08/17/09 - The Matrix

The Matrix (1999, 136 min)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0133093/

Ahh... The Matrix. Surprisingly, I'm pretty sure I'd only seen this twice before now. The first time was when it came out on DVD and the second was before the two sequels came out. Yet I still somehow remembered a large majority of the movie. Back when I was younger and before I had seen lots of movies, I considered this a 10/10 movie so I was interested to see where it fit today.

In case you somehow don't remember The Matrix, it basically follows Neo (Keanu Reeves), a hacker, who awakens to the real world via the help of Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne) and Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss). The antagonists in the film are the backstabbing Cypher (Joe Pantoliano) and Agent Smith (Hugo Weaving).

This movie is an action movie first and foremost. Yet it brings the philosophy to a forefront in this film, The Matrix (unlike the sequels) is heavily focused on the action. And the action is incredibly relentless. The first scene with Trinity running to a hard-line phone to the last scene with Neo taking out Agent Smith, almost every moment is adrenaline paced. Something like the lobby shootout or the Agent Smith and Neo subway fight are amazing. I knew the outcomes of these and I was still on the edge of my seat watching. Next, while the philosophy of The Matrix is there in the first installment, aside from transition scenes and a couple five to ten minute spans (the being "born" again part and the Oracle part), it's minimal. But still there enough to make the movie more interesting than an explosion fest. It's expertly well balanced.

Obviously, the thing most often remembered in The Matrix is the bullet time cinematography. While this wasn't new at the time, it obviously and unquestionably brought this kind of technique to mainstream cinema. I read that around 20 movies had incorporated bullet time somehow by 2002, not even three years after The Matrix's release. While not as jaw-droppingly awesome now, I was still taken back to the first time I saw these scenes. They were mind boggling. I was stunned. I didn't know something so simple as a kick to the face or a cartwheel could become so cool on the screen. Similarly, one of the Agent's dodges bullets and Neo counters in the now iconic backwards and twisting contortion to do the same. These scenes were just as fascinating now as they were back then. I find it really hard to say the same thing about many action movies.

There's plenty of things I don't like about The Matrix, too. First, the delivery of many of the philosophical lines seems way too over-the-top. I don't know if this is what the Wachowski brothers were going for, but sometimes it's just a little too cheesy. Next, I found myself not really caring about some of the other characters aside from Morpheus, Trinity and Neo. The deaths of the other people on the ship elicited little more than a shrug from me. This is because these characters weren't really built up, but it somewhat takes away from Cypher's betrayal. Finally, the Sentinels don't seem like that dangerous an enemy and I never really felt that threatened by them. Really not that many negatives when you think about it.

Overall, I gave this film a 10/10. It's simply astounding even ten years later. The phrase "often imitated, never duplicated" perfectly sums up The Matrix. And that includes the sequels. The Matrix stands up perfectly by itself and that's another reason why it's so great. Perhaps stunningly I'm giving this movie a higher rating than Terminator 2: Judgment Day which many regard as a perfect action movie. I simply feel that the amazing feeling of watching The Matrix for the first time is almost unparalleled. The "newness" feel to it is still there, all this time later.