Matrix, The (1999)

The Matrix (1999), written and directed by The Wachowskis.

I must have been in a sour mood when The Matrix first appeared, because it just irritated me.

I think it was because I had my head down in a stressful computer job and the film suddenly appeared as a phenomenon without my prior knowledge or permission. I resented the people going nuts over stuff I cared about but which I didn't have time to deal with then: computers, cyberpunk science fiction, hacker culture, deep thoughts on the nature of reality.

What bothered me:

• The whole concept seemed iffy: the machines have fusion power but need human beings as electrical batteries? Wouldn't they get the equivalent by just burning the nutrients? (But: later developments in the mythology suggest a co-dependence between humans and machines which could explain this).

• That residents of a simulation could detect the nature of their reality or break out of it: forget about it. (Unless bugs in the system allowed that, or the designer put in trap doors to the outer reality. Again, later developments support the notion).

• Real hackers are more steak than sizzle. The Matrix fashion look of dark glasses and long coats inspired short-lived hacker-chic. Who doesn't find poseurs irritating?

• The sad reminder that cyberpunk -- it seemed to me -- turned out to be 2½ good books by William Gibson. The rest: more fashion posing.

• The way history and religion are pillaged for cool-sounding names.

• I always find Deep Thoughts in others embarrassing. I don't know why; it's not like my own are any more valuable.

• How does doing cartwheels while shooting improve your aim?

Having gotten over my petulance, I like it better now. A remarkable vision and ambitious presentation of the story.

The admirable aspects, most of which are illuminated by the later films:

• The love between Neo and Trinity.

• The insight that machine intelligences are separate from the Matrix itself, that they have their own goals and problems, and are not necessarily dedicated to the extermination of the human rebellion.

• That these intelligences might also have faith apart from knowledge and find their savior in Neo.

• The cleverness of Agent Smith turning the tables on the humans: if they can penetrate into the Matrix, then he can come out into their world in retaliation.

• The mysterious nature of Neo, who really is The One in the Matrix -- which is believable -- but who also has miraculous powers in our reality...

• ...which we customarily ascribe to some transcendent higher plane, meaning this world really is a sub-reality of another. No wonder both human and computer beings revere him.

• Just as I did not like the first film as much as others, I liked the next two more than many viewers. I appreciated the moral maturity of the ending: accommodation between the human and machine worlds, agreeing to continue. In popular fiction it is Good vs Evil and victory must be 100%. Life is not like that. Myths are not life, but they are not necessarily like that either.

• The Wachowskis next film, V for Vendetta (2005), suffers in vision by comparison. Good vs Evil, total victory.

After the recent rewatch I'm having second thoughts about Neo as a miracle-worker. He was able to save Trinity in the Matrix but not in the outer reality. Could be he has powers -- being able to stop the attack machines and seeing without eyes -- because he, like Picard with the Borg, has some mysterious connection with the Matrix and his "powers" are routed through that channel. Meaning he is not "divine" in this reality.

In retrospect the big action scenes which take up so much of all three films are not as important as they used to be. So many films have copied the spectacle and Big Beat Down since.

I've spent my time on the ideas rather than the production but wanted to commend the cast. All seem devoted to the project and interested in making their characters work. Laurence Fishburne is sensitive as the warrior-prophet, teetering on the edge of faith and doubt. Hugo Weaving delights as a deranged AI.

Photographed by Bill Pope (Bound (1996)).

Available on Blu-ray with several commentary tracks, none of which seemed to be essential listening.