Entertaining Movie with Holes

Rating: 7/10 (27 January 2019)

28 June 2002. The fuel-celled, powered cars looked something like a scene from the animated Disney movie, "Tron" and the special effects of the cars almost seemed to be the same, about 15, 20 years old. This movie while fun and engrossing doesn't really rise to the qualitative level of the visionary "Blade Runner." The overemphasis of style over substance in the beginning felt more like a director who wanted to try to show off the futuristic gadgetry except with less success than in "2001: A Space Odyssey." There are irritating lapses in believeability, where Tom Cruise overlooks the simple fact that he can be located through electronic surveillance of his retinal patterns, as a top cop he can't even physically defend himself successfully from an amateur Justice Department sleuth, that stun guns aren't used when they would be most effective, and crime fighters can even set up a trap to "surround" someone even when they know where their suspect is going to be.
Overlooking these obvious glitches, the movie moves apace with a decent plot and some interesting futuristic set designs and gadgets that were created based on real ideas about the future. The personal emotions of the characters poured through at appropriate times, though the use and manner of humor in the movie tended to diminish the seriousness and realism that a director such as Ridley Scott would have brought to the screen - here Spielberg was trying to be too cute. This movie won't win any awards except for technical and special effects and design but it will bring in the bucks for action. This movie probably raises more questions in this time of heightened terrorist fear and civil rights sensitivity than it answers.
In short, "A Minority Report" is just about picking the right sandwich and milk bottle from a refrigerator when you're blind and groping through the darkened alleys of the imagination of Phillip K. Dick, the sci fi author who penned the short story upon which this movie was based.