Holy shit.

That is all at this time.

You've seen already?

I must see the first film again before Reloaded. I've forgotten nearly all the plot. Or maybe there wasn't a plot.

I'm borrowing the video from a friend before we go and see Reloaded: I can't remember a damn' thing about the first film.

Anyone see the "making of" documentary the other day which showed Hugo Weaving freaking out about the receding hairlines of all his doubles?

The first Matrix was on TV here on Saturday night, deliberately timed I'm sure. I still don't understand it, but I'll see Reloaded anyway.

The first movie was really character driven and plot heavy. This one is less so.

But holy shit. I'm never driving on a feeway again.

Regis took a motorcycle to and from the screening she went to this morning. I'm amazed she made it back alive.

(Good flick. Entirely a setup for number 3, but good flick.)

I loved it. Went to the midnight session of it last night and I loved it. Have I said that enough yet? hee. I'm confused as hell about some things but you know, nothing a repeat viewing won't solve.

For some of the fight scenes and action sequences I can pretty safely say I was sitting with my mouth open. Wow. The things computers etc can do these days!

I loved the soundtrack that went with it too. Like Claudia's said though, it's so completely a setup for the last part. Pity we have to wait 6months for it.

I definitely did not love it. Many of the scenes went on way too long, without providing character development or moving along the plot.

A bunch of the fight scenes were so blatantly CGI-d, with even Neo obviously not Reeves, that it pulled me out of the moment over and over. The fight scenes were well-choreographed, though, and I can get why there's no way they could have done some of them with actual people.

Also, the music bugged. I found myself pulled out of the moment by orchestration which did not fit the action- that same thing happened in Minority Report as well.

So, it was okay. I didn't dislike it and wasn't disappointed because I really didn't have an expectations.

The one thing I was very pleased with was a shift in the focus from the extra-special talents and development of Neo, to the importance of humanity in each of them. I hope it changes the whole focus of the next film.

How bizarre. 'Things you didn't know about the Matrix' includes the assertion that "Neo gets a love scene in the first sequel with Monica Bellucci, a virtual person played by Carrie-Anne Moss. She said she was 'very embarrassed' having the Wachowski brothers screaming at her: 'Have your orgasm now.'"

The rest of the factoids (90% fewer calories than actual facts!) are accurate--don't know how they mangled that one out of reality (which is that Monica Bellucci plays Persephone).

On a slightly more serious note... why "Merovingian"? A bit of websearching tells me that was the name of a dynasty of Frankish kings up until the mid-eighth century. Slightly more outre web pages talk about an order of the Knights Templar, Holy Grail etc. etc., and an idea that the Merovingians were descended from Jesus (biologically and all); the order is devoted to returning them to kingship.

So... does the Matrix character have aspirations? Or did he once? Is he Neo's predecessor in a messianic line? Ideas?

http://watch.pair.com/priory.html
http://adam23.freeyellow.com/
http://www.nexusmagazine.com/ringlords1.html
etc.

Wow. That was a strange movie. Like Boliver, I didn't really have any expectations, I'm not a huge Matrix fan, but the pretty fights and special effects made for an okay way to pass a couple of hours.

A word of advice to anyone yet to see it, don't do what I did and have a nap pretty much straight after seeing the movie. Boy, did I have weird dreams. Lots of doors.

I've just finished re-watching the first movie tonight. Things brought up and expanded on in the sequel make alot more sense now that I have the backstory refreshed. What I'm never doing again is trying to explain all of it to my parents who joined me for like the last 10min of the film. Way too hard and I think I may have just messed myself up again on what I had thought to have worked out so far.

I guess I'm in Boliver's camp. There were some cool fights and Keanu looked hot, but it was too long and poorly paced. Most of the scenes in Zion bored me rigid, some of the dialogue was truly awful, and I was more impressed with the fights in Shanghai Knights, for goodness sakes, than with some of these CGI-tastic efforts. I didn't hate it, but it could have been half an hour shorter. 6/10

That whole Zion rave/sex scene had me wishing I had a fast forward button. Strange.

