the film was convoluted, underused it's actors and was way too long

Rating: 5/10 (30 August 2003)

This may contain spoilers of the plot, so be aware if you continue to read:
Minority Report was a film that after seeing the trailers, I already knew it would not meet my expectations. Unfortunately, I decided to give it a shot after discovering that my brother had it on DVD (it was free, why not?). I had heard so much positive feedback from others who had seen it, that I figured it would at least be worth my time.
Sadly to say, that was not so. I found the plot extraordinarily convoluted (even for a sci-fi film), felt that character's roles were underdeveloped, and given the fact that I felt it had already reached it's climax at 2 hours into the film doesn't speak very well for the remaining 30 minutes that followed. These are just some of the items I will focus on below.
For starters, one piece of advise to Spielberg: you have achieved your goal of making some of the finest and most profitable films in history. Don't let that clout go to your head anymore and insist on making garbage like this. If you are going to film more movies where you lay down the law for the characters like (spoiler) "do not take the bandages off for twelve hours or you will go blind", then make sure you follow through and make them blind for doing so. He still had 5-6 hours to go, didn't he? Well then, why didn't he go blind? And likewise, (spoiler #2) why did the pre-cog at Cruise's house near the end freak out for him to run, even though in the very end, he is free and acquitted of the murders? If she really could see the future as far as their son was concerned (at the house), then wouldn't that mean that she could see Cruise's future too and know that all would work out ok? Oh yeah, that's because they still had no clue how to end the movie until they were at it's doorstep. That just to let you know, means that they were inconsistent with the plot-line. Very convoluted. Bad move.
But that's just one example. There were many other parts that were in violation of the trust the film-goer gives the filmmaker in order to enjoy the set-up. Too bad there's not enough here for those other examples.
Then there was the performances. I'll just focus on Colin Ferrel's. Nice and all, but hey, all of a sudden (spoiler #3) we're killing him off near the end after barely having any screen time in the movie. Why? I guess to make the bad guy look even more bad. I personally didn't catch any real motivation from the bad guy in the movie, so if there is anyone else that did, please remember and tell me if I ever bump into you on the street. Good thing for him, he didn't need this role to show he's a great actor. Thank goodness! (PS, I used to have enough trust in Spielberg that if I saw something like a (spoiler #4) bloodpack under an actor's shirt after being shot, then that meant that he wanted us to know that the character really wasn't dying, only that he was maybe fooling the person that shot him making him think that he died. But then he did die. Made me very confused. I guess the days of Spielberg being very careful about his filmmaking techniques are over.)
As far as the length goes, holy crap, I was so ready for it to be over after Cruise realized he was set up, that the remaining half-hour dragged on so slow, I kept asking my wife "Is it over yet? Why isn't it over yet?" It wasn't just the end though, Act II pretty much dragged. Why did we have to know (spoiler #5) the exact situation and wherabouts of everybody in the building when the spiders where eye-scanning people? The shot showing us all of that was way too long and could have been completely cut short. I remember being told that if there is something that doesn't help tell the story then it should be cut out of the film. A shot that's close to two-minutes long telling us how the spiders crawl in and get scans of people's eyes needs to be shortened extremely. There were likewise other examples where scenes could have been cut-short, but once again, you get the idea.
So all in all, I was very disappointed with the movie. I don't think I'll be paying any money to see any more of Spielberg's movies until he can throw away all the garbage that got him to where he is now and go back to his roots. Let's focus on some good reality-based storytelling. That's what I used to like him for.