﻿In today’s video, we will be going through the 2011’s Science Fiction
Romantic Thriller: The Adjustment Bureau. Spoilers ahead! You have been warned. Make
sure to give this video a thumbs up, comment on what your favorite part was,
and subscribe to our channel for more. David Norris is a popular, young congressman
from Brooklyn. He runs for the United States Senate in 2006. He is the leading candidate in the
running to become the next New York senator before his senate ambitions get derailed because of an
embarrassing “mooning” scandal the congressman gets involved in at his college reunion party,
which gets splattered all over the front page of the New York Post. As a result of the
scandal and his past bar fights, Norris, branded “impulsive” and “immature” by voters, loses the
election. A bummed Norris, while rehearsing for his concession speech at a hotel loo,
meets a carefree, beautiful Elise Sellas who is hiding in the men’s WC from hotel security looking
for her for crashing a wedding. Elise’s carefree attitude enchants the congressman as opposed to
his tactfully crafted public persona. They share a passionate kiss, though he does not get her name.
Inspired by her, David delivers an unusually candid, authentic, and electrifying speech that is
well-received by the public, undoing a lot of the damage caused by his scandals. It makes him the
obvious front-runner for the next election. A month later, David prepares for a new job at his
friend Charlie’s Venture Capital firm as a senior partner. At Madison Square Park near David's home,
two men in suits wearing peculiar hats meet. They are Harry Mitchell and his superior Richardson.
Harry is instructed by the latter that he is to spill coffee on David's shirt by 7:05 AM,
so David misses his bus. However, waiting for David to arrive at the park, Harry falls asleep;
David boards a bus to his work, where he runs into Elise again. Harry comes to his senses
and unsuccessfully chases after the bus. He gets knocked over by a speeding car at an intersection.
Harry gets himself together and takes a worrying look at his mysterious book.
This time around, David gets Elise’s first name and phone number.
David arrives at work early and walks briskly towards his office, where everyone is frozen
in time. He walks into a conference room where he finds Richardson and a bunch of other shady
unfamiliar men examining his friend. Startled, David fears for his life and unsuccessfully
attempts to bolt. He is eventually incapacitated and taken to a warehouse where Richardson reveals
the existence of the Adjustment Bureau. As its staff, Richardson and his men ensure people's
lives proceed following "the Plan,” a complex document Richardson attributes to "the Chairman.”
Most things that happen in people’s lives are according to “the plan.” Although sometimes,
it happens because of pure luck. He tells David that he was supposed to spill coffee on his shirt
at the park, go back to his place to change his shirt, and miss his bus to work. Consequently,
he would have arrived late at work, giving the Adjustment Bureau enough time to reprogram his
friend Charlie’s mind into following “the plan.” It is also revealed that he was supposed to never
meet Elise again, so they destroy the card in his pocket with Elise's phone number.
David is firmly warned by Richardson that if he tells anyone about them or tries to
meet Elise again, he will be "reset.” His memory and personality will be permanently erased.
Three years pass by, and David again encounters Elise after seeing her from a bus window.
He has been riding that bus for three years every day, hoping to bump into
her. He calls his friend Charlie asking him to postpone his scheduled speech.
He takes Elise to a secluded restaurant hoping to hide from the prying Adjustment Bureau.
He learns that she dances for Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet. Panic ensues at the Bureau,
and it is concluded that David ran into Elise by chance. Richardson arrives at the restaurant
using an ordinary doorway that helps him travel instantly to distant locations. Miraculously,
Charlie finds David at the secluded restaurant, and the Bureau secretly changes Elise’s rehearsal
venue to Pier 17, close to the place where David was supposed to be delivering his speech.
This gives David a sense of, albeit false, relief and finally convinces him to deliver the speech.
As he gets down from the stage after delivering the speech, David notices Richardson monitoring
him from a distance and immediately deciphers his plan. He starts running towards pier 17.
He doesn’t find Elise as her dance rehearsal had again been moved back to the original venue
by the bureau. They further try to prevent David from finding Elise by manipulating all
nearby telephone and taxi services. However, David still manages to outsmart
them by exploiting the bureau’s power limits to find out her dance studio’s address and starts
making his way towards her in a taxi. He breaks traffic laws, bypassing the pre-planned traffic
jams put in place by the bureau in order to stop him. He is chased by Richardson and his aide all
the way to the studio, where David eventually sees Elise. After taking a look at his book,
a dejected Richardson is informed by his aide that he has reached his “limit” and he can’t do
anything about David and Elise anymore. It is revealed at the Bureau that David and
Elise were in fact meant to be together since the 1970s when David was born according to previous
versions of the plans of the bureau until 2005. That’s when their destiny was rewritten.
They weren’t happening to meet each other despite multiple attempts by the bureau to tear them apart
by pure luck but rather because of the remnants of their old destiny pulling them together.
