On Sat, Jun 29, 2002 at 10:39:41AM -0500, Marvin Long, Jr. wrote: > > I like it. I don't like it. > > Spoilers (and some shouting) > . > . > . > . > . > . > . > . > . > . > . > . > . > . > . > . > . > . > . > . > . >
I guess I liked it even less than Marvin. The concept of cops seeing the future and preventing murder is an interesting one. Everything else about the movie was poor. I'll accept the whole vegetable children predict the future thing as a given, since it is necessary for the concept of the film. But with that big suspension of disbelief, it should have been possible to have everything else fall into place from there. But it didn't. In addition to the glaring errors Marvin pointed out, I thought the whole justice system for prevented murders was ridiculously unlikely. The wooden painted balls were just silly. And it seemed the potential murderers were tried and sentenced for murder before they were even caught. I would have expected something like an arrest warrant to be issued by the judge/witness, then the potential murderer is apprehended, then there is a trial. Probably, things would work out that the cops, when feasible, would wait until the last minute for the murderer to make an attempt, then they would stop the murderer just in time, which would make the evidence more likely to hold up in court. Since the murder was not committed, the crime should be attempted murder, not murder. If convicted, the attempted murderer should be treated accordingly, but it seems unlikely it would be necessary to put them in some mental-vegetable prison. Perhaps some prison time ould be necessary for some, but more likely would be house arrest, therapy, maybe community service (perhaps combined with police surveillance, since they might commit other crimes than murder during their rehabilitation/parole). Also, I can understand the necessity not to go into too much detail about how the oracle children are able to predict the future, but the movie could have told us more about their lives. Maybe I missed an explanation (my concentration was a bit off when I saw the movie), but I wanted to know how the children were chosen, was their future "life" explained to them beforehand and did they consent, how long was their tour of duty, etc. Was there anything in it for them? Were they promised something? Or were they just doing it for the good of society, etc. Did anyone read the book on which the movie was based? I wonder if it was any better thought out. -- "Erik Reuter" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> http://www.erikreuter.com/
