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Janet Dokouzian
Professor Reider
English 102
September 13, 2014
Minority Report
In the future murder will be abolished, victims spared untimely deaths and perpetrators
quickly and ably apprehended and funneled away for a life sentence of immobility. With the help
of three mutant beings called pre-cogs who can predict the future, and a Pre-crime department;
complete with a judge and prosecutor, it is reality in Steven Spielberg’s Sci-Fi thriller about what
life might be like in 2054. Minority Report delves into the consequences of having a law
enforcement system that has too much power and puts all its faith in the premonitions of the precogs.
Minority Report is a 2002 science fiction thriller directed by Steven Spielberg. It is
loosely based on a short story written by Philip Dick. Dick was a California based science fiction
writer, who wrote “thirty-six speed fueled novels” beginning in the 1950’s. His books have
become prime inspiration for numerous movies including “Total Recall”, “A Scanner Darkly”,
and most memorable Ridley Scotts “Blade Runner” (Gopnik par 3).
Minority Report stars Tom Cruise as Chief John Anderton, the head of the pre-crime
department, whose job it is to arrest murderers before they commit the crime. The movie takes
place in the future, the year 2054. Thanks to a squad of law enforcing cops and three remarkable
beings called “Pre-Cogs” the crime of premeditated murder has been virtually eliminated. The
Pre-Cogs (Agatha, Dashiell, and Arthur) have the ability to predict a murder before it occurs,
giving the police a couple of days to apprehend the suspects and prevent the crime. Once the
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perpetrators are caught they are fit with a “halo” that renders them immobile, and they are sent
away to be imprisoned with the other offenders.
The “halos” are just one of the many religious references in this film. Halos are usually
symbolic of something heavenly and innocent, reserved for angels and saints. In this case they
are worn by the guilty, perhaps suggesting their innocence. Prisoners are put into a kind of
suspended animation, sent to a dark “hell like” place that is run by a warden named Gideon, a
character from the Bible. The place where the pre-cogs are kept is called the “temple” and the
officers are referred to as priests.
An important theme of the movie is free will verses determination. If all actions are
determined by the natural laws of the universe and God it would mean man is not free to choose
his destiny. Our ability to make choices and change our minds is what makes the difference in
the outcome of any situation. Many people believe that God has already predetermined
everyone’s destiny. Yet He has given man free will to make our own choices.
Six years earlier John Anderton lost his six year son Sean when he was abducted at a
public swimming while under his care. John believes if pre-crime had been in place when his son
was seized and likely murdered, that the event could have been prevented. Pre-crime prevents
murder by predicting it before it happens. If pre-crime had been in place at the time of the boy’s
abduction it would have been predicted by the pre-cogs. The suspect would have been arrested
before the crime occurred saving the boy’s life.
John Anderton is pre-crimes biggest advocate until a twist of fate leaves him doubting
the system. A prediction is made by the pre-cogs that John is about to murder someone. A man
named Leo Crow whom he doesn’t even know. He is the first to see the prediction of the precogs as a red ball with his name and another with the name of the victim emerge from the
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computer. He flees, vowing to prove his innocence by changing the outcome. Anderton takes the
pre-cog Agatha with him when he escapes. Agatha is the most gifted of all three pre-cogs. If
Agatha’s prediction differs from the other two pre-cogs a minority report is generated. This casts
doubt on the validity of the prediction.
Predicting a crime before it occurs does not take into account that people can exercise
free will in a situation. Who knows if they might have had a change of heart at the last minute
and not committed the crime? A prediction is a prophecy or a forecasting. The meaning of these
words leaves room for the possibility of the event not actually happening. Weather forecasts
don’t always play out as they do on the news. Prophecies don’t always come true. So the system
of pre-crime is not flawless. In the past when minority reports appeared they have been
immediately destroyed to avoid shadowing doubt on the justice system. “Who wants a justice
system that instills doubt? It may be reasonable but it’s still doubt” (The Minority Report 2002)
John Anderton goes on a quest to find his minority report. When he discovers there is no report
he goes on a quest to change the future.
Pre-crime is a form of racial profiling, which is defined as “The consideration of race,
ethnicity, or national origin by an officer of the law in deciding when and how to intervene in an
enforcement capacity (“Racial Profiling"). People are convicted on the prediction of the pre-cogs
who determine who will commit a crime and who the victim will be. The perpetrator is arrested
and put away before they have a chance to act. So would the crime really have been committed?
