Nearly Perfect.

Rating: 9/10 (23 June 2002)

My wife and I saw this film twice. We live in rural Appalachia and unfortunately, a lot of the people in the audience just didn't `get' this movie. I saw three couples get up and leave about half way through. One man mumbled `What a rip-off, this is boring' on the way out. Another couple plotted to break into Scooby Doo. That's more of a comment on the poor taste of rural Appalachians than of the quality of the movie. This film required thought to watch and some people just don't like to think.

MILD SPOILERS (not too many details, like a movie trailer)
My wife and I both found the move totally thrilling. It is definitely not a mindless a `Triple X' or `Mission Impossible 2' type action flick. In fact, Spielberg's film is only part action. It also contains equal measures of sci-fi, and murder mystery. Much to our delight, the film succeeded on all three fronts. So many Sci-fi pictures fail because they don't paint a believable image of the future. Spielberg creates a very plausible future universe that is *ALMOST* devoid of annoying plot holes. The holes are so minor, that I didn't even notice them until the next day. His vision of the future is one segregated by classes, where the rich live in new, completely automated luxury apartments and cruise on elevated highways far above the old city. The middle class are still living in vinyl sided or brick faced two story houses in bland suburban neighborhoods. The poor are huddled into government build apartment complexes. Advertising has run rampant. Everyone has their eyes scanned whenever they walk by a talking billboard, shop at the GAP, and even when they get on the Subway. I take it the subway sends them a bill based on their retinal scan. Personal privacy in Spielberg's future world has been compromised to a believable degree. And that in itself is kind of scary.
As far as action, there are plenty of cliff hanging, high speed chases. But the highlight was a fight on the conveyor belt or a 100% automated LEXUS plant where Cruise's character escapes by driving off in a car that ends up being built around him. That's clever! Most people were caught off guard by the resolution of the mystery, but they didn't complain. The mystery plot, like the rest of the film, was not all that far fetched, and a delight when finally revealed.
Some of the scenes are quite beautiful. Drenched in brilliant white light or grey industrial skies, every scene from start to end is pure eye candy. The female `precog', Agatha, is freaky to behold while lying in her `soup' bath (you'll understand) and even weirder when on the lamb.

There are so many GOOD things about this movie, so much attention to detail, that I can't possibly list everything that this film managed to do well. But there is one consistent fault Spielberg that he can't seem to shake--his incessant and predictable use of the `Hollywood ending.' In my opinion, it is the only thing holding Spielberg back from being a timeless director. In my opinion, the ending could have been way better. The film would have made more of an impact if it stopped twenty minutes earlier in the prison. The ending as it stands almost seems tacked on. I can't help but think that Spielberg did end the film where I thought it should end, but it didn't `test well' in group, so he re-wrote it. Perhaps a redneck or two at the screening test got up and walked out because it wasn't to their liking. Ah, well. All I can say is if the ending had been a little less predictable, I would have liked this film even more than I did. It gets a nearly perfect 9 out of 10.