Minority Report


Director: Steven Spielberg
Writter: Philip K. Dick, Scott Frank, Jon Cohen
Tom Plays: John Anderton
Status: ON DVD

Plot

In the future, criminals are caught before the crimes they commit, but one of the officers in the special unit is accused of one such crime and sets out to prove his innocence.

Media:


Photos | Videos | Official Website

Goofs

Factual errors: Signs advertise an election to be held on Tuesday, April 22, 2054. 22 April 2054 will be a Wednesday.

Continuity: Shots from the outside of Lara’s cottage show the windows on the front open, however as Agatha is walking around inside, behind the same windows, they appear closed.

Continuity: The jacket that Agatha is holding, disappears and reappears on her shoulder during the car journey.

Continuity: As Anderton approaches Crow, he has his gun drawn. Then we see him from a different angle and he draws his (already drawn, as far as we know) gun.

Continuity: Anderton says “his” case is #1109, but the display screen he uses to sort it out says it’s #1108.

Continuity: When Dr. Iris hands the “plant-waterer” to Anderton it is pointing one way (watering hole to Anderton’s left), when the camera angle changes it is it is pointing the other way.

Continuity: Joel Gretsch’s character is listed as “Donald Doobin” in the credits, but the name appears in the movie as “Donald Dubin”.

Revealing mistakes: When Anderton is being chased through the alleyway, the hole cut in his leather jacket for his safety harness is clearly visible when he is at the top of the fire-escape.

Continuity: When Anderton is arresting Howard Marks, he states the date as April 22. Later while Anderton is running, the commercial states the vote on the National Pre-Cog Initiative is on April 22 and later that same day while he is walking with Burgess, Lamar says that “in one week” the people will vote on the initiative.

Revealing mistakes: The events take place in the year 2054, but when Anderton is checking the hotel registry to look for Leo Crow, the entry he sees just before he sees the one for Crow is for a hotel client who has checked in and out in the year “44” (i.e. 2044). The entry for Crow has the year reference blanked out.

Crew or equipment visible: After John’s chase in the Lexus, a crouching crewmember in a white shirt is reflected in the car door as it opens.

Revealing mistakes: In the alley where the police are attempting to subdue Anderton, he takes a sick stick and pokes one of the policemen who vomits immediately, but the vomit is coming from “below” his mouth – that the “vomit tube” is mis-positioned on the left side of the actor’s face.

Incorrectly regarded as goofs: When Anderton kicks out the window of the car and climbs outside, it appears that he ends up standing on the same window he kicked out (which shouldn’t, of course, be there anymore). But on closer inspection it is apparent that the car has rotated as it moves around the building and that he is, in fact, standing on a completely different, and thoroughly intact, window.

Crew or equipment visible: Safety diver visible in the upper right-hand corner of the screen when Anderton is in the pool holding his breath.

Continuity: When Anderton tumbles into the yoga class after jumping from his car, the Asian yoga student in the green leotard is flat down on her chest. In the next shot, the same yoga student is up on her hands.

Revealing mistakes: When Danny Witwer is shot, a blood pack is visible under his shirt.

Continuity: Lamar shoots Danny Witwer in the head and in the chest, where his blood pools and accumulates. But in subsequent shots of Lamar on the phone with Lara, with Danny’s body slumped over in the lower right of the frame, there is no blood on his shirt, and his head is intact.

Continuity: When Anderton is in the park looking for Howard Marks’ house, the merry-go-round behind him is not moving. A couple shots later, the merry-go-round is moving in the foreground.

Continuity: When Anderton confronts and then shoots Leo Crow, Agatha is crawling off the bed and takes most of the pictures off the bed onto the floor with her. Later, when Witwer and the PreCrime team are studying the crime scene, the pictures are back on the bed. It is unlikely that either Anderton or Agatha would have stopped to put the pictures back on the bed before leaving, and no policeman worth his salt would have disturbed a crime scene and scooped up the pictures and put them on the bed.

Continuity: When Anderton is in the greenhouse with the pre-crime’s creator, she says, “This just isn’t your week is it,” as she helps him sit down, and takes her hands off of him. In the next shot she has her hands in the original location as he says, “I am not a killer.”

