Minority Report - many many plot holes (spoilers)
Robert Stockwell
HOLES:
THE SETUP
-) Anderton is framed because he found out about the precog's mom (Anne Lively),
but he did not find out about the real murder til after he was framed. In fact,
if he wasn't framed, he probably would not find out about the real murder.
It really seemed that the reason for setting up Anderton was because he found out
about the existence of minority reports. At that point in time, the real murder
of Anne Lively was still a flawless plan (as known to Burgess). Why would
Burgess think he would have to kill Anderton to keep the Anne Lively murder
secret? Burgess did not know that Anderton would find a precog vision of the
real murder (after all, Anderton did not start looking for that plant lady,
and find the secret precog backups until after he was framed).
-) Burgess sets up Anderton, but doesn't tell him where
Crow is or how to find him. This had to happen somehow, you can't
merely put a guy in a room, and hope that Anderton finds it,
and hope that Anderton kills him. We can assume in the original timeline
that Burgess must somehow lead Anderton to the apartment, but this was
never mentioned in the movie, and leaves a big question. Burgess could
not have planned Anderton finding out about the future vision, THEN becoming
a fugitive, taking the precog, and finding the apartment with the
precog's help. There must have been another original plan, but it is
completely ignored.
-)the setup assumed and counted on Anderton killing Crow. Big assumption. If Anderton
does not kill Crow, then the investigation of Crow as the child killer
shows that Burgess set it up (in fact the detective figured this out right away,
claiming that there was an orgy of evidence, and that it did not make sense.)
This is in fact another flaw in the plan. It occured as Burgess expected, but the police
still didn't buy it and were suspecting a setup. Which maybe/probably would have
led back to Burgess.
-) Anderton's murder was a brown ball, but it was obviously a 'crime of passion'
and should have been a red ball. Unless the premeditated part was the setup,
in which case it seems very unlikely to me that there is no other information
about the murder (like the name of the person who premeditated the murder etc).
IE the precogs would know that the murder was set up, but not give the name of
the premeditator, or visions of the premeditator talking to the hired killer etc.
-) Witwer's murder was pinned on Anderton, even though he is far
away with witnesses (his wife and the precog) at the time of death.
Again, it implies that a precog murder case gets no trial, no defence
lawyers, no investigation etc.
-) why not use Agatha as a witness to the suicide of Crow. Also there are witnesses
that Anderton did not kill Witwer (Agatha and his wife). So Anderton should
not have been convicted of anything at the end, even if he did not have conclusive
proof against Burgess.
THE ANNE LIVELY MURDER
-) Burgess kills Anne Lively with a clever plan, BUT you know what would have been
even MORE clever, not killing her IN WASHINTON DC! Tell her that her daughter
is in Oregon, and give her a plane ticket.
-) Burgess' murder of Anne Lively, why didn't the brown ball fall
with the old guys name on it? Surely they don't erase possible echos
without first checking the names. (More on "echoes" below.)
-) the Burgess' 'fake murder', was there no investigation of that,
shouldn't the cops have looked for motive, and perhaps found out the killer
was hired, then try to go after who hired him? I can imagine the first thing
the killer said was "some old guy hired me to kill her!"
- why was Burgess claiming no knowledge of Ann Lively's fake-murder,
only to give a giant OOPS to Anderton's wife ("she drowned", and in fact she did
not drown acoording to what was thought by everybody to be true)?
Why didn't he say, "yeah, John mentioned it to me. Don't know what the deal was though"
Or better yet, admit that sometimes there are only two feeds of the visions
from the precog, and John had found that the Ann Lively case was one of them.
A little bit of truth is a good way to hid deeper lies.
INCONSISTENT PRECOG ABILITIES
- inconsistent precogs: we see them always getting a vison together ("they are a hive mind"),
Early on in the movie we are told (apparently) the twins see the fake murder, while the girl
apparently had a 'minority report' with a different scene (ie wind blowing other way).
Later the story changes to the girl saw another murder that occured later (and was thought to be an echo).
The movie itself is confused as to what the cover story was.
So the story is EITHER agatha's vision of Anne's murder was a minority report, taken
simultaneously with the twin's version, and thus erased. OR the story was that Agatha's
vision of Anne's murder was an echo that was recorded at a later time. BUT we know that
the first 'fake murder' was a valid precog vision (so why did Agatha not see it, what
happened to her report?) AND we know that the second real murder (of Anne by Burgess) was
a valid precog vision (so why did the twin's not see that vision). Who knows, maybe they did,
and all three were erased.
The problem with the "echo" story of the Anne murder:
Firstly, the tech must have looked at the vision's images to determine that it was
an echo. And he must have seen that image of Burgess's face. There is no way a tech would
delete the info without looking at all of it, and especially checking out the names
of the murderer and victim. It would be a very easy and failsafe way of identifying
that it was indeed an echo.
The names must have come from the precog, since it did not come from any IDing of the images,
since the police could not find the murderer (i.e.they could not get a positive ID, not from
the retina scans of the precog images of the people or anything). For instance there
were 10 or so names of the wifecheater killer in the DC area, and the cops did not know
what one to go after.
