A perfect example of how Hollywood works...

Rating: 6/10 (14 December 2006)

Minority Report could have been THE best Steven Spielberg picture to date. The moment when Tom Cruise is incarcerated along with the endless fields of pre-crime criminals was the moment the credits should have rolled and my mouth would still be open in awe of a fabulous and expertly crafted film, even more so because it starred Tom 'so wooden a woodpecker is pecking at my wooden head' Cruise, and even MORE so because it was conducted by the co-founder of the Hollywood blockbuster and master of happy endings - Steven Spielberg.
But, alas, that is not how Hollywood works. That ending is too bleak, too ambiguous, too risky for the studios. Didn't you get the memo? Audiences don't want to feel this strange sensation in between their ears as they leave the movie theatre, it might be mistaken for a brainwave; hold the phones!! Audiences might start to think about the film long after they watch it, they might include themselves in audience participation and meet the director half way, they might like it!! Disaster!! They might start to eat less of their extortionately-priced Extra-Large-Does-Not-Satisfy-You-In-Any-Way butter-soaked popcorn!! The popcorn corporations might not reach their profit targets for this year!! THE END IS NYE!!!!!
Or that's what Hollywood wants you to think anyway, and that is the reason for the added twenty minutes of drivel, that raps everything up in a neat silk-covered package with a red- ribbon and a Hollywood studio seal-of-approval.
At that moment, before the drivel starts to seep into the nervous system, if you listen very carefully, you can hear the last ounces of Spielberg's artistic credibility cry its last high- pitched "I'm melting!" shrieks as he puts his signature on the studio contract.