Continuity: The door in the house of Howard Mark is first opened by the blonde man, and he leaves it open. After that Anderton rushes in but the door pivots from the other side of the doorpost.

Continuity: When in Anderton’s house, Danny Witwer is sitting in front of Lara asking for her husband. In the first shot she’s sitting with both arms and legs in the same position. In the next shot, her left leg is crossed and his right arm is resting on the photo frame.

Continuity: When Anderton is first viewing the images from the Mark’s murder, the technician behind him takes his folder and folds it behind his arms twice.

Revealing mistakes: When the four backup police arrive at the Marks’ home, the first one to land on the bed clearly has a strap and metal ring sticking out from the back of his uniform, and it is attached to a swivel and safety wire.

Audio/visual unsynchronized: When Anderton remembers Solomon P. Eddie set his patients on fire, Eddie says “I put ’em out!” and then “Some not as quickly as others…” but his mouth does not match the words.

Continuity: When Howard Marks picks up his glasses from the bedside table, he is holding them upside down. In the next shot he puts them on, and he is holding them right-side up.

Continuity: After Anderton has attacked Crow in the hotel room, the position of the broken glass in the mirror changes between shots.

Continuity: When the robots are looking for Tom Cruise to scan his eye, he grabs a small cooler of ice and throws it into the bathtub to get in and hide. The next time the camera shows the tub, there is nearly 10 times as much ice in the tub.

Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): In the apartment building Crow lives in, as Anderton is talking to the clerk, Agatha calls Anderton “Anderson”.

Continuity: When Anderton has surgery to change his eyes he has brown eyes, but on the computer screen his eyes are blue. Also the eyes he uses to get access to the Pre-cog are blue.

Incorrectly regarded as goofs: Goof submissions relating to perceived holes in the logic of what pre-cogs can/cannot do are not being accepted. Since they are a fantasy creation, they can do whatever the filmmakers say they can do, even when their abilities are apparently contradictory.

Plot holes: Anderton gains access to pre-cog using his own excised eyeball. As he was wanted and on the run, shouldn’t his access have been cancelled – or at least shouldn’t the police have been alerted to his presence?

Quotes

John Anderton: Mr. Marks, by mandate of the District of Columbia Precrime Division, I’m placing you under arrest for the future murder of Sarah Marks and Donald Dubin that was to take place today, April 22 at 0800 hours and four minutes.

Agatha: Think about all the lives that little girl has saved.
Lamar Burgess: Think about all the lives that little girl has saved, think about all the lives she will save, that little girl could have saved Sean.
John Anderton: [yells] Don’t you *ever* say his name!
Male Precog: You used the memory of my dead son to set me up.
John Anderton: [yells] You used the memory of my dead son to set me up! That was the one thing you knew would drive me to murder.
Male Precog: What are you going to do now, Lamar?
John Anderton: [yells] What’re you going to do now, Lamar?
Male Precog: How are you…
John Anderton: …going to shut me up?
Male Precog: I’m sorry, John.

John Anderton: No doubt the precogs have already seen this.
Lamar Burgess: No doubt.
John Anderton: You see the dilemma don’t you. If you don’t kill me, precogs were wrong and precrime is over. If you do kill me, you go away, but it proves the system works. The precogs were right. So, what are you going to do now? What’s it worth? Just one more murder? You’ll rot in hell with a halo, but people will still believe in precrime. All you have to do is kill me like they said you would. Except you know your own future, which means you can change it if you want to. You still have a choice Lamar. Like I did.

Officer Fletcher: John, don’t run.
John Anderton: You don’t have to chase me.
Officer Fletcher: But you don’t have to run.
John Anderton: Everybody runs, Fletch. Everybody runs.

