Minority Report isn't Spielberg's best

I just watched Minority Report for the second time or third time. It's not a terrible movie, but it's not a great movie, either. Given Steven Spielberg's skills and experience, I have to say that I was rather disappointed when I watched it for the first time as it just came out a couple of years ago. Why did I watch for the second time(or third time?) today? Well, it's because I wanted to get my mind off, and also I wanted to find out why it was disappointing and I wanted to write about it. So, what did I find?

1. Too narrative and too many events take place; the story is not a terrible story. It kind of makes sense, though it's nothing original. I guess, since too many events take place, it feels like the story is forced to be told, and because of that, the story seems too narrative.

1.2. The ending seems a little forced. Bad guy dies and bad system closes down. All these happen within minutes at the end of the movie.

1.3. In some cases, being narrative and showing a lot of events work well (like how it's done in GoodFellas), but it does not work in this case. It does not work because each event, each scene in this movie has or is supposed to have meaning in this movie. This is a science fiction, and each event, each scene is created to have its own meaning in this movie. However, there are too many events and scenes and they are put in 2 hours of the movie rather forcefully.

(1.4. Showing many events and scenes works in GoodFellas, because events and scenes are rather domestic. They are kind of events and scenes that can be happening everywhere. Cars, houses, and gangsters; you can actually find them and see them.)

2. Since Tom Cruise is in the movie, you tend to think that this is a happy story, and the movie looks like that on the surface, but the story told is actually a pretty dark story. The government takes a lot of control and sets up monitoring system everywhere. Corporations are ever more powerful, and they really become integral part of every second of your life. However, the cinematography and atmosphere do not exactly match the story.

2.2. The ending is predictably a happy ending. The ending can be a happy ending, but it needs to fit. It needs to be created so that there is flow; Blade Runner, another science fiction movie, also tells a dark story. The movie has a happy ending, but it is not a typical Hollywood happy ending, and it fits. Minority Report doesn't have that kind of ending.

2.3. Can Tom Cruise ever be a part of dark story? Maybe, maybe not.