[The 25th anniversary of THE MATRIX is March 31. Here is Mark's review from 1999.]
CAPSULE: Capsule: What a mixed bag! This is a film with great ideas, beautiful visuals, terrific martial arts, and concepts that tie reality in knots. It also has incredibly thin characters and long sections where the plot does not advance beyond who is kicking, shooting, or blowing up whom. The storytelling is totally muddled. But for the characters and the plot this would be a great film. Rating: 6 (0 to 10), high +1 (-4 to +4). Note: Every effort was made to keep this review spoiler-free.
THE MATRIX is a tough film to review for many different reasons. In the first place, what can one say about the basic concept without revealing too much? The entire premise of the film is something of a surprise. I will say that it is fair to say that things are not as they seem at the beginning of the film, but saying anything more than that about the premise could conceivably damage the viewer's enjoyment of the film. In this story the actuality is really very different from being what it seems to be. Philip K. Dick would have been right at home in THE MATRIX with his frequent stories of reality being turned inside out. I believe there was an episode of the newer series of THE TWILIGHT ZONE on this concept, but this is its first treatment in detail in a feature-length film.
Neo, the main character (played by Keanu Reaves), has this gut feeling that there is something different that is going on beyond with everybody seems to know. It is something *very* different. Neo wakes up one morning with a phone call from the mysterious Trinity (Carrie Anne-Moss) Trinity seems to be something like a hacker with what frequently look like magical powers--powers like an ability jump amazing distances. Trinity takes her orders from someone even more elusive and mysterious, the nearly omniscient super-hacker Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne). The government is trying to track down the hackers Trinity and Morpheus, and sends to recruit Neo some agents who look a lot like the title characters in MEN IN BLACK. Neo is given the choice of helping to capture Morpheus or of being enslaved by strange forces. Soon it is not clear to Neo what is real and what is in his dreams. But when he throws in his lot with Morpheus and Trinity, things become even stranger. And then they become a lot stranger still.
THE MATRIX is written and directed by Lana and Lilly Wachowski who previously demonstrated that they could write and direct a nice compact and tightly plotted thriller with BOUND. There is, sadly, little that is compact or tightly plotted about THE MATRIX. This is a film just chock full of martial arts fights, shootouts, and bomb explosions. But the Wachowskis spend very little screen time fleshing out their main characters or getting us to care too much what happens to them. We know they stand between the world and some really nasty fate. Presumably if they lose, the people in the audience lose also. But that is not the same thing as making us really care if these people live or die. Keanu Reeves sees to be is a sort of stupor through much of the film. That is not unrealistic considering the circumstances but it certainly kills his empathy value. The characters get themselves in and out of danger without ever creating dramatic tension.
Somehow in BOUND the Wachowskis did a much better job of getting the audience to identify with their primary characters. Unfortunately, the two were far more concerned about the look of the film than about making the audience empathize with Trinity or Neo or even Morpheus. This film shows the main characters getting lots of action, having lots of fights, but never giving us any reason to care who wins and who loses those fights.
The exquisite look of the film, frequently variations in visual themes of blacks and reds, is created by cinematographer Bill Pope, who previously filmed DARKMAN, ARMY OF DARKNESS, CLUELESS, and BOUND. Perhaps part of Pope's inspiration was the noir-ish world of DARK CITY. His photography nicely shows off the stunts and martial arts work of Hong Kong director Wu-ping Yuen, here just a stunt coordinator and a martial arts instructor. But all too often Yuen seems to be soaking up screen time. It seems a pity that this film has such an audacious concept and ends up with so many fights that could have been taken from any simple police procedural plot. It is a little insulting to the audience to present some of the more interesting ideas and then to treat them on such a superficial level, almost as if the script did not realize how good its own ideas were. THE MATRIX could have done so much more to engage the intellect and not simply a gut reaction.
When there was so much potential for an intelligent story here the Wachowskis have opted to spend most of their screen time on mindless action. This is a good martial arts film and action film in a world already overflowing with martial arts and action films. It should please the vast bulk of the audience who want to see it Friday night, have a good time, and have forgotten about it by Saturday morning. Those who would want an intelligent and thoughtful piece of science fiction will be more tantalized and frustrated than gratified. I rate THE MATRIX a high +1 on the -4 to +4 scale and a 6 on the 0 to 10 scale.
Mark R. Leeper Copyright 2024 Mark R. Leeper