Or could the perpetrator stop at the last minute or avoid the situation entirely, leading to a
different scenario The department of pre-crime believes it can change the outcome of a situation
by stopping a murder before it happens, yet the perpetrators are not given the opportunity to stop
themselves before they commit the crime.
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This film deals with free will verses determination, whether or not you could change the
course of the future if you knew in advance what the future would be. This film looks at how
media in the future has virtually no limits, how you walk into a department store and your eyes
are scanned by a computer. The computer greets you by name and talks about the last item you
purchased there. Today computers do something very similar, they track our buying and
spending habits. They track what we have looked at on the web. With the information they
gather computers are able to predict what we will buy next, what web sites might interest us. All
these things attest to the fact that the idea of pre-crime is not so farfetched. We are already
experiencing this kind of surveillance with every keystroke on the computer.
“Post 9/11, real life has begun to imitate Philip K. Dick minus the pre-cogs”. In a report
to congress it is revealed that a kind of pre-crime unit exists that uses data mining programs to
sift through databases of information looking for suspicious activity. The Justice Department
uses data mining to track identity theft, Medicare frauds, and various other illegal activity.
According to Wired magazine everything from fishing licenses to bankruptcy proceedings are
used to assess an individual’s risk for becoming a terrorist threat (The FBI’s par.2). All the
techniques that are used today validate Philip Dick’s vision of what the future might look like.
John Anderton is the protagonist or main character in this film. He is portrayed as a sad
lonely man, unable to let go of the past. The antagonist in the film is Danny Witwer who is
played by Colin Farrel. Witwer works for the Department of Justice and is sent to evaluate precrime before an upcoming vote on the project. He is looking for flaws in the pre-crime system.
John and Danny have an adversarial relationship. Danny is doing everything he can to find a
reason pre-crime doesn’t work. John on the hand thinks the system is flawless. “There hasn’t
been a murder in 6 years. There’s nothing wrong with the system, its perfect”. (The Minority
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Report 2002). But pre-crime is not a perfect system. It does not take into account that free will
exists. Individuals have the ability to alter their future if they choose. So while survelliance has
its place in society and can be beneficial to preventing crime, it is not perfect. Just because the
evidence points to a person committing a crime doesn’t mean the individual will follow through.
This is the the flaw with all types of surveillance, you are looking at what an indivdual is doing
in the present to predict what they will do in the future.
Minority Report is set in Washington D.C. The residents are getting ready to vote on
whether or not to allow the pre-crime division to continue. The scenes are shot with high contrast
and somber colors. The film has a black and white or “film noir” feel to it. Spielberg sets the
tone of the movie by using these techniques to show what the world might look like in 2054,
after further depletion of the natural resources, rampant use of technology and overpopulation.
The film is an interpretation of the future, a future where people are willing to give up personal
freedom in exchange for government protection.
The Minority Report looks at how the future might look, a future where the government
has implanted itself into our personal live.to the extent that having your eyes scanned by a
mechanical spider has been normalized. A world where technology has taken hold to the point
that every time you walk down the street or into a store a computer discharges a commentary on
what you should buy or where you should vacation based on the personal data.it has acquired on
you.
Dick’s original short story contains many parallels to the world today. With advances in
technology that could only be imagined in the 50’s. Today every time you go online you are
besieged with computer generated ads for anything and everything you have Googled for the last
6 months. Government intrusion into our daily lives is familiar with cell phones that track our
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daily activities and surveillance cameras capturing our every exchange. Is the world a better safer
place because of all this analysis? As powerfully spoken by the Pre-cog Agatha “You still have a
choice”. (The Minority Report 2002).
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Works Cited
Gopnik, Adam."Blow Against The Empire, The return of Philip K. Dick". The New Yorker.com.
Aug 2007. Web. 26 September 2014.
"The FBI's department of precrime." The New American.6 Aug.2007. Opposing Veiwpoints in
Context.Web. 15 Sept 2014.
"Racial Profiling"The Free Dictionary by Farlex." West'sDictionary of American Law, 3rd
Ed.2008. Web.15 September 2014.
The Minority Report. Dir. Steven Spielberg. Perf. Colin Farrell,Samatha Morton, Tom Cruise.
Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. 2002. Film. 10 Sept 2014.