Corrected entry: After Anderton flushes himself alongside Agatha down the tank, Gordon is directing security to seal the area. Witwer interrupts him with the statement "Doesn't matter, he wins" and responds to the more detailed plans to stop them in the reservoir with "Gordon, she's in the room with him when he kills Crow. She's already a part of his future." This seems awfully defeatist for a character that was established as being so gung-ho about landing a job at a division specifically based around preventing undesirable futures from happening. The only plausible reason for this total 180 that flies in the face of the film's premise? The writers needed a quick way to move past an escape sequence in the sewers without leaving the audience wondering what was missed.
Corrected entry: When Lamar shoots Colin Farrell, where was a pre-cog ball?
Correction: It's explained quite clearly in the film - unless the three precogs are together, it doesn't work. As Agatha is away from the twins, off with Anderton, there's no precognition, so Lamar can kill Witwer without being picked up.
The question still remains though: why was there no pre-cog ball of Witwer's murder rolling, before Agatha was kidnapped by Anderton? Witwer's murder happened a few hours after Crowe's death, hence the pre-vision of Witwer's murder could have easily occurred a few hours after the pre-vision of Crowe's death.
The decision to murder Wither was not made until after Agatha was taken. As stated at the beginning of the film premeditated murder gives them more time to look at the visions and decode the information, crimes of passion only give them minutes.
Well yeah but they aren't attained only after the decision is made by the perpetrator. Anderton got his ball well before he even knew he would do anything. His ball came hours before the intended murder, so should Lamar's. I like this question.
But with Anderton there were events that lead to the murder that happened before he knew anything, like Burgess hiring Crow to be the victim. So somehow the Precogs pickup on that and created a ball. With Wither there was nothing before hand that would trigger the Precogs.
The PreCrime system works by the PreCogs scanning for people with the intent to kill and then determining details. Burgess' intent to murder Witwer came well after Agatha was disconnected, when he discovered that Witwer knew about the framing of Anderton. Therefore, there couldn't have been a ball, as the system was offline.
Correction: It's because Burgess' murder of Witwer would count as a red ball since he doesn't have any reason to murder Witwer until Witwer reveals he's getting too close to uncovering the truth. By the time the precogs would normally have foreseen such a murder (remembering the movie states red ball killings only have a few minutes worth of warning) Agatha has long since been removed from the equation so yes, it makes sense Witwer's death isn't picked up ahead of time.
Corrected entry: Precrime couldn't figure out Howard Marks' new address. But the Post Office (also a federal organization) must have known it; otherwise how would the Markses get their mail? Recall that a magazine or newspaper was shown in the previsions, and Anderton unsuccessfully tried to zoom in on the address label, proving it was delivered. The United States Postal Service knew their new address, yet Precrime didn't?
Correction: Magazines, letters and so forth are delivered to whatever's on the address label - it doesn't automatically follow that this information is in a Post Office database somewhere. Besides, we never see how the magazine gets to the house - it could have been forwarded on from their old address by the new occupants, or Marks could have gone back and collected it.
Corrected entry: When Anderton is about to have his eyes replaced, the "doctor" swipes his credit card. Wouldn't the police use everything possible to find him, including the use of his credit card?
Correction: The doctor stated that there wasn't very much money in the account when his nurse swiped the card. Anderton said that he had moved as much money as he could safely move, so it's reasonable to assume Anderton moved the money to something like a gift card, which couldn't be traced back to him.
Corrected entry: In Containment, Anderton asks the sentry about Agatha's missing prevision. The sentry says, "For that, we go for a ride," while facing the pipe organ. The camera cuts to a wide shot of the plank extending and the sentry is now facing away from the organ.
Correction: When the camera cuts to a wide shot of the plank extending this is a new scene - the actors leave the organ room and start moving within the containment area by the moving platform - two different environments. It is not a continuity error when changing to a next scene.
Corrected entry: In the scene where Anderton drops the eyeball that he wants to use to gain entry to Pre-Crime, the eye rolls down the passage, making "clickety-clack" noises. We were watching the movie on DVD with a friend who works in an eye clinic, and we all burst out laughing. Eyes are too soft to either roll or sound like that (only the ones from Halloween novelty stores do that...). (01:20:45)
Correction: The noises aren't "clickety clack". It's a sticky/wet sound, initially slapping against the pavement and then rolling along the ground.
