry on a little extra than expected.

Overall a great movie, possibly in the top 10 movies i've ever seen.

Get. The. DVD.

Watch without prejudice
Spielburg is certainly a sentimentalist, and not the most obvious choice of director to transfer Philip K. Dick's noirish paranoia and incisive irony to the big screen. But sorry, folks - it works! This is his best film since Jaws - a tremendous thriller (and if you Dick fans out there refuse to believe that your idol wrote thrillers, read Now Wait For Last Year again - it ought to be a movie, too, and I for one would cheer if Spielburg were to direct it. Those of you who believe there is no overarching morality in Dick's novels are also deeply mistaken: Dick's socialist conscience is apparent in everything he writes). Constant quirky explorations of the limits of human perception make this film the most disconcerting and funny of Spielburg's career, and he comes much closer to the spirit of Kubrick in it than he did in AI. Flaws? All right, I'd have prefered a darker ending - but the family coda is beautifully handled, and the darker implications are never sacrificed entirely to it. I can imagine a much, much worse handling that the Spielburg of ten years ago might have considered. Don't be put off by the Spielburg haters: this isn't ET or Saving Private Ryan - it's an intellegent film by a talented director at the height of his powers.