Note, the movie shows us that echoes happen after the original vision, Agatha's vision
was an supposed to be an "echo", not a minority report.
What defines an 'echo'? Not that it looks similar, but that the names are the same. It is
ridiculous that a technician (who is really trying to catch murders) would delete (why delete,
why not just put it in the echo folder?) a murder without looking at the names?
And the video was not the same, since it would have had the Burgess' face in it! A tech would
delete an echo without even watching the whole thing first??
Or if the computer automatically processed these visions, then why did it think it was an echo?
Surely the computer's software would actually check for echoes by comparing names and the
whole image stream.
PRECRIME OPERATIONS
-) these minority reports are secret, so no one ever asked for the evidence of
a pre-murder, there was no trial or records? are there no defence lawyers?
And the minority reports must be of the murder in a different way, because
if the 'alternate future' was of no murder, why would they precog it (i.e. there
would be missing reports, not minority reports).
- what about proof that they have the correct guy, all they get is a name
(not a ret scan from the vision, since they didn't know which guy did the
wifecheating murder, only his name of which there were 10 or so)
- the precog evidence is merely equivalent to a video tape of the scene, which may not be conclusive
evidence, and requires further investigation by the police.
GENERAL PLOT PROBLEMS
- minority reports - they are ignored the whole movie, although mentioned that there
are several of them (i.e. only two precog movies). The problem with this is that the
whole precrime department is shut down at the end of the movie. But why? The pre cogs
were perfect. It was the head guy Burgess who manipulated the system by effectively
erasing the evidence and report of a murder (anne's) which the precog's (at least agatha)
did see correctly. The only reason to abandon the project it seems is because of the minority
reports, which weren't a part of the movie.
- at the beginning with the wifecheater murder, the cops look up 10 or so guys with
the name of the killer, getting all their info, but they don't know which one it is.
So far so good. Based on the images, they they narrow it down to a street across
from the park, and to about 10 houses that all look alike.
WHY NOT LOOK UP THE HOUSE OF THE GUY'S NAME WHO LIVES ON THAT STREET??
GRAB A PHONEBOOK. They had all that info on the computers at the precrime office.
Or why not at least send one officer into each house.
And why didn't the other officers run in behind Anderton, instead of crashing
through the ceiling? (Yes i know, it looked cool)
- what was the point of the bassethound face for Anderton he just walked the in back
door using his Anderton identity anyways.
OTHER FUTURE STUFF PROBLEMS
-) why doesn't anyone wear sunglasses, I'd avoid retina scans all the time, especially
with that obnoxious advertising.
-) the non use of weapons, and weapons that are quickly forgotten, sicksticks (cool!),
stun rifles, etc.
-) the moldy sandwich, ok tom has lost his smell as well as sight. This could NOT be revenge
since the doc didn't know Anderton was coming.
- the lack of a LAN, and the use of op(tical)-floppies to transfer files across a room.
- the precogs are in a giant toilet, that the precrime cops didn't know about ("find out where that went").
Anderton flushes them out to make his spectalur escape. LAME
- the prison has one rent a cop watching it, and the wife can just walk in and free Anderton.
Even if she got in using tom's eye, why would a criminal still have security clearance?
Or why wouldn't they at least put a lock on the door to the prison??
- the precogs have no security other than a locked door on a backdoor hallway to the outside.
- tom can still use his retscan to get in the precrime building after he is wanted for murder
- why wasn't tom blind in his replacement left eye (it got scanned and unbandaged after 6 hours)
- infra red cannot see through walls, and if it could, humans are not the only
hot things around. My skin temp is not that different that everything around me.
Although they did call it 'thermal imaging' so maybe there were secret xrays
or something involved
- car factory, they make a car about every thirty seconds, but we don't see any of them,
DISCUSSION
If I may state the obvious:
- Agatha's vision of the crow murder is not what happened, ie picture of crow standing there
with the bullet hitting him in the chest, vs both of them holding the gun into the guy.
There was no minority report of that vision. After thinking about it I realized that what
we saw was a second time line, and there are always at least two time lines (one where the
murder happens, and one where it is prevented) So what we saw was the murder prevention
timeline that happened. The visions time was wrong, in that the watch alarm went off before
Crow was killed. The vision did not show crow's admission of the setup. etc. At first
I thought these differences showed that the precogs could be wrong, but after thinking
about it, the precogs were perfect.
AND in the second (prevented murder) timeline, Crow killed himself, so this does not show
up to the precogs (they don't see suicide), which explains why there was no precog vision
of what really happened (which was the second timeline).
COMMENTS
Better non-spielberg ending, I was hoping that when Burgess killed himself, he framed Anderton
(who was arrested for it), thus Burgess would realize his dream of getting precog nation
wide (although he is a bit dead).
Gespaccio
"Robert Stockwell" <rgs...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:3D1C8F0E...@hotmail.com...
