Saturday, November 20, 2004

Layman Movie Review: The Matrix

I had this on while I build my new Lego Millenium Falcon. I haven't watched this movie since the third Matrix movie came out last year, and I wanted to see how it held up. Sadly, it's not quite what it once was. I've long maintained that the Matrix, released in 1999, was the "first movie of the 21st Century," but after 5 years the effects don't seem quite as mind-blowing and knowing that all the spiritual hokem leads in the follow-up movies to exactly jack-squat, it diminishes this movie. Still, even though I'm convinced the Watchowski Brothers* pulled the second two movies out of their ass, there are some moments in the first movie which resonate a little, know what happens in the next two. From the very begining some futuristic computer smack-head called Keenua "his own personal Jesus," which ties into Neo ending up as a Christ-figure in the third movie.

I'll probably suffer through the second Matrix movie and then the Anaimatrix, and then sell them, keeping online the first movie and pretending it stands alone. Still, if I wanted to watch the Matrix, I oughta just pop in Dark City. It's the same freakin' movie! Only Dark City is a lot less pretentious and spooky and visually interesting. My interest in Dark City over the years has only grown, while Matrix has diminished. Also, the fight scenes that seems so amazing in Matrix have been supplantd by Crouching Tiger and this hong kong fightin'-chick action flick So Close, which I absolutely LOVE.


*I heard one of the Watchowski's got a sex change operation. Does that mean we should now call them "The Watchowski Siblings?"

2 comments:

Chris said...

Layman, I think that you're full of crap about The Matrix, but I love ya anyway.

Chris Hunter

Brian Perez said...

I must be an army of one regarding the Matrix quintilogy (I am counting The Animatrix and Enter the Matrix) But I saw nothing wrong with any of the movies. In fact, I was quite excited by the action in Reloaded though Revolutions did disappoint, but only because their reason for changing Oracles was vacuuous and insipid, but it wasn't as bad as everyone seems to think. Layman, please be specific as to why you think the latter two films 'sucked'. Maybe I can alter my thinking and be like you.
P.S. I saw a trailer on the net calling itself "Beyond the Matrix" but it looked all CGI like "Final Flight of the Osiris."