Corrected entry: After Witwer is killed, Lara calls Burgess, who asks, "Has he got the precog with him?" to which Lara responds, "Yes". But Lara has never seen a precog. How would she know what a precog looks like?
Correction: Lara may not have seen one before, but it's hardly unreasonable for her to make the assumption that the woman with Anderton is the missing precog. Who else could she be? Anderton's hardly going to have stopped to pick up a date.
Corrected entry: During the "greenhouse" scene Dr. Hineman explains to Anderton how the Pre-Cogs came about from the children of drug abusing mothers using these words, "This was 10 years ago when neuroin first hit the streets...All of these kids were born with severe brain damage. Most died before the age of 12." If this only happened "10 years ago" how does she know they died "before the age of 12" and, more importantly for the film, how is it that Agatha and the twins are older than 10? (From the European DVD version, scene 10, with the English "Hard of Hearing" subtitles on for clarity.)
Correction: If she said "This was 10 years ago when neuroin first hit the streets..." that simply means that it became easily obtainable at that time. It could have been around much longer than that, although it may not have been as easy to find from drug dealers.
Corrected entry: John Anderton is a wanted man. The precogs have implicated him in the future murder of Leo Crow and put out an all-points bulletin on him. They are able to track his movements through retinal scanners placed all over the city and two chase sequences show that they will send disruptive squads of nearly a dozen members and risk extensive property damage just to arrest him. That premise is made clear. What isn't made clear, however, is why the facility hosting the precogs, the central hub of this operation, allows John to use his old eyeballs to just waltz right in through the back without so much as even a warning going off? For that matter, why is there only one single, effectively unmonitored (one loopy caretaker with a manual alarm on a far wall does not a security system make) door to what is probably the single most valuable government asset? Why hasn't the system been updated to remove his access to key areas? And most importantly, why does the system have a flush mechanism that dumps the precog out to an unsecured location? The audience is expected to accept that these are very competent policemen that have enough planning and expertise to stop every single murder within the region for several years, but also that they would leave such a glaring security hole in their system.
Correction: Precrime didn't know Anderton was going after the precogs until it was too late. Not everyone knows about the Minority Report system, as evidenced by Anderton's reaction. As for not updating the database to deny Anderton access, maybe they simply didn't have time in the rush to capture him. Regarding the flush mechanism, again, they had no idea it would be used to transport the precogs out of the building. It's simply there to drain the water and nothing more.
Corrected entry: How can the precogs confine their dreams/visions to the District of Columbia? When they were about to go "national", we are to believe they will all of the sudden be able to have visions that stop at the Canadian and Mexican border?
Correction: The range attainable by the precognitives' visions is never stated. It apparently covers the entire District of Columbia, but there is clearly some distance limitation involved, otherwise putting the precogs into an isolated cabin to give them a peaceful vision-free existence, as we see at the end of the film, would be a pointless exercise. While the situation you bring up never arises during the movie, it's hardly unreasonable to assume that should a vision be pinpointed to a location outside DC, then the PreCrime unit could simply notify appropriate authorities in that area, or they may have agreements with those areas that they can enter them in the course of their duties, or they may simply be ignored as being outside PreCrime's jurisdiction. Likewise, once the programme is expanded to the national level, some sort of agreement could readily be drawn up with neighbouring governments to cover the eventuality of a prevision being traced to a location outside the United States. None of these possibilities are explored in the film, but the fact that they aren't touched upon doesn't make this a mistake, simply an unanswered question.
Corrected entry: The Precrime cops make a huge effort to track down and arrest Anderton before he commits his murder. However, they make no effort whatsoever to protect Crowe. They could've moved Crowe to a secure location, one Anderton was not aware of, rather than waste time chasing down someone who knows their tactics and could easily outrun them. It made sense why they didn't protect the other victims because the murders took place mere minutes after Precrime analyzed the visions, but the Precogs saw Anderton's murder days in advance. The cops had plenty of time to locate and protect Crowe. If Anderton couldn't find Crowe in the first place, the murder would've been prevented, since all the other murders were prevented when the killer was separated from the victims and could not commit the crime.