> Spoilers:
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> HOLES:
>
>
> THE SETUP
> -) Anderton is framed because he found out about the precog's mom (Anne
Lively),
> but he did not find out about the real murder til after he was framed. In
fact,
> if he wasn't framed, he probably would not find out about the real murder.
> It really seemed that the reason for setting up Anderton was because he
found out
> about the existence of minority reports. At that point in time, the real
murder
> of Anne Lively was still a flawless plan (as known to Burgess). Why would
> Burgess think he would have to kill Anderton to keep the Anne Lively
murder
> secret? Burgess did not know that Anderton would find a precog vision of
the
> real murder (after all, Anderton did not start looking for that plant
lady,
> and find the secret precog backups until after he was framed).
>
He wasnt framed specifically to cover up the murder of Ann Lively he was
framed to cover up the minority reports. The fact that several crimes have
had dissenting opinions from at least one of the pre-cogs is something he
didnt want getting out just before the program went national.
> -) Burgess sets up Anderton, but doesn't tell him where
> Crow is or how to find him. This had to happen somehow, you can't
> merely put a guy in a room, and hope that Anderton finds it,
> and hope that Anderton kills him. We can assume in the original timeline
> that Burgess must somehow lead Anderton to the apartment, but this was
> never mentioned in the movie, and leaves a big question. Burgess could
> not have planned Anderton finding out about the future vision, THEN
becoming
> a fugitive, taking the precog, and finding the apartment with the
> precog's help. There must have been another original plan, but it is
> completely ignored.
>
It's been discussed here many times. Obviously Burgess would have slipped
information to Anderton that would have lead him to the room and to the
meeting with Crow. Before that can happen the pre-cogs get a vision of the
intended murder and it includes the ramifications of him seeing the vision
such as the fact that Agatha is with him in the room.
> -)the setup assumed and counted on Anderton killing Crow. Big assumption.
If Anderton
> does not kill Crow, then the investigation of Crow as the child killer
> shows that Burgess set it up (in fact the detective figured this out right
away,
> claiming that there was an orgy of evidence, and that it did not make
sense.)
> This is in fact another flaw in the plan. It occured as Burgess expected,
but the police
> still didn't buy it and were suspecting a setup. Which maybe/probably
would have
> led back to Burgess.
Smart villains like this dont leave a trail back to themselves. Remember
Crow never saw him, didn't know who it was only knows that he has to do this
or he goes back to jail and his family doesnt get any money.
> -) Anderton's murder was a brown ball, but it was obviously a 'crime of
passion'
> and should have been a red ball. Unless the premeditated part was the
setup,
> in which case it seems very unlikely to me that there is no other
information
> about the murder (like the name of the person who premeditated the murder
etc).
> IE the precogs would know that the murder was set up, but not give the
name of
> the premeditator, or visions of the premeditator talking to the hired
killer etc.
>
Supposedly the reason it is premeditated is because Anderton has been
planning for years what he would do to the guy who took his son. I agree
it's weak.
> -) Witwer's murder was pinned on Anderton, even though he is far
> away with witnesses (his wife and the precog) at the time of death.
> Again, it implies that a precog murder case gets no trial, no defence
> lawyers, no investigation etc.
Again I'll agree a little weak but I think they were running out of time and
decided not to add the extra scene or two that could have made it plausible
for Anderton to kill Witwer. Not a major flaw.
> -) why not use Agatha as a witness to the suicide of Crow. Also there are
witnesses
> that Anderton did not kill Witwer (Agatha and his wife). So Anderton
should
> not have been convicted of anything at the end, even if he did not have
conclusive
> proof against Burgess.
>
I think of it more of like a jailbreak. When the ball comes down the judge
and lawyer view the case and agree on the outcome. So he's already
convicted and is now an escaped felon. They dont go into the legal system
enough to know if there was an appeal system but it seems unlikely. If this
movie came out 20 years ago they might have explored that a bit more with
some tense courtroom dramatics but now you have to keep the plot moving and
that means chase scenes.
It's sad to say but you have to go to television for drama that doesnt
involve explosions.
>
> THE ANNE LIVELY MURDER
> -) Burgess kills Anne Lively with a clever plan, BUT you know what would
have been
> even MORE clever, not killing her IN WASHINTON DC! Tell her that her
daughter
> is in Oregon, and give her a plane ticket.
But his way was virtually fool proof with no possibility of a police
investigation. At least until her body turns up somewhere, which could be a
problem.
> -) Burgess' murder of Anne Lively, why didn't the brown ball fall
> with the old guys name on it? Surely they don't erase possible echos
> without first checking the names. (More on "echoes" below.)
>
The balls dont fall unless a technician starts the process. We see at least
a couple times where an echo is coming up and no ball falls.
> -) the Burgess' 'fake murder', was there no investigation of that,
> shouldn't the cops have looked for motive, and perhaps found out the
killer
> was hired, then try to go after who hired him? I can imagine the first
thing
> the killer said was "some old guy hired me to kill her!"
