COMPUTER NERDS, KUNG-FU & KEANU REEVES. THIS IS COOL?
(reviewed at KOP with Stu on opening day, Thurs. May 15th, 2003)
There is only one improvement that The Matrix Reloaded holds over its predecessor, and that would be the final shot. If you remember (and how can you forget? Even though I said “looking for a mind-bending sci-fi classic? Look elsewhere” about The Matrix, ironically it has become just that), the final shot had Keanu Reeves as “Neo,” the sunglasses wielding, dark clothed hero flying through the sky and straight at the screen. What the Wachowski Brothers (obviously they’re nerds because they’re losers with women-- see Bound--, and even more so because they made The Matrix) wanted to accomplish with that final scene was not that this franchise will be continued (no…even though the matrix, a computer that feeds off humans, was never defeated in the first one, the only reason for the new sequels is $, not unleft plot), but that you would leave your seat saying to your friends, “Cool!”
Sad to say, the final scene of the first Matrix was silly and stupid. What…is Keanu Reeves supposed to be Superman? It’s even worse in the new Matrix when Reeves flies up into the clouds and by the moon and is apparently supposed to be an homage to Batman. Jesus Christ…what’s next? Reeves as Aquaman?
& while a lot of people loved the first Matrix, I thought the beginning was interesting and the final action scene good, but besides that it wasn’t all that great. Most critics seemed to feed off of the first film as being good because it was smart. So what’s smart about a machine controlling humans? The philosophizing gets even worse in The Matrix Reloaded, a film that pretends to be “smart” by featuring well-known college prof Cornell West in a cameo, but then also features Roy Jones Jr. in a cameo and gives him five more lines than West.
What worked in the first film were the action scenes, and what detracted from the first film was the silly dialogue and the “training” sequence that was a borderline joke (was it actually supposed to be “cool”?). The new film is just about the same…the story is about as thin as a vanilla wafer. The only “new” thing we witness is the underground human city known as Zion that features dance raves in a cave (yeah, I thought that scene was pretty bad, too). The only “plot” in the new one involves the matrix digging towards Zion to attempt to destroy it, and also some silliness involving a key maker and a golden door that ultimately is completely pointless in the grand scheme of things (except, of course, to leave enough room for another sequel…Nov. 5th’s The Matrix Revolutions). But yet again, what works in the new one is the action scenes, unfortunately there are only two that work; the weapons fight scene that leads into the extremely cool highway chase sequence that is even better than anything in the first film. Another cool aspect to this highway chase are the two new nameless characters that are white dudes with glasses and dreads that can disappear and reappear in the middle of fighting. Pretty cool stuff. Unfortunately, everything else is anti-cool and laughably silly. The French guy subplot is supposed to be funny but is ridiculously awful in a “I can’t believe they filmed that” vein. At least the French guy’s wife is played by the red hot (but taken-- sadly she’s married) Monica Belucci, who survived a Bruce Willis film (Tears of the Sun) –and- a ten minute anal rape
scene (Irreversible) this year. It’s sad that she has very little to do, as do most characters beside Neo and his g-friend, Trinity, played by Carrie Anne Moss. They dominate the film while the others are left to lay in the backround, and thus the film just seems like it was slapped together. “Let’s have a hot French chick!” the brothers Wachowski probably shouted between reading comic books, jerking off, and drinking Grape soda. “Now we’ll have a car chase!” And then they high-five. And then they realize that their parents won’t be proud of them, so they throw in some philosophizing that makes no sense, even to them. I would pay to hear the conversation Cornell West had with Roy Jones Jr. on the Australian set.
But there is one thing that this new Matrix has done better than the original, and that is the ending. It’s a climax of sorts because it leaves you hanging, and as soon as it ends the credits slam up against the screen with a Rage Against the Machine song blaring in the background. It is a truly great cliff-hanger ending. Sadly, the movie isn’t really good enough to make me care how the cliff-hanger is resolved. And jeez…the humans are obviously gonna beat the matrix and win in November…right?
We’re talking comic book nerds here, so yeah, they’ll win…& get the girl. ** (out of ****)