Agatha: Dr. Hineman once said, “The dead don’t die. They look on and help.” Remember that, John.
John Anderton: Agatha…
Agatha: Sean… He’s on the beach now, a toe in the water. He’s asking you to come in with him. He’s been racing his mother up and down the sand. There’s so much love in this house. He’s ten years old. He’s surrounded by animals. He wants to be a vet. You keep a rabbit for him, a bird and a fox. He’s in high school. He likes to run, like his father. He runs the two-mile and the long relay. He’s 23. He’s at a university. He makes love to a pretty girl named Claire. He asks her to be his wife. He calls here and tells Lara, who cries. He still runs. Across the university and in the stadium, where John watches. Oh God, he’s running so fast, just like his daddy. He sees his daddy. He wants to run to him. But he’s only six years old, and he can’t do it. And the other men are so fast. There was so much love in this house.
John Anderton: [sobbing] I want him back so bad.
Agatha: So did she. Can’t you see? She just wanted her little girl back. But it was too late. Her little girl was already gone.
John Anderton: She’s still alive.
Agatha: She didn’t die, but she’s not alive.
John Anderton: Agatha, just tell me, who killed your mother? Who killed Anne Lively?
Agatha: [whispering] I’m sorry John, but you’re gonna have to run again.
John Anderton: What?
Agatha: [screaming] RUUUUUUUUUNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!

[while he’s kicking Leo on the floor] John Anderton: Is he alive? He’s alive. Where’ve you got him? Is he all right?
[shouting] John Anderton: Tell me, you fuck, where is he?

John Anderton: He set me up. He set me up.

John Anderton: They set me up.

Director Burgess: Who’s the victim?
John Anderton: Somebody, Leo Crow
Director Burgess: Who’s Leo Crow?
John Anderton: I have no idea. But I’m suppose to kill him in less than thirty-six hours.

Director Burgess: You don’t have to run John.
John Anderton: You don’t have to chase me.

John Anderton: There hasn’t been a murder in six years. The system, it is perfect.

John Anderton: Why’d you catch that?
Danny Witwer: Because it was going to fall.
John Anderton: You’re certain?
Danny Witwer: Yeah.
John Anderton: But it didn’t fall. You caught it. The fact that you prevented it from happening doesnt change the fact that it was *going* to happen.

John Anderton: I need your help. You contain information. I need to know how to get at it.

John Anderton: I have to know. I have to find out what happened to my life.

John Anderton: Why don’t you cut the cute act, Danny boy, and tell me what it is you’re looking for?
Danny Witwer: Flaws.
John Anderton: There hasn’t been a murder in six years. There’s nothing wrong with this system it is…
Danny Witwer: Perfect I agree, but there’s a flaw. It’s human.

[Hundreds of contained prisoners rise up around Anderton and Gideon] John Anderton: My God, I forgot there were so many.
Gideon: And just think, they’d all be out there killing people if it wasn’t for you. Look at how peaceful they all are. But on the inside…
[taps his head] Gideon: busy busy busy.

[Anderton gets wheeled into containment unit] Gideon: You’re part of my flock now, John.

[Officer Fletcher, on a jet pack, lands in front of Anderton] John Anderton: Rough landing… have to work on that.
Officer Fletcher: Yeah, it’s this shit knee of mine.

John Anderton: [to Agatha] Everyday for the last six years I’ve thought of only two things. The first is what Sean would look like if he were alive today, if I would recognize him if I saw him on the street, the second is what I would do to the man who took him if I ever found him. You’re right… I’m not being set up.
Agatha: You have to take me home.
John Anderton: No. You said so yourself. There is no minority report, I don’t have an alternate future. I am going to kill this man.

[the readings Agatha is giving run quickly on a makeshift screen] John Anderton: It’s too fast. Slow it down.
Rufus Riley: How do I slow this down, I should hit her on the head?

[Dr. Solomon is about to transplant new eyes into Anderton] John Anderton: I’d like to keep the old ones.
Dr. Solomon: Why?
John Anderton: Because my mother gave them to me.

John Anderton: I’m not being set up. I really am going to kill this man.

Leo Crow: You’re not going to kill me.
John Anderton: Goodbye, Crow.

John Anderton: Don’t you ever say his name.

John Anderton: That’s all, huh? Just walk right into Precrime, go into the Temple, somehow tap into the Precogs, and then download this Minority Report…
Dr. Iris Henimen: If… you have one.
John Anderton: and then walk out.
Dr. Iris Henimen: Actually, I think you’ll have to run out, but yes, that’s what you have to do.

Dr. Iris Henimen: Find the minority report.
John Anderton: How do I even know which one has it?
Dr. Iris Henimen: It’s always the more gifted of the three.
John Anderton: Which one is it?
Dr. Iris Henimen: The female.

Rufus Riley: [to Agatha] Are you reading my mind right now?
John Anderton: Get up.
Rufus Riley: [to Agatha] I’m sorry for whatever I’m going to do and I swear I didn’t do any of that stuff I did.