Again it's doubtful he ever made actual contact with the hit man. He hired
the guy through connections and then imitated the murder after he saw the
vision.
> - why was Burgess claiming no knowledge of Ann Lively's fake-murder,
> only to give a giant OOPS to Anderton's wife ("she drowned", and in fact
she did
> not drown acoording to what was thought by everybody to be true)?
> Why didn't he say, "yeah, John mentioned it to me. Don't know what the
deal was though"
> Or better yet, admit that sometimes there are only two feeds of the
visions
> from the precog, and John had found that the Ann Lively case was one of
them.
> A little bit of truth is a good way to hid deeper lies.
>
Yeah a stupid slip up, felt weak to me but it's possible.
> INCONSISTENT PRECOG ABILITIES
> - inconsistent precogs: we see them always getting a vison together ("they
are a hive mind"),
> Early on in the movie we are told (apparently) the twins see the fake
murder, while the girl
> apparently had a 'minority report' with a different scene (ie wind blowing
other way).
> Later the story changes to the girl saw another murder that occured later
(and was thought to be an echo).
>
But the other murder was at the exact same location in the exact same manor.
The reason the water is moving a different way is because it's at a
different time.
> The movie itself is confused as to what the cover story was.
> So the story is EITHER agatha's vision of Anne's murder was a minority
report, taken
> simultaneously with the twin's version, and thus erased. OR the story was
that Agatha's
> vision of Anne's murder was an echo that was recorded at a later time. BUT
we know that
> the first 'fake murder' was a valid precog vision (so why did Agatha not
see it, what
> happened to her report?) AND we know that the second real murder (of Anne
by Burgess) was
> a valid precog vision (so why did the twin's not see that vision). Who
knows, maybe they did,
> and all three were erased.
>
Ok I may be reaching here but I think her minority report would be a showing
of the actual murder that does happen whereas the other two see the planned
murder. So with her greater psychic abilities she sees the murder is foiled
in the first case and that Burgess will later come along and complete the
murder in much the same fashion.
> The problem with the "echo" story of the Anne murder:
> Firstly, the tech must have looked at the vision's images to determine
that it was
> an echo. And he must have seen that image of Burgess's face. There is no
way a tech would
> delete the info without looking at all of it, and especially checking out
the names
> of the murderer and victim. It would be a very easy and failsafe way of
identifying
> that it was indeed an echo.
Failsafes is one thing this movie failed to take into account. A top notch
security institution doesnt forget to change the access codes for an
employee that has just been convicted.
> The names must have come from the precog, since it did not come from any
IDing of the images,
> since the police could not find the murderer (i.e.they could not get a
positive ID, not from
> the retina scans of the precog images of the people or anything). For
instance there
> were 10 or so names of the wifecheater killer in the DC area, and the cops
did not know
> what one to go after.
Yes the names come from the precog but writing them to wood doesnt happen
until a technician starts that process.
> Note, the movie shows us that echoes happen after the original vision,
Agatha's vision
> was an supposed to be an "echo", not a minority report.
> What defines an 'echo'? Not that it looks similar, but that the names are
the same. It is
> ridiculous that a technician (who is really trying to catch murders) would
delete (why delete,
> why not just put it in the echo folder?) a murder without looking at the
names?
> And the video was not the same, since it would have had the Burgess' face
in it! A tech would
> delete an echo without even watching the whole thing first??
I think it's explained that the computer ignores the minority reports and
only shows the majority picture. So if it happens as I stated above then
they dont see them when its happening and on an echo they can instantly tell
the vision is only coming from Agatha and ignore it. May not make sense
entirely but it is a system setup by Mr. Burgess and he seemed to have a bit
of a forked tongue.
> Or if the computer automatically processed these visions, then why did it
think it was an echo?
> Surely the computer's software would actually check for echoes by
comparing names and the
> whole image stream.
>
Yes the computer sees that it's only coming from one source and
automatically decides it's an echo.
>
>
> PRECRIME OPERATIONS
> -) these minority reports are secret, so no one ever asked for the
evidence of
> a pre-murder, there was no trial or records? are there no defence lawyers?
> And the minority reports must be of the murder in a different way,
because
> if the 'alternate future' was of no murder, why would they precog it (i.e.
there
> would be missing reports, not minority reports).
> - what about proof that they have the correct guy, all they get is a name
> (not a ret scan from the vision, since they didn't know which guy did the
> wifecheating murder, only his name of which there were 10 or so)
> - the precog evidence is merely equivalent to a video tape of the scene,
which may not be conclusive
> evidence, and requires further investigation by the police.
>
The legal system has obviously changed. They do have a judge and an
attorney present at the viewing of the vision to give it a sense of
legitimacy. But no there seems to be no appeal or actual trial in court.
>
> GENERAL PLOT PROBLEMS
> - minority reports - they are ignored the whole movie, although mentioned
that there
> are several of them (i.e. only two precog movies). The problem with this
is that the
> whole precrime department is shut down at the end of the movie. But why?
