Minority Report (2002)

The entire justice system of 2054 runs on three psychics floating in a glorified kiddie pool, and not one person in Washington thinks that’s sketchy. That’s the movie. Spielberg builds a future so sharp it’s unnerving: billboards scan your eyeballs and greet you by name, cops shuffle evidence around in midair with fancy gloves, and little spider robots crawl under doors to check your ID. Tom Cruise spends 145 minutes running from his own department and sells every second of the panic. Samantha Morton’s Agatha is the real reason to watch, though. She barely talks and she’s the most unsettling thing on screen. The problem is the last stretch. It ties everything up so neatly it feels like a studio note snuck into the edit. Still pulled $358.4 million worldwide on a reported $102M budget. An 8.2 because the first two hours are close to perfect sci-fi and the ending blinks first. $199 says you swipe at your TV like Cruise tonight and absolutely nothing happens.

What works: Samantha Morton’s haunted Agatha, a future packed with ideas that feel eerily familiar now, and Cruise sprinting through all of it like his life depends on it.

What doesn’t: The final act wraps everything up far too neatly for a movie this dark, and a couple of the chases run long.

Who it’s for: People who like their sci-fi with a detective story inside it and a future that looks a little too close to home.