In life, people have the freewill to choose what they want; however, in some cases, faith and fate takes the center stage despite the choices made through freewill. This aspect of life comes out clearly in the movie Minority Report and the play Antigone. Even though at some point some characters in Antigone have the freewill to make choices, faith plays a key role throughout the play. In the movie Minority Report, faith and fate run all actions that take place in the movie.
In Antigone, after Creon decrees that Polynices will not be given proper burial, Antigone chooses to follow her faith. She decides to follow the unwritten law according to her faith. She does not care whether this will cost her life or not. Fagles notes that, “Antigone appeals not only to the bond of kindred blood but also to the unwritten law, sanctioned by the gods, that the dead must be given a proper burial – a religious principle” (Sophocles 40).
In this case, faith takes precedence over freewill. Even though Antigone has the freewill to comply with Creon’s edict, she has to follow the ‘sanctions’ of her faith. Like wise Creon, even though he seems to defy religious beliefs that the dead should receive a proper burial, he follows faith. Fagles notes that, “But Creon’s, position is not anti-religious; in fact, he believes that he has religion on his side.
The gods for him, are the gods of the city…Creon finds it unthinkable that these gods should demand the burial of a traitor to the city” (Sophocles 40). This shows how faith is deeply rooted in this society. Freewill does not matter; people can only use freewill to make choices based on what they believe.
In the movie Minority Report, faith takes center stage. Anderton’s police have absolute faith in their system of detecting future crimes and stopping them before they happen. This explains why if a Pre-cog detects a suspect, he or she is arrested without questioning.
There is no need of trial because the authorities have faith that this system works perfectly. “Anderton’s single-minded belief that locking up potential murderers is right based on his pre-deterministic belief in Pre-Crime’s righteous predictions” (Bruni Para. 7). This is absolute faith. Actually, Anderton has faith in this system such that even after he learns he would become a murderer in the near future, he does not hide or escape.
Despite the fact that Anderton knows that he is only set up to kill Crow and refuses to kill him in the first place, he later pulls the trigger killing Crow to comply with Pre-cog’s report. This can only be explained in matters of faith. If Anderton had freewill, he would choose not to kill Crow and uphold his decision. Unfortunately, he has so much faith in the system that he does what it says.
Nevertheless, the Pre-cog system has faults and this comes out clearly, after Witwer concurs that the systems suffers recidivates of past murders. It is only faith that keeps Agatha, Anderton and Witwer in the Pre-cog system despite the fact that they know it is faulty. Its faultiness comes towards the end of the film when the Pre-crime department is closed.
Faith dominates the play Antigone and movie Minority Report. Antigone’s faith makes her hold steadfast to her beliefs even unto death. Creon also holds to his faith, which he believes does not allow evil people to receive proper burial. As a result, tragedy befalls Creon’s empire because of misusing his faith.
On the other hand, Anderton and his allies have absolute faith in their Pre-crime detection system. This faith explains why an individual; detected in the Pre-cog system, becomes guilty of murder without trail. Actually, Anderton accepts to kill Crow simply because the Pre-cog system has said so. Therefore, faith is used in this movie and drama and not freewill.
Works Cited
Bruni, John. “Minority Report.” 2004. Web.
Sophocles. “The Three Theban Plays.” Fagles, Robert & Knox, Bernard. (Eds.) New York; Penguin Group, 1984.