The pre cogs
> were perfect. It was the head guy Burgess who manipulated the system by
effectively
> erasing the evidence and report of a murder (anne's) which the precog's
(at least agatha)
> did see correctly. The only reason to abandon the project it seems is
because of the minority
> reports, which weren't a part of the movie.
>
No it was shut down because of the scandal. The head of the department was
using the whole project to commit murders without being caught. That would
be a huge scandal to overcome and one that wouldnt blow over quickly, better
to just shut it down. Supposedly there was a line of text at the end cut
from the film telling us that the next year there were 116 murders in
Washington.
>
> - at the beginning with the wifecheater murder, the cops look up 10 or so
guys with
> the name of the killer, getting all their info, but they don't know which
one it is.
> So far so good. Based on the images, they they narrow it down to a street
across
> from the park, and to about 10 houses that all look alike.
> WHY NOT LOOK UP THE HOUSE OF THE GUY'S NAME WHO LIVES ON THAT STREET??
> GRAB A PHONEBOOK. They had all that info on the computers at the precrime
office.
He had just moved and they didn't have an accurate address. Seems a little
fishy to me with how quick things can be updated now but its not a major
concern.
> Or why not at least send one officer into each house.
> And why didn't the other officers run in behind Anderton, instead of
crashing
> through the ceiling? (Yes i know, it looked cool)
> - what was the point of the bassethound face for Anderton he just walked
the in back
> door using his Anderton identity anyways.
>
> OTHER FUTURE STUFF PROBLEMS
> -) why doesn't anyone wear sunglasses, I'd avoid retina scans all the
time, especially
> with that obnoxious advertising.
Doubt sunglasses would block the retina scans and I'm sure there are upsides
to it.
(SNIP a bunch of minor nitpicks)
I think ending it with the confrontation with Crow would have been better,
however they would have had to rework much of it. The pacing didn't feel
right to me and the emotional impact felt too watered down for it to be the
actual ending.
zach
> > OTHER FUTURE STUFF PROBLEMS
> > -) why doesn't anyone wear sunglasses, I'd avoid retina scans all the
> time, especially
> > with that obnoxious advertising.
>
> Doubt sunglasses would block the retina scans and I'm sure there are upsides
> to it.
Most sunglasses are transparent to infra-red wavelengths (my friend
has a digital camera with an IR filter, and it's weird to compare
almost identical shots, but the IR on you can see right through
shades), though I hear that mirrored shades might help. It wouldn't
be that hard to overcome that, either, considering that my friends
filter is only utilizing ambient IR, i.e., it is not an active
scanner. I can imagine an entire underground industry dedicated to
fooling such technology. Some kind of contact lens that gives
scanners a false reading. Of course, the government could always
outlaw the wearing of such to make everyone feel good, but like anti
concealed weapons laws and gun-free school zones, it would not and
could not stop anyone from doing it.
Rob Hall
1) you must be tired from all that typing
2) all those questions are a bother
3) repeat after me--- 'Its only a MOVIE!!!' 'Its only a MOVIE!!!'.
4) just watch it as a movie, don't waste energy thinking and analyzing it.
I know that I spend enough time at work thinking and analyzing, I certaintly
don't want to do that during a movie..
Rob
®§åi¥å-jiñ Wîll®
> 4) just watch it as a movie, don't waste energy thinking and analyzing it.
> I know that I spend enough time at work thinking and analyzing, I
certaintly
> don't want to do that during a movie..
I disagree.
I'm surprised by ramc-f actually. Why? It seems that for once, the deep
analysis and thinking is positive.
I don't get the sense that people are attacking the movie, or that they were
watching the movie with the intention of bashing it afterwards. People here
seem to do that too often, and seem totally unable to suspend beleif unless
every single plot and line meets their incredibly high standards.
But people (even the "knowledgeable" internet fan) liked this movie. So for
once the analyzing and thinking has been enjoyable. Almost everyone has
noticed something, and/or saw the movie in a different way. Thats the beauty
of this movie.
--
"How many retards'll listen to me
and run up in the school shootin when they're pissed at a
teach-er, her, him, is it you is it them?
"Wasn't me, Slim Shady said to do it again!"
Damn! How much damage can you do with a pen?
who woulda thought
Slim Shady would be somethin that you woulda bought
that woulda made you get a gun and shoot at a cop
I just said it - I ain't know if you'd do it or not" (The Greatest poet
of the modern era, Eminem)
John R. Rybock
<rgs...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>Spoilers:
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>HOLES:
>
>
>THE SETUP
>-) Anderton is framed because he found out about the precog's mom (Anne Lively),
>but he did not find out about the real murder til after he was framed. In fact,
>if he wasn't framed, he probably would not find out about the real murder.
>It really seemed that the reason for setting up Anderton was because he found out
>about the existence of minority reports.
I thought setting up Anderton was much more about saving power - his
drug use was a liability that would get the system taken away from
Burgess once it went national. Set him up to kill, stop him - the
system works despite the bad seed, and he's now no longer a liability.
