Minority Report review: Low-budget bid to recreate Tom Cruise's action flick ... trends now
Minority Report
Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith
Verdict: Rent the film
I had high hopes for David Haig's stage adaptation of Philip K Dick's 1956 sci-fi novel, The Minority Report.
Alas, it is more in line with Tim Vine's great gag about crime in multi-storey car parks: it's wrong on so many levels.
David Haig's stage adaptation of Philip K Dick's 1956 sci-fi novel, The Minority Report follows a society that has developed brain chips to stop criminals before they act
Max Webster's production is a low-budget, high-tech melodrama that includes a toe-curling car chase in a flimsy Smart car (pictured)
David Haig's play is more in line with Tim Vine's great gag about crime in multi-storey car parks: it's wrong on so many levels
Most fundamentally wrong, the story of a society that's developed brain chips to stop criminals before they act, tries to emulate the kinetic energy of Steven Spielberg's 2002 action film version of the book, starring Tom Cruise.
The Cruise character becomes Jodie McNee's Julia, a soundbite -spouting CEO of the dystopian Ministry of Pre-Crime preaching an end to misogynistic violence and a new dawn of peace, calm, health and happiness.
But when the technology turns on her, it suddenly looks a lot less cool.
Sadly Max Webster's production is a low-budget, high-tech melodrama that includes a toe-curling car chase in a flimsy Smart car.
Car chases, alas, only work on stage as comedy and although McNee vies to take Julia seriously, there is some unusually risible acting amid dystopian clichés of interminable rain, brollies and electronic Vangelis music culled from
