Minority Report

"Minority Report" (2002)

The moment: Mechanical spiders skitter through a slum apartment building searching for Tom Cruise's eyes.

Why it's great: In "Minority Report," Spielberg imagines an America where the citizens have passively bartered away their civil rights in the ... morename of public safety with imaginative imagery and bravura style.

Why it has lasted: There isn't a word uttered about the invasion of the body human (let alone privacy), but the sight of innocent bystanders hunted down by the icky spiderlike surveillance robots and subjected to invasive retina scans is a nightmarish portrait of a paternal police state. That the cops so casually unleash this home invasion and the citizens endure it with such numb acquiescence only makes it more insidious. This is Spielberg at his darkest and most political, and he sneaks it all under the cover of a thrilling piece of suspense and creepy spectacle.

(20th Century Fox / Courtesy Everett Collection)