There was some line about good men wanting to keep power, if I recall,
though I don't remember who or when it was said.
>-) Burgess sets up Anderton, but doesn't tell him where
>Crow is or how to find him. This had to happen somehow, you can't
>merely put a guy in a room, and hope that Anderton finds it,
>and hope that Anderton kills him. We can assume in the original timeline
>that Burgess must somehow lead Anderton to the apartment, but this was
>never mentioned in the movie, and leaves a big question. Burgess could
>not have planned Anderton finding out about the future vision, THEN becoming
>a fugitive, taking the precog, and finding the apartment with the
>precog's help. There must have been another original plan, but it is
>completely ignored.
Let's look at the opening scenes that show Pre-Crime in action - at
what point were the couple put on the path that led to the husband
about to stab his wife? When he chose to watch the man go inside? When
he seemed to recognize the guy across the street? When he FIRST saw
the guy across the street, leading him to recognize him later? When
his wife began the affair? When he got so consumed in work, she began
to have the need to have an affair? When they got married? When he
proposed? When they started dating?
The point being, especially when dealing with stories of time and
altering it, where do you say "This is where it begins"? It can get
even tougher, because part of the flow of time for John Anderton in
this story actually involves the pre-cogs and his knowing the future,
something no one else Pre-Crime deals with knows.
Perhaps Burgess planned to slip the information to Anderton about Crow
later on, but his plan was altered by the pre-cog vision. Or, as
Witwer seemed to find out about the drug use around the same time as
the vision (he arrived at HQ at the same time Anderton is escaping),
it wasn't until just AFTER the vision that Anderton became a true
liability for Burgess, who had access to the visions and set it up
based on that.
>
>-)the setup assumed and counted on Anderton killing Crow. Big assumption. If Anderton
>does not kill Crow, then the investigation of Crow as the child killer
>shows that Burgess set it up (in fact the detective figured this out right away,
>claiming that there was an orgy of evidence, and that it did not make sense.)
>This is in fact another flaw in the plan. It occured as Burgess expected, but the police
>still didn't buy it and were suspecting a setup. Which maybe/probably would have
>led back to Burgess.
Not if Burgess didn't really put it in motion until AFTER he saw the
pre-cog. Then he KNOWS it works, he KNOWS that Anderton will go
through with it.
>
>-) Anderton's murder was a brown ball, but it was obviously a 'crime of passion'
>and should have been a red ball.
Anderton had though long and hard about what he would do to the man
who took his son. And he was in the room knowing this was the man for
a while. That can set up "premeditation" (they didn't go into a lot of
detail over the boundary between the two). Also, in actuality, Crow
kills himself, and he went in intending to die, so that may cloud the
passion/premeditation determination. And in the first vision did not
come true - at the strike of 0, Anderton shoots Crow. Anderton CHOSE
not to, time passed. It is no longer the same timeline as the precogs
saw. A minute later, Crow shoots himself with the gun in Anderton's
hand. It wasn't the scene that the pre-cogs saw, though close enough
for the investigators.
>
>-) Witwer's murder was pinned on Anderton, even though he is far
>away with witnesses (his wife and the precog) at the time of death.
>Again, it implies that a precog murder case gets no trial, no defence
>lawyers, no investigation etc.
>
>-) why not use Agatha as a witness to the suicide of Crow. Also there are witnesses
>that Anderton did not kill Witwer (Agatha and his wife). So Anderton should
>not have been convicted of anything at the end, even if he did not have conclusive
>proof against Burgess.
Normally, they don't need it - judges review the cased, they get
positive IDs and retinal scans, the warrant is issued. The belief is
the system is perfect, that those are all the safe guards you need
(that's one reason Anderton was upset by the idea of a Minority Report
- it was a potential flaw in the system that even HE didn't know
about). The same system was used for the murder of Witwer, though they
didn't have a pre-cog vision of it. Again, a flaw in the system. And
given the time from Anderton's apartment to the summer house is
probably the same for Anderton running from the law as it is for
Burgess to send the team (and if he was smart, he'd pad the time to be
sure), he could have shot Witwer and made it to the house before
Pre-Crime. His witnesses - his wife who clearly has feelings for him,
and a pre-cog who hasn't been outside of the bathtub for years - not
ideal witnesses (while Agatha might be viewed as "a god" by some, her
rambling talking would make it tough to illicit hard information the
jury feels is reliable).
>
>
>THE ANNE LIVELY MURDER
>-) Burgess kills Anne Lively with a clever plan, BUT you know what would have been
>even MORE clever, not killing her IN WASHINTON DC! Tell her that her daughter
>is in Oregon, and give her a plane ticket.
If you want to have a decent alibi, you do it in D.C. He's a local,
not federal official, so any long trip would call attention. And as it
sounds like all those children were worked on in the same place, she
would probably know what facility her daughter was in.
>
>-) Burgess' murder of Anne Lively, why didn't the brown ball fall
>with the old guys name on it? Surely they don't erase possible echos
>without first checking the names. (More on "echoes" below.)