[giving Anderton the antidote for a plant that has poisoned him] Dr. Iris Henimen: You’d better drink this. Soon you won’t be able to swallow, and then you’ll be totally buggered.

John Anderton: You set your patients on fire.
Dr. Solomon: I put ’em out.

[last lines] John Anderton: [voiceover] In 2054, the six-year Precrime experiment was abandoned. All prisoners were unconditionally pardoned and released, though police departments kept watch on many of them for years to come. Agatha and the twins were transferred to an undisclosed location, a place where they could find relief from their gifts. A place where they could live out their lives in peace.

GAP Sign: Hello Mr. Yukkamoto and welcome back to the GAP!
John Anderton: *Mr. Yukkamoto?*

Trivia

Three years before production began, Steven Spielberg assembled a team of sixteen future experts in Santa Monica to brainstorm out the year 2054 for him. This team included Neil Gershenfeld, professor at the Media Lab at MIT; Shaun Jones, director of biomedical research at DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency); William Mitchell, dean of the school of architecture at MIT; Peter Calthorpe, the New Urbanism evangelist; Jaron Lanier, one of the inventors of virtual reality technology; Douglas Coupland, author and commentator; Stewart Brand, author, scientist and co-creator of The Well on-line community; Kevin Kelly, founder of Wired Magazine; Harald Belker, car designer; and John Underkoffler, the science and technology advisor for the movie.

Steven Spielberg turned to Lexus for some ideas in designing a car for the future, but the bulk of the designs were done by Harald Belker, who has also designed vehicles featured in Armageddon and xXx.

Tom Cruise began filming only days after completing work on Vanilla Sky.

Cameo: [Cameron Crowe] Tom Cruise’s director from Jerry Maguire and Vanilla Sky appears as a commuter on the train who looks at Anderton over the top of his newspaper and recognizes him.

Cameo: [Cameron Diaz] Tom Cruise’s co-star in Vanilla Sky plays the blond woman sitting just behind director Cameron Crowe, the man who looks over at Anderton on the train.

Both Matt Damon and Dutch actor Yorick van Wageningen were considered for the role of Danny Witwer.

Spencer Treat Clark played the role of Sean at age 11 in a brief dream sequence meant to be placed immediately after Anderton is put into containment. The entire scene was deleted. Nevertheless, theatrical prints of the film had him in the cast list in the end titles.

Paul Thomas Anderson, who directed Tom Cruise in Magnolia, has a cameo on the train. It is reported that he is so hard to find that Anderson himself does not know where he appears.

The small storage media used throughout the film are clear plastic versions of Iomega’s PocketZip disks.

The “PreCogs” were all named after famous mystery writers. Dashiell Hammett, Arthur Conan Doyle, and Agatha Christie.

The film projected on the wall of Dr. Solomon’s apartment that shows a man being shot in a Japanese hot-tub is Samuel Fuller’s House of Bamboo.

The husband at the beginning was going to murder his wife and her lover with a pair of scissors. This was also the murder weapon of choice in Dead Again. Both films were written by Scott Frank.

The opening sequence is a homage to Alfred Hitchcock. The scissors: Dial M for Murder, the eye glasses: Strangers on a Train, and the prolonged shot of the eye: Psycho.

The tiny, in-the-ear cell phones used throughout the movie (but most noticeably by Pre-Crime Director Lamar Burgess (played by Max von Sydow)) in the film’s final scenes, are actually Bang and Olufsen earphones minus the connection cables.

The opening part of the sound track by John Williams echoes that of Vangelis’ score in Blade Runner, with the booming noises and a black screen, before the opening scene fades in.

Apparently, Colin Farrell had a lot of trouble delivering the line “I’m sure you all understand the legalistic drawback to Precrime methodology”.

The car factory scene is based on an Alfred Hitchcock idea for a never-filmed sequence in North by Northwest to which François Truffaut also referred in interview.

The pistol that John Anderton uses is the Beretta 9000.

The second part of Spielberg’s unofficial “running man” trilogy, beginning with Artificial Intelligence: AI and concluding with Catch Me If You Can.

The “PreCogs” sepia-toned cottage is the same place used as Senator Padme Amidala’s lakeside retreat on Naboo for Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones.

