| Aug022009 | The Matrix (1999) |
I just finished watching the Blu-Ray version of The Matrix and I can tell you this: it is still a great movie. Like many other nerds lament, it’s a shame they never made a sequel.
The special effects are still top-notch and very awesome to watch. It’s a balls-out action movie with a undercurrent of sci-fi philosophy. No fucking politics, no diplomacy, no magic, and the some of the best martial arts choreography you’ll find outside of China.
Here’s my play-by-play.
Trinity is attacked and chased
The movie establishes itself as sci-fi and paranoia with futuristic green letters and a hushed telephone conversation between Cypher and Trinity. We are introduced to the angry, contained and complicated voice of Agent Smith. We’re treated to a great line delivered by the lieutenant, “You give me that ‘juris-my-dick-tion’ crap… you can cram it up your ass.”
Soon fights break out for no reason and there’s no mistaking that this is an action movie. Personally, the action here never did it for me. Carrie-Anne Moss doesn’t throw herself into the action as readily as the other leads; we don’t really feel the collision, the physicality. Her jump-kick simply has no force behind it. The other big stunt, jumping off the roof of a building and diving through a small window, is lessened because the various cuts distract and remove the audience’s frame of reference. I would have loved to see a single shot with no cuts, that would have made Trinity look superhuman and awesome.
Watching these opening scenes, I can’t help buy think of Larry Wachowski’s penchant for BDSM. Trinity’s androgynous look, distant demeanor and the abundance of leather make her scenes feel like a love letter to Carrie-Anne Moss. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
Neo is caught and bugged
Neo is introduced as a lowly cubicle worker caught in a web of intrigue, a bucketload of foreshadowing that he is The One, a mysterious contact that tells him to run, men in black chasing him down; we’re already rooting for Neo and unsure of who to trust. During the interrogation, his mouth just disappears off his face and you know shit just got real.
Morpheus talks a lot
Morpheus is unveiled and we can finally put a face to the voice. I almost wish he was more of an eccentric with quirks rather than this single-minded man that’s driven by some dramatic prophecy. He speaks in riddles but takes himself far too seriously; it’s contradictory to me for Morpheus to be so serious yet so aloof.
The dojo scene
It’s very forgivable that Neo throws out a stoner line like, “I know kung-fu,” because the very next scene is this amazing face-off between him and Morpheus. Both characters dive straight in and look like they’re actually prepared to land a hit and seriously injure the other guy. The choreography is just so delicious and it reduces the audience to a bunch of little boys drooling at such artful violence.
Neo meets The Oracle
We now well and truly understands that The Matrix is an artificial reality. Now it’s time to start breaking our assumptions and show that this revered Oracle is just some lady in a rundown apartment baking cookies. The dialog in this scene and our understanding of the Oracle is pretty pivotal to the rest of the movie, it’s a much richer experience if you think about what she says in relation to the rest of the plot. Namely: 1) Neo is not The One, “maybe in a second life”, 2) Neo will have to choose between his life and Morpheus’, and 3) Morpheus will find The One. Easy to miss but very rewarding.
Afterwards, brutal fisticuffs occur between Morpheus and Agent Smith. We see Morpheus demonstrate his devotion to his beliefs and we’re worried that if Neo has made the choice to let Morpheus die. Cypher reveals himself to be a traitor and half the cast is killed off to later be replaced by less likable characters.
Agent Smith talks a lot
We learn a lot about Smith here, the film establishes that he is not a faceless agent. He’s some kind of entity that is sick of policing The Matrix and sick of humankind. There’s a symmetry here with Morpheus’ early gas-bagging to Neo. It’s wordy and a lot of hard work to get to the virus metaphor but important to really become acquainted with this character. Besides, Hugo Weaving could read me the dictionary for all I care and I’d give it five stars.
Subway battle
Neo decides not to run and face Agent Smith head-on. It’s another gorgeously choreographed fight scene that highlights the strength that an agent has over a human. Also shows how futile it is to try and kill them because they just possess somebody else.
One thing that’s so captivating about the fights in this movie are the prolonged shots of punches and kicks being thrown and blocked. The camera just lovingly sits there like it’s a bystander in the perfect position to witness everything. There’s none of these bullshit fast cuts to try and electrocute the audience into a heart-sickening pace, we hunker down for a long fight between two adversaries.
Neo becomes The One
Death and resurrection, a beautiful moment of tension as Neo unceremoniously falls dead in the hallway and the agents walk off. Suddenly it’s revealed that Trinity has fallen in love with Neo which is very believable as the two characters have as much chemistry as two planks of wood leaning against a barn. We forgive though because Neo wakes up with the power to see The Matrix and stop bullets. The movie closes with an ultimatum delivered to the machines and Neo flying off.
Rage Against The Machine starts blaring through the credits and first-time audiences know they just sat through something that kicked a lot of ass while simultaneously made us doubt if we’re all caught in an artificial dream. 10 years later and this film is still unsinkable to me, I’ll see you all again on the 20th anniversary when it’s released in Hyper Lime Green Ray Holocube.
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