Doesn't get to the name part - the tech deletes it as he sees it,
recognizing it as an echo, something he was taught to do. It wasn't
put through to the point where the balls are created.
>
>-) the Burgess' 'fake murder', was there no investigation of that,
>shouldn't the cops have looked for motive, and perhaps found out the killer
>was hired, then try to go after who hired him? I can imagine the first thing
>the killer said was "some old guy hired me to kill her!"
There was no murder from Pre-Crime's POV - they stopped it. They
immediately ID the killer, and put the Halo on him. Doubt they pay
attention to his begging in that moment. They left he alive, and never
got any report of another attempt on her life.
>
>- why was Burgess claiming no knowledge of Ann Lively's fake-murder,
>only to give a giant OOPS to Anderton's wife ("she drowned", and in fact she did
>not drown acoording to what was thought by everybody to be true)?
>Why didn't he say, "yeah, John mentioned it to me. Don't know what the deal was though"
>Or better yet, admit that sometimes there are only two feeds of the visions
>from the precog, and John had found that the Ann Lively case was one of them.
>A little bit of truth is a good way to hid deeper lies.
Why be power hungry? Why not retire at 80 having created this new
national system? Greed makes one a bit irrational - he doesn't want
any connection between him and that murder, so he denies it. He denies
all flaws in the system.
>
>INCONSISTENT PRECOG ABILITIES
>- inconsistent precogs: we see them always getting a vison together ("they are a hive mind"),
>Early on in the movie we are told (apparently) the twins see the fake murder, while the girl
>apparently had a 'minority report' with a different scene (ie wind blowing other way).
>Later the story changes to the girl saw another murder that occured later (and was thought to be an echo).
>
>The movie itself is confused as to what the cover story was.
>So the story is EITHER agatha's vision of Anne's murder was a minority report, taken
>simultaneously with the twin's version, and thus erased. OR the story was that Agatha's
>vision of Anne's murder was an echo that was recorded at a later time. BUT we know that
>the first 'fake murder' was a valid precog vision (so why did Agatha not see it, what
>happened to her report?) AND we know that the second real murder (of Anne by Burgess) was
>a valid precog vision (so why did the twin's not see that vision). Who knows, maybe they did,
>and all three were erased.
Agatha saw the "real" murder, the boys saw the initial attempt. Thus
Agatha has a "minority report" that is deleted. Later, when she is
actually killed, they all have a vision of that - for the boys, it's
new, for Agatha, it's an echo.
>
>The problem with the "echo" story of the Anne murder:
>Firstly, the tech must have looked at the vision's images to determine that it was
>an echo. And he must have seen that image of Burgess's face. There is no way a tech would
>delete the info without looking at all of it, and especially checking out the names
>of the murderer and victim. It would be a very easy and failsafe way of identifying
>that it was indeed an echo.
Burgess' face was in the minority report, not the echo. And at that
point, a name has not been punched out - as echos are common, the
system is that the echos are deleted before it gets to the name-ball
part of the process.
>Note, the movie shows us that echoes happen after the original vision, Agatha's vision
>was an supposed to be an "echo", not a minority report.
She had both.
>
>
>GENERAL PLOT PROBLEMS
>- minority reports - they are ignored the whole movie, although mentioned that there
>are several of them (i.e. only two precog movies). The problem with this is that the
>whole precrime department is shut down at the end of the movie. But why? The pre cogs
>were perfect. It was the head guy Burgess who manipulated the system by effectively
>erasing the evidence and report of a murder (anne's) which the precog's (at least agatha)
>did see correctly. The only reason to abandon the project it seems is because of the minority
>reports, which weren't a part of the movie.
They are ignored because no one knew of them. Everyone, even someone
as high up and under Burgess' wing as Anderton didn't know about them.
They were a serious flaw in the system - they thought the three
pre-cogs were never wrong; well, if they disagree, then at least one
is wrong. Calls the whole system into question. Add to that the
manipulation of the system by a person with access to it, it calls the
whole operation, which many would be wary of, unpalatable, and gets it
shut down.
>
>
>- at the beginning with the wifecheater murder, the cops look up 10 or so guys with
>the name of the killer, getting all their info, but they don't know which one it is.
>So far so good. Based on the images, they they narrow it down to a street across
>from the park, and to about 10 houses that all look alike.
>WHY NOT LOOK UP THE HOUSE OF THE GUY'S NAME WHO LIVES ON THAT STREET??
>GRAB A PHONEBOOK. They had all that info on the computers at the precrime office.
>Or why not at least send one officer into each house.
>And why didn't the other officers run in behind Anderton, instead of crashing
>through the ceiling? (Yes i know, it looked cool)
They have 60 seconds. And they had no known address for the guy - his
records showed an old house, that looked like it burned down. They
system wasn't updated on their new address, so a phone book likely
wouldn't be either. It also shows they don't bust down any old door -
they need probable cause, they need to ID the specific location.