Yeah, what was that in aid of? And Mopheus' speech was rather uninspiring. I also noticed that the population of Zion was predominantly black, although they still had a council run by elderly white people. Speaking to a friend after the movie, she said she'd read somewhere (so, reliable source...) that "they had the population mostly black intentionally, because kids would think it was cooler". Not sure if there's any truth in that.

Worst line ever: "I can't (let you die), I love you too damn much". Gah.

I finally went to see Matrix Reloaded last night and I really enjoyed it. Sure, the plot wasn’t as inventive or original as the first film, but for fight scenes, special effects and big bangs I felt I’d got my money’s worth (even at inflated London prices).

I don’t particularly feel the need to explore or analyse the mythology—I’m happy to walk out of the cinema and forget all about it until the next film. Most of the dialogue struck me as being part of the rich tradition of sci-fi hokeyness combined with sixth-form philosophising so while it made me laugh (I was practically in hysterics duing the “I love you too damn much” scene) I’d happily fastforward through it if I ever rewatched (Merovingian, I’m looking at you).

It’s hard to believe now that Keanu Reeves was something like the 14th choice to play Neo, he seems so perfect for it now—beautiful yet so blank. Hugo Weaving was clearly having the time of his life, and it was nice to see Harold Perrineau again (what’s he been doing since Romeo + Juliet?), though Link seemed decidedly underwhelmed when he found out

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the whole of Zion, including Zee, had been massacred.

Was it just me hoping to see some clips from Bill and Ted on the architect’s wonderwall?

Well, I didn't at the time, but now that you mention it, that would have been cool.

I must try and see Bill & Ted again soon.

I just saw it, and it seems weird to say, but I liked it better than the first one. It had more variety, and less slime. I don't like slime.

The relationship and sex elements humanized it and gave it more depth, which is good, since the first one was like an icy piece of glass. The mass orgy/individual sex scene was powerfully erotic. Man, that one shot where her head is cradled in the crook of his arm....

Neo and Reeves become a little more human in those contexts... he does the emotion well. And from your complaints about the "too damn much" line, I assumed that he would hit every syllable hard. But he didn't, he soft-sold it, kind of swallowed it, so it worked well enough for me.

The only parts that lost my interest were some of the fights, which just got boring. The one with the many Agent Smiths being the worst... I just couldn't focus and it didn't seem very real or exciting. All sort of by-the-book. The chase scene on the highway, on the other hand — I'd read all this stuff about how mind-blowing it was, and so I was expecting something a lot more surreal and out there. But, no, it was about the dangers you'd actually find on a real highway, and it dealt more in reality than defying the laws of physics. So I liked it. It might have not gone on for a half hour, though.

Only toward the end did I start to get a little confused about what was happening.

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I was all, "Could you repeat the options on the two doors again? What does each one do?" Still didn't quite sort the implications out. Do you think Neo was able to control the machines and lapsed into a coma because he realize that Zion and "reality" were themselves just another level of the Matrix? It seemed similar to the shock he went through the first time he discovered his reality wasn't real. Mirren, I don't think Zion was destroyed. When Neo got back, he said that the machines would be coming for it in nine hours or something like that. The machines killed the people on the third ship (the ones who collapsed in the Matrix), and they destroyed the Nebuchadnezzar, but I think Zion's still there.

I agree that Link was great. The movie needed heaps more of him; his humor brought the whole thing to life.

The only question I can't get past is: Do they not have laundry soap and darning needles in Zion? They can make clothes, but not wash them? It's all too implausible.

Yeah, Zion wasn't destroyed, not yet.

I don't think Zion is another level of the Matrix, but it is an open question at this point. I thought the question of whether reality was real was implied in the first movie, and somehow jumped out at me in this movie long before this point. I remember pondering it while the old councilor and Neo were looking out at the cavernous spaces all the machinery is in.

