The
Matrix
Reviewed
by Leonard Heldreth, December, 1999
This science fantasy
received a lot of bad press because the teenaged killers at Columbine
High dressed in the black raincoats and sunglasses worn by Neo in
the film, and the film's violence was said to be reflected in their
killing spree. The millions of other teenagers who saw the film and
did not go on a killing spree imply that something more than Keanu
Reeves in a cool raincoat shooting "agents" is necessary
to trigger deadly violence in an ordinary high school filmgoer.
Whatever link it may have to Columbine High, The Matrix
is a better-than-average science fiction film with some interesting
mental concepts, state-of-the-art special effects, and high-powered
action. The plot is relatively simple, drawing upon Dark City and
some other films that play with the nature of reality, but it throws
out allusions in all directions (the Oracle is a black woman who bakes
cookies) and doubles up its concepts to the point where the whole
thing might come tumbling down if anyone questions it too much. Neo
(Keanu Reeves) is a young man with talents he hasn't figured out until
he is taken under the wing of Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne), who leads
a group of rebels who want to break up the hallucination that the
world is okay and to demonstrate that it is run by machines who grow
humans in vats for nefarious purposes. Morpheus is looking for the
chosen one who will help them break this oppression (told you it had
lots of allusions!), and he thinks Neo might be the person. When they
visit the Oracle (Gloria Foster), she tells him, "Honey, you're
sweet, but it ain't you. Sorry." Of course, as any student of
Greek mythology knows, the Delphic Oracle can't be trusted because
she may encourage you to misinterpret her words.
The rebel crew operate out of a hovercraft type of base
and have to fight mechanical octopi with cutting torches for mouths.
The rebels transport through phone lines, sending virtual bodies into
the world as we know it to fight the machines, who look like FBI agents.
If none of this makes much sense, most of it works well enough in
the high-speed graphics setting of the film. Just go with the cutting-edge
special effects—this is not a deep, character-driven film. It
pays homage to dozens of other films as well as to comic books, mythology,
and any number of other cultural repositories.The film has several
sequences which stand out for action and special effects. In the opening
scene, Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss) wipes out a squad of policemen sent
to capture her and then escapes across the rooftops, leaping large
chasms between buildings at a single bound. In another, highly publicized
scene, Neo and Trinity armed with several automatic weapons literally
blast their way into the building where their leader is held captive.
When they try to escape in a helicopter, Trinity has the directions
for running it downloaded into her mind, and they take off (when this
technique becomes common, all school teachers can start looking for
jobs as computer programers). In the concluding scene, as Neo learns
to manipulate reality, his defenses become more imaginative. Throughout
the film the graphics, sets and costumes will captivate the eyes.
Try to ignore the video-game style fight scenes in the middle of the
film unless you're into kung-fu movies.
The Matrix is a dense, high-speed, razzle-dazzle science
fiction action film that is great fun and seldom pauses long enough
to catch its breath or allow you to think too closely about the logical
fallacies in what is going on. Matrix 2 and Matrix 3 are said to be
already on the drawing boards.