>- what was the point of the bassethound face for Anderton he just walked the in back
>door using his Anderton identity anyways.
To get to that point. He was Mr Yakamoto up to that door. His face was
known, so he changed that. He changed his eyes, so he wasn't
recognized on the retinal scanners - he could go through the public
areas as far as possible without getting seen.
>
>
>OTHER FUTURE STUFF PROBLEMS
>-) why doesn't anyone wear sunglasses, I'd avoid retina scans all the time, especially
>with that obnoxious advertising.
Do they stop retinal scans? Didn't see any indication they do.
>-) the non use of weapons, and weapons that are quickly forgotten, sicksticks (cool!),
>stun rifles, etc.
Well, they are "quickly" forgotten because it wasn't an action movie.
There were maybe 3 action sequences: The cars, the Pre-Crime cops in
the alley/apartments, and the car factory. Not a lot of action outside
of that.
>-) the moldy sandwich, ok tom has lost his smell as well as sight. This could NOT be revenge
>since the doc didn't know Anderton was coming.
It was an old safe-house. Half the sandwich had been eaten before, but
grew moldy. The doctor used the space before, just doesn't bother to
clean.
>- the lack of a LAN, and the use of op(tical)-floppies to transfer files across a room.
>- the precogs are in a giant toilet, that the precrime cops didn't know about ("find out where that went").
> Anderton flushes them out to make his spectalur escape. LAME
>- the prison has one rent a cop watching it, and the wife can just walk in and free Anderton.
If no one has been trying to break out people, and only people with
the proper retinal scan get it, and the prisoners are comatose, how
many guards to you need?
~consul
> Spoilers:
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> HOLES:
>
>
> THE SETUP
> -) Burgess sets up Anderton, but doesn't tell him where
> Crow is or how to find him. This had to happen somehow, you can't
> merely put a guy in a room, and hope that Anderton finds it,
> and hope that Anderton kills him. We can assume in the original timeline
> that Burgess must somehow lead Anderton to the apartment, but this was
> never mentioned in the movie, and leaves a big question. Burgess could
> not have planned Anderton finding out about the future vision, THEN
> becoming a fugitive, taking the precog, and finding the apartment with the
> precog's help. There must have been another original plan, but it is
> completely ignored.
Didn't Burgess get a copy of the vision? He saw what was going to happen, and so
he knew when and where to place the murder to happen like it did in the vision.
If the argument is "How?" then I think Burgess is a better reader of the visions
than Anderton, and he figured it out quicker.
> This is in fact another flaw in the plan. It occured as Burgess expected, but the police
> still didn't buy it and were suspecting a setup. Which maybe/probably would have
> led back to Burgess.
He made mistakes, he's human.
> -) Witwer's murder was pinned on Anderton, even though he is far
> away with witnesses (his wife and the precog) at the time of death.
> Again, it implies that a precog murder case gets no trial, no defence
> lawyers, no investigation etc.
I think that's the point of those 2 folks in the display. The investigation is
done in front of them, analysing the visions. The defines doesn't matter, the
vision shows it happening. And the trial doesn't matter as well, for the same
reason. It's happening/happened and the two witnesses are, I guess, given
complete trust.
> -) why not use Agatha as a witness to the suicide of Crow. Also there are witnesses
> that Anderton did not kill Witwer (Agatha and his wife). So Anderton should
> not have been convicted of anything at the end, even if he did not have conclusive
> proof against Burgess.
No trial, no luck. :(
> - why was Burgess claiming no knowledge of Ann Lively's fake-murder,
> only to give a giant OOPS to Anderton's wife ("she drowned", and in fact she did
> not drown acoording to what was thought by everybody to be true)? Why didn't he say, "yeah, John mentioned it to me. Don't know what the
> deal was though" Or better yet, admit that sometimes there are only two feeds of the visions
> from the precog, and John had found that the Ann Lively case was one of them.
> A little bit of truth is a good way to hid deeper lies.
I was thinking that too. Just say "John told me."
> BUT we know that the first 'fake murder' was a valid precog vision (so why did Agatha not
> see it, what happened to her report?) AND we know that the second real murder (of
> Anne by Burgess) was a valid precog vision (so why did the twin's not see that vision). Who
> knows, maybe they did, and all three were erased.
The fake murder was a real murder, the first murder. The 2nd murder, the one of
Lively, was a real murder as well. It was just done so it registered as an echo
of the first murder.
> And the video was not the same, since it would have had the Burgess'
> face in it! A tech would delete an echo without even watching the whole thing first??
I think that maybe they get so many echoes, that if, say the first 10 minutes is
the same, it's an echo.
> Or if the computer automatically processed these visions, then why did it think it was an echo?
> Surely the computer's software would actually check for echoes by comparing names and the
> whole image stream.
I don't think a computer could do the evals of the visions, seeing how chaotic
they are. And if they did, they probably have a similar criteria of "first x
minutes the same = echo"
--
"american girls . . . all weather and noise . . ."
Jameson Stalanthas Yu
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