Minority Report (Film)

Minority Report (Film) Imagery

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We see John in his home for the first time as he plays old videos of his son Sean and his wife. When John plays a video of his wife, Spielberg shoots the image from the front, so she looks real. Then, when he switches to shooting her from the side, we see the projected image blurring in a stream of light towards the opposite wall that John stands near. Then the image disappears. Spielberg's imagery shows how John's life is all based on what was, memories of a past life he yearns to recreate. The image slipping away shows the nature of yearning for something John cannot have.

Smoking Gun

After Burgess shoots Danny Witwer to cover up his crime, Spielberg shows a close up of the pistol with the smoke still coming out of the barrel. The image is shocking given the suddenness of Burgess' murder of Witmer. The smoke from the gun represents the shock that follows the event.

Precog Visions

When the Precogs have a vision, Spielberg shows it to us as a grainier image than the rest of the film. By doing this, he creates a separation between what the three Precogs see in their minds as visions of future crimes and what is happening in the present day. The grain of the image also suggests the potential unreliability of the image and in the case of Anne Lively, the murkiness of the memory.

Iris Hineman's house

Iris Hineman's house, a small cottage situated in the middle of a large forest filled with plants, stands in stark contrast to the rest of the film's aesthetic. While the imagery of the city is very sleek and modern, with flying vehicles and holograms, Iris Hineman's world is filled with exotic plants hanging all over the place, a temple of biology and nature. The imagery of Iris's home is very vivid in relation to the rest of the film's imagery, calling to mind the relationship between technology and nature.