But I think what actually happened is that just as Smith has a bit of Neo, Neo has a bit of Smith, and Smith has some real-world extension to him that could affect those hunting squid machines, and Neo instinctively accessed that ability. Or something like that. They'll need some advantage like that over real-world machines if they're going to survive (if reality is real).

It wasn't? Oh, I thought the cliffhanger was that

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everyone in Zion had been killed apart from the goatee guy, who was a traitor.

And I thought it was a pretty lame cliffhanger at that. Now I'm revising my opinion (of both the ending and my ability to follow simple dialogue) downwards.

That's an interesting theory, Claudia. One thing I found a little baffling about this one was that programs inside the Matrix could be independent of the system. It was a good twist and makes for a nice variety of villains, but was it true in the first one as well?

Also, assuming that Zion is real, I thought Agent Smith, the Oracle, and their like had no ability to go there and no existence outside the Matrix. And then I'd think that nothing of Smith could affect Neo in the real world. If this is a real reality, I just get the feeling that Neo is something divine within the real world.

Well, the question is, what is Agent Smith? (for example)

He could be purely a computer program. But he could be a robotic critter with a computer program as an extension of him. Perhaps in the world in which Zion exists, he's one of those squid-like machines? Or otherwise has an extension into that world. I don't know. It's just a theory, and one I cribbed from a friend at that.

See, that's what I think too. My own little theory is that he's just growing more powerful for the final showdown in Zion. Same as he was able to get inside the Matrix and see it for what it really is, he's now able to somehow change things in the real world

I tend to think this stems from the fact that in my eye he's changed a fate that had already been decided for him. Like the Matrix's creator told him, all the others before Neo had chosen to save Zion first. Neo didn't. he went after Trinity who it was also said would die regardless. Neo went in and altered that. It didn't end up coming to pass like it was supposed to so it seems like he's shifted the order/nature of events. And because of that, he's able to do what he did back in Zion.

Plus I don't think it's only me right when I notice the whole Jesus/Messiah overtones? the ultimate sacrifice for humankind? Or mayeb here too, he'll be able to save the world and get the girl? something no doubt I'll be mulling over quite a bit in the coming months.

Did anybody else see this?: Matrix reloaded banned in Egypt.

Interestingly, the ideas of the film are more of the reason for the ban than the violence (or sex, which the article doesn't mention at all).

Thanks for the link!

I saw the movie last night and really enjoyed it, even though there was heaps I didn't understand. (Or so I thought: ten out of ten says I do!) But oddly, several of the things I thought I did get the people I went with were in complete disagreement about.

I like the idea that either a) everything's a Matrix, even Zion, and there is no reality for Neo or b) he never returned to reality after meeting 'God'/the architect in the video-wall room or even c) he's just developed some new ability in reality-world, but I don't mind which it turns out to be.

But what I'm not sure about is the idea that five have come before him. I assumed that the five were all versions of him, but my pal insisted that the Merovingian was an earlier attempt by 'God' to reboot the Matrix, which seems really impossible to me (I thought he was an exile, rogue programme who had become decadent and corrupt and also a really annoying pain in the arse taking up too much screen time waffling about cake. Going by Claudia's links, if the Merovingian represents an order protecting the Grail, that suggests that the Keymaster is sorta like the Grail, just the object of their quest which only Neo is pure enough to find).

If so, what choice did the earlier five versions get, given that 'God' specifically said that this Neo was the first to have a relationship with Trinity? This door, save the remnants of Zion, that door ... what?

I also don't understand exactly what Agent Smith is, apart from very camp, but I know that that's because it's been left open.

The fight scenes pretty much bored me. Too long, too many scenes of When Multiple Smiths Attack!, far too much of the freeway which seemed to last several hours. But the film looked very nice, I love how Zion looks. The rave orgy was actually one of my favourite parts. I could totally see why they would choose to reaffirm their humanity before their big last stand, by celebrating two very visceral, physical things that machines could never really do, have sex and dance. And I thought it was pretty sexy. I liked Link a lot and was more connected to him than anyone - Neo and Trinity are too cold and blank to really care for, Morpheus is too noble-Hestonesque: they should have actually shown him dancing, not just Buffy-speechifying.

