Dark, complex and interesting

Rating: Null/10 (7 July 2002)

In the year 2054 the murder rate in Washington is zero because of the Pre-Crime division. Pre-Crime uses three pre-cognitives to see the near future and direct officers to arrest the murderers before they can commit the act. However during a visit by an assessing authority the pre-cognitives see chief officer John Anderton kill a man. John runs, escaping the pre-crime police and trying to find out how and why he was seen killing a man.
This contains many levels of seeing, maybe linking up with how Speilberg sees his films  at first the visions are easily controlled but then they are fallible and more complex. Anderton even changes his eyes at one point to show how his vision is changed. Aside from these metaphors the film itself is a lot more complex than Speilberg would have done several years ago. The film deals with a complex future where we are pre-judged by a big brother style police and the film does have an element of the moral questioning that this throws up. However for the majority it is a complex mystery film and this carries it no problem right up till the end.
The end (I'm not spoiling it) is where it trips up a little  the conclusion is a little too easy and the ends are too tidily tied up, showing that Speilberg perhaps isn't yet the mature director he almost is. His vision however is very good, yes, we have all the CGI we need and only occasionally does it not look good. However more than all the CGI, Speilberg mixes the present with his futuristic vision rather than having us all living in pods!
Cruise has become more mature as well. His Anderton starts out as an Ethan Hawk character  full of confidence, but later he is able to add more layers and more doubt. He is also able to act well beside some other strong performances from good actors like Max Von Sydow and a strong Colin Farrell. The rest of the cast has some famous faces like Ayre Gross, Sam Morton, Tim Blake Nelson, Stormare etc but outside of them really it's Cruise all the way.
Overall it may disappoint the Jurassic Park/Matrix audience expecting a fast, action packed thriller  the marketing makes it look like the Matrix when really it's much more like the noir of Bladerunner. The moral complexities run nicely alongside the action but eventually it falls into Speilberg sentiment mode with a disappointing end. Overall though this is very good but not quite Bladerunner.