The Matrix Reloaded

Scott Hardie | May 21, 2003
Feel free to unload your comments about the film. -Spoilers herein!- I suspect that Matt and I were the only two people on here to like it. (He just left from his trip here to see it, which is why I'm only now getting to this topic.)

Me, I really loved the film. It was my favorite kind of movie, the grand spectacle. Where else do we get to see such exhilarating sights? The Wachowskis set out to create the most elaborate movie car chase ever, and while they may not have been able to match the coolness of the chases in "Bullitt" or "The French Connection" or even "Terminator 2," they've certainly earned a respectable place in those ranks on complexity alone.

As for the main complaint that I've heard about the film so far, that the dialogue is 95% boring-as-shit exposition, I agree... but I don't think it's a significant detriment to the film. It was kept to the minimum needed to set up the action scenes. People who say this film lacked the philosophical discussions of its predecessor may have overlooked Neo's conversations with Hamann about humanity's need for machines, with the Oracle about knowing why you live your life, and even with the Architect about emotion obscuring free will. There should have been a scene of Neo actually conversing with some of his followers in Zion instead of giving them concerned stares, but I certainly didn't leave this film wondering what happened to the cerebral overtones of the first film, because they're still there, just meshed better with the exposition. There's even time for fun; Link, Agent Smith, and the Merovingian are clearly enjoying themselves even if no other characters are.

I do have a few small complaints, none that significantly damage the film. A) The special effects look very fake in a few places, namely when Neo spins around in the air with the pole out in front of him, and when Morpheus is walking towards the Agent on top of the truck while the camera circles above them. B) Link saying "Where's my puss... Hey, kids!" when he enters his apartment is not only a terrible joke but very degrading. C) Just a little overkill with the slow-motion-spinning-camera technique. That's mostly because too many other filmmakers (mostly amateur) have ripped it off in the past four years. D) As I've said elsewhere, I hate Don Davis's score. It feels like it's beating you over the head.

This is the most anticipated film of the summer, possibly the whole year, and it made a whole lot of money last weekend, so I know some of you saw it and have things to say. Unload.

Jackie Mason | May 23, 2003
[hidden by request]

Scott Hardie | May 28, 2003
[Spoilers as always...] Lately I've been seeing a lot of one complaint in particular: That the agents seem less tough now, that other characters can beat them up. Excuse me? Trinity got killed by an agent twice, both in the dream and in the Matrix. Morpheus was about to be killed, and lived only by Niobe's intervention. In fact, the only reason Morpheus won that fight is because, with Niobe's help, he got to make a surprise attack on the agent. (Trinity's point-blank head-shot in the first film showed that agents can be killed when attacked by surprise.) Sure, Neo wipes the floor with hordes of agents, but that's the point of his progress. How do people base this complaint about the film?

Wendy Hampson | May 29, 2003
I liked it. A lot. Saw it twice. Some of the special effects/CG were pretty obvious at times, like you mentioned before. I'm not really sure if everyone caught onto the fact that Merovingian and his clan are Vampires. Now I can't honestly say whether or not Merovingian himself is one, but they are introducing vampires, ghosts... also known as "glitches" into the Matrix mix. Some of the dialogue did drag on a bit, especially between Neo and the 'creator' of the Matrix. I almost brought my pocket Thesaurus the second time around so I could understand what was going on with those two. I admit, it doesn't compare to the first...but why should it? It's a sequel. It's supposed to introduce new things. That's what sequels do. But I'll get off my soapbox. I liked it. I'll buy the DVD. I'll see "Revolutions" in November. Enough said.

Jeff Flom | May 29, 2003
+++Major Spoilers+++
+++Major Spoilers+++
major spoilers
Jeff's Thorough Movie Review

It was o.k.

At times I enjoyed the movie. I couldn't keep a huge smile from coming across my face, at times.
The movie had a very poor plot, which weighs on the film, though.
Plot holes you could drive an aircraft carrier through:
1. It is essential to the function of the matrix that Neo make it to the architect - why is the matrix trying to stop him? For one thing an agent (a real one, not Agent Smith) tries to kill the keymaker, this makes no sense.
2. Why is Zion so technologically advanced? Why don't the humans who chose not to be a part of the matrix live at say a medieval tech level. It was simply necessary to give humans a choice, either live in the matrix or don't. The ability to build mechwarriors does not figure into this equation. When I saw the first Matrix I thought that Morpheus was part of a govt. / society that pre existed the Matrix and this is how they had this technology, etc. When I found out in this movie that the architect was completely responsible for Zion and the resistance movement this technology level just stopped making sense.
3. If the architect made / controls Zion than why do they need this big army to come and kill everyone? Just turn off the power, everyone will die soon enough.

I'm sorry but this story is contrived. I hope that the third one will make up for it.

Scott Hardie | May 30, 2003
Wendy: I feel the same way, of course. I did not realize that the Merovingian clan were vampires. It wasn't until that Albino Association of America or whatever complained about the twins and Warner Brothers issued a statement that "duh, they're ghosts" that I realized that about them.

Jeff: The mechwarriors bugged me too, because if the humans can put big-ass guns on those things, why can't they put them on ships to protect against sentinels? When I ran my Matrix RPG for a year, I made sure that the ship in my game was equipped with a missile bank and a big laser, and we had fun with subterranean aerial combat on more than one occasion. As for the two agents trying to kill the Keymaker, I think there are two reasons: The agents do not know that Neo must make it to the Architect (they've never indicated so), and they'd been trying to "delete" the Keymaker for a long time, but he'd been hidden by the Merovingian until that point. I liked that the agents more or less ignored Morpheus and Trinity while a higher-priority target was nearby; they were thinking like computer programs. Well, computer programs in service of the plot, anyway. :-)