However, is Gina Torres stalking me at the moment or what? She's everywhere! Power of Jasmine ... And Link's wife looks like Angela Bassett. There *were* a lot of black characters. I don't know why - except possibly that, having possibly less of a stake in the Matrix-created world, they were more likely to resist and wake up? - but it was cool. However, I could have done without the weird mouth-mangling ways of the moany captain who didn't like Morpheus.

I had forgotten Torres was Mrs. Fishburne until she appeared in Reloaded.

Edited to say yes, that was definitely her. Heh.

I thought it was her! But then dismissed it as my overactive imagination.

I went and saw it yesterday afternoon and came out going 'Huh?' I mean, I enjoyed watching it, but forming any coherent ideas about what I'd seen is still beyond me.

I quite enjoyed the mutiple Agent Smith's, but mostly because Hugo Weaving looked as if he was really having fun with the part.

My overall impression was that it looked good, but didn't necessarily get me lost in that world.

That said, I want to see what happens when the next one comes out.

What was the Easter egg in the credits? I hadn't realised it was there , and I so I got up and left before it was shown. Much as I enjoyed watching the film, I don't think I'll pay to see it again, just to find out.

It's a trailer for the third movie.

I hadn't considered the possibility that there was another Neo and another Trinity before... five times, to be precise. I don't think that would make sense to me. Because if reality's real, they're actual human beings on the outside who happen to look the same in the Matrix. It seems more logical that the Architect just groomed or prodded the destinies of five other people before this. If reality isn't real, then of course nothing means anything.

No, I thought that what 'God' was saying was that only Neo had been in that situation five times before. Weren't those screens showing how he'd reacted the previous times? I'm sure at least one had him saying "You're saying I've been here four times before? Get out!" or something like that. But Trinity was a new factor he'd added as he refined the programme. Neo, though, was not real (very Bladerunner) but something he'd created, a ghost in the machine, a reboot faculty - or so 'God' wanted him to believe, anyway. In that case, given that Neo can operate in the real world, either a) he's just a really sophisticated programme b) there is a real Zion, but Neo has only ever been in the Matrix version of it c) there is no real Zion, but the choice that he has to make is somehow important to cleansing the system or d) the architect made the entire thing up and forged the previous reaction footage. Whether that means we should believe anything he says is another matter.

No, those screens were showing all the many ways he could choose to behave, and then we zoomed into one each time he made a choice and reacted--thereby leaving hundreds of other possibilities in the dust or for alternate universes or whatever.

I'm undecided about whether it was Neo each time before. You seem pretty sure that it was... I'm going to see it again in a couple weeks and I'll have to pay closer attention there, because that's not what I came away with.

Oh! Okay, that makes sense. I thought it was just tricksy camera stuff.

I'm not sure about anything in that film. But if the architect was trying to convince Neo that he was just a program he'd created in order to reboot the system periodically, why wouldn't he be the same 'person'?

I didn't even think that the Architect was telling Neo he was a program. I thought he had chosen an individual human each time who had innate potential, and then possibly orchestrated him/her being released from the Matrix... or pretending to, in some compelling Savior myth that would affect the other humans.

It's all very confusing.

Potential? Shudder ... not again.

For those of you who've seen the movie, what have your impressions been? I tried not giving anything away in the "what movies have I seen" thread and not too sure what I can say here yet without it being a spoiler.

I liked it. Really did, although some things could have been done differently. That's all I'll say for now.

Oh dear, I am seeing some very bad reviews. Then again, people weren't too crazy about the second film and I liked it. Got to catch it this weekend before I get too put off.

I liked the second better than the first, myself.

On the Daily Show last night, Stewart testified that Elf is the number one movie in America. The Matrix doesn't count because it "bbbbbbbbbllllooooowwssssss". He must've said it at least five times.

I was excited to see it, but I must admit I take his opinion pretty seriously. I no longer have very good expectations.