In the scene where John kidnaps Agatha, Danny Witwer (Colin Farrell) asks, “How much time do we have?” (Asking how much time until John commits the murder). A Pre-Crime Officer responds, “51 minutes 28 seconds.” This is exactly how much time remains until the end of the movie as well (until the credits begin to roll).

Steven Spielberg used the town of Gloucester, Virginia as a location for a portion of the film. Though the crew was in the town for a little over a month shooting, the scenes are only shown in the movie for a minute or so. The town was given no acknowledgment in the credits.

Jan de Bont was a credited producer because he was originally going to direct the film. Steven Spielberg claimed that De Bont did no work on the film once Spielberg joined the project and publicly questioned whether he deserved the credit.

The film playing in the background while Anderton is recovering from the eye transplant is The Mark of Zorro.

The song Dr. Solomon Eddie’s assistant sings is a Swedish children song called “SmÃ¥ grodorna” (The small frogs) usually sung on Midsummer Eve parties.

Meryl Streep was originally cast as Iris Hineman, but had to back out.

The story by Philip K. Dick was originally adapted as a sequel to Total Recall by writers Ronald Shusett and Gary Goldman (later joined by Robert Goethals). The setting was changed to Mars with the Precogs being people mutated by the Martian atmosphere, as established in the first film. The main character was also changed to Douglas Quaid, the man played by Arnold Schwarzenegger. The project eventually fell apart but the writers, who still owned the rights to the original story, rewrote the script, removing the elements from Total Recall. This script was eventually tossed out when writer Jon Cohen was hired in 1997 to start the project over from scratch. The only original element from the early script which made it to the final film is the sequence in the car factory, an idea that Spielberg loved.

Steven Spielberg chose the special effects company Imaginary Forces to design the film’s prevision sequences because he liked the title sequence they designed for Se7en.

The part of Danny Witwer was originally American and with a father who died outside a church in Maryland but Spielberg didn’t think Colin Farrell could fully shake his Irish accent so the character was made Irish.

The film was almost shot a few years earlier, before Steven Spielberg decided to do Artificial Intelligence: AI instead and have the Minority Report script reworked. According to reports, Tom Cruise’s co-stars in that version would have been Cate Blanchett as Agatha, Matt Damon as Witwer, Ian McKellen as Burgess and Jenna Elfman as Lara Anderton. After the delay, Javier Bardem has stated in interviews that he was offered the part of Witwer, but turned it down because he “didn’t want to just run around chasing Tom Cruise”. This lead to the casting of Colin Farrell.

In the first draft of the screenplay, the main character was named Paul Anderson. This was changed to “John Anderton” to avoid confusion with movie directors Paul W.S. Anderson and Paul Thomas Anderson.

Cameo: [Scott Frank] the co-writer appears as a customer talking to imaginary guests (“You’re the man”) in the cyber parlor.

According to sound designer Gary Rydstrom, the sounds for the Mag-Lev (Magnetic Levitation) car system was made from the sounds of his own washing machine.

Director Trademark: [Steven Spielberg] [Music] Score by John Williams.

During the scenes that show Anderton manipulating the PreCogs’ visions of future crimes, the music in the background is Franz Schubert’s Symphony #8 in B Minor – more commonly known as the “Unfinished” symphony.

For the scene where Anderton holds his breath in the bathtub, Steven Spielberg was going to CG the air bubble rising but Tom Cruise took the time and learned how to do it himself.

This is the first movie Steven Spielberg has directed for 20th Century Fox. The studio, which handled theatrical distribution rights in North America, financed the film along with Dreamworks, which handled theatrical distribution rights in all other countries outside of North America. Though Dreamworks released the film on DVD and VHS in North America, while Fox handle DVD and VHS rights worldwide.

At the police station the officers talk about the metaphysical proof of precognition. Chief Anderton (Tom Cruise) rolls a red ball along a table to demonstrate the law of cause and effect to Det. Witwer (Colin Farrell). All of this is an allusion to the philosopher David Hume’s famous claim that by observing billiard balls you can actually demonstrate that cause and effect does not exist but is merely a habitually created fiction of the mind.

Steven Spielberg hired the top 12 contortionist from around the world to do the futuristic yoga class scene.