Senior Bureau official Thompson then takes over David's case, taking him to the warehouse,
where David argues he has the right to choose his own path. Thompson says that
the bureau hasn’t always or consistently been in control of people’s destiny throughout history.
He says they took humanity from the hunting and gathering days to the peak of the Roman Empire,
after which “free will” was reinstated. But that saw five centuries of dark age characterized by
economic, intellectual, and cultural decline. That’s when the Adjustment Bureau came back in
bringing the renaissance, the enlightenment, and the scientific revolution. In the 1910s,
the Adjustment Bureau again took a step back and human free will inflict upon world war one,
the depression, fascism, and one of the worst moments of recent human history: the holocaust and
finally brought the entire planet to the brink of destruction during the Cuban missile crises.
That’s when they stepped back in before humans did something even the bureau can’t fix.
Humans now don’t have free will but rather just the appearance of free will. They may
make inconsequential decisions like choosing the toothpaste they use or the beverage they drink.
Still, the bureau makes the more important decisions as humanity is not mature enough
to do that. He further continues that all the things that have happened to him throughout his
life were a part of an elaborate scheme to nudge him towards his pre-decided destiny,
like losing his mother at a young age, when his brother made him promise to not be like him the
day before he overdosed, his father taking him to the senate gallery when he was 10.
They all contribute to his yearning to be in front of people and the hollow emptiness when he is not.
David then asks why they care so much about who he loves.
Thompson explains that Elise is good for him but only in small doses. His meeting
Elise at the hotel and bringing him back from a state of despair after losing the election,
and inspiring him to make a captivating speech was a part of the plan. However, in long doses,
she makes him reckless and impulsive. Without Elise's influence, David can become President
of the United States, while Elise can become a world-famous dancer and Choreographer. However,
being together will ruin both of their futures. Thompson then causes Elise to sprain her ankle
during her performance to demonstrate his power, and David abandons her at the hospital to avoid
ruining their futures, as Thompson described. Eleven months later, as David campaigns again,
Charlie, his campaign manager and a lifelong best friend comes across a news article about Elise’s
imminent wedding to her fiancé Adrian. He tells David about the wedding and suggests he take a
day or two off. Harry contacts David via secret meetings in the rain near water, which prevents
the Bureau from tracking them. Harry reveals that Thompson exaggerated the negative consequences of
David and Elise's relationship. He says that it is not that being with Elise makes him reckless,
but rather Elise fills the void in him that he otherwise fills with applause,
votes, and dreams of one day making it to the white house. David asks him why Harry is more
empathetic towards him than other agents. Harry reveals his connection to his father and brother.
He also confirms, though, that Elise is not happy with the marriage. David asks for his
help to get Elise back. Harry takes David to downtown Manhattan’s water pumping station,
where the agents can’t sense them. The station is just some miles away from the courthouse. He
teaches David how to teleport through the doors wearing the special hat and evade the bureau by
sticking to the “substrate” doors. Just before the wedding, David reaches
the courthouse and meets Elise in the washroom. He tells her how much he loves her,
but Else is understandably puzzled and angry at him for abandoning her at the hospital.
An agent storms into the WC, but David neutralizes him. Elise inquires why they are after him.
He tells her about the Bureau's existence, and he shows her how to travel through doors. Upon
learning that at the bureau, Thompson requests reset authorization from the chairman and deploys
an intervention team who pursue them across New York City as the pair teleport from one place
to another. All of this starts to drive Elise crazy, and she asks David what’s happening.
He explains to her that these mysterious people are trying to break them apart, and he abandoned
her at the hospital because if he had stayed with her, she wouldn’t have achieved her dreams
of becoming a world-renowned dancer. David remembers Harry telling him back at the water
pumping station not to rotate the doorknob to the left as it teleports one to the Adjustment Bureau.
David then decides to meet the chairman at the bureau, who writes “the plan” to end the conflict.
Elise isn’t convinced, and David finally relents and offers to leave through the door alone and
never to see her again, or she goes with him even though he is not certain what’s on the other side.
Elise chooses to accompany him. They enter the Bureau's offices with agents in pursuit.
After a chase through the building, David and Elise find themselves surrounded by
the Intervention team on the observation deck of the Adjustment bureau building
with no escape in sight. They mentally surrender and declare their love and kiss before David can
be caught and reset. However, when they let go of each other, the Bureau members are gone. Thompson
appears but is soon interrupted by Harry, who shows him, and then David and Elise, the Bureau’s
revised Plan from the Chairman. Inspired by the risks that David and Elise took for each other,
the chairman had erased their pre-written destiny allowing them to write it the way they wished.
Harry commends them for their devotion to each other and says they are free to leave.
As David and Elise walk away, Harry speculates that the Chairman may be preparing humanity
to "one day" write its own Plan. Thanks for watching! Make sure to like
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