Correction: The director of Precrime is the one that set up Anderton. He set set up the fake future murder. He could have easily directed the police to avoid protecting Crowe.
Corrected entry: Anderton approaches that old Doctor's house and the camera shows a KEEP OUT sign. However the sign is pointing towards the camera, the same way that Anderton's car is driving as he approaches, which means either the sign is the wrong way round or the Doctor doesn't want anyone ever to leave her property. (00:53:05)
Correction: We see the car drive up behind the sign and stop to the left of the sign, at the end of a footpath which runs past the sign up to the house. The sign is for people on the path, not the road.
Corrected entry: In the Lexus plant, Anderton kicks Whitworth who touches his hand to his mouth, and spits out blood. At the end of this scene, after Anderton drives out of the plant, the close-up of Whitworth shows a trail of dried blood coming out of his nose, not his mouth, which shows no sign of injury. (00:51:20 - 00:52:40)
Correction: There is never any sign of external injury to Danny's mouth - most likely it was his gums or teeth bleeding.
Corrected entry: In the footage of Anderton murdering Leo Crowe, we get a good look of an old lady with a pipe and a guy with glasses being behind the window. With all their technology, databases and awareness of where everybody is, they never bothered to look those two up? They could have narrowed it down easily. More than that, we learn Leo Crowe was listed in the hotel register. Could they not look him up as well and find out where he could be? It just seems they made too many mistakes for a department which could stop murderers in a few minutes.
Corrected entry: This film is based on a play written by Sophocles call Oedipus Rex. If you read the play you will see that there are many references to this play in the movie, from his eyeballs being taken out to the telling of his fate.
Correction: Actually, no, it's based on the Philip K. Dick story of the same name. Whether Dick might have borrowed any ideas from the Sophocles play is irrelevant, this film was not based on it. Any similarities, and there aren't really that many, are purely coincidental.
Corrected entry: After the fight scene in the automobile plant where Anderton is built into a car on the assembly line, we see him sit up after the car is done being made. It's obvious that we are looking at the tail-end of the production process, because we see the car he is in being painted as it rolls along. When the car is finished, Anderton sits up in the driver's seat and drives the car out an exit that is apparently right in front of him. If this is the end of a giant assembly line, where do the rest of the cars go? Does someone drive all of them off of the line as well?
Correction: The cars drive themselves off the line and to the place where they are to be stored or loaded for shipping. Recall that moments earlier, Anderton's own car went into "automatic pilot" mode while he was fleeing, suggesting that cars can be piloted both manually and via computer.
Corrected entry: When Burgess is talking to John Anderton in his car on the flip up transparent panel on his desk, the word Nokia is the correct way round to the people in the cinema, therefore it would have been a mirror image to Burgess who was using it.
Correction: That would actually be a clever marketing strategy by Nokia. If the computer is used in a library, airport, cafe, or any public place, Nokia would want their logo to appear correctly to other people as a form of advertising.
Corrected entry: Eye scanners can tell the difference between living eyes and dead ones from the pulses in the blood vessels. If the eyes have been removed and shoved in a bag, the scanners shouldn't have recognized them in the first place.
Correction: Yes, some eye scanners can tell the difference between living and dead eyes. These ones can't, that's not a movie mistake.
Corrected entry: When Anderton and co. are scrambling on-board the hovercrafts to go and prevent Howard Marks from killing his wife and her lover, Anderton and the female pilot can be seen strapping themselves in and their data screens automatically lower down in front of their faces. Later on however, when the Pre-cops are searching the sprawl, the pilot has to manually pull down her data screen.
Correction: The first time the data screen automatically came down, perhaps it was due to them taking off and/or it came down when they strapped themselves in, kind of like the fasten seat belt light goes off when you fasten it. So, when she manually pulls it down, she might have moved it on her own, so she could have a better view of her surrounding area, and just lowered it down so she could view the information it was providing. Plus, she was already strapped in, and it wouldn't come down automatically.
Corrected entry: Anderton's assistant explains to Whitwer that the balls are impossible to forge because the "shape" and grain of each ball is unique. The grain may be unique, but each ball has the same shape. (00:21:20)
Correction: The balls are probably not perfectly round, which would give each ball a unique shape.
Correction: Character decission to act like this. Not a plot hole.
Brad ★