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Posted by Caleb Varns (Member # 946) on :
 
Nope, haven't seen it yet. But I'm going tonight at 9:40 p.m. Central Standard Time, and I wanted to prep my rant space. Plus, I had to take my mind off of another thread, so here it is. Please no spoilers until after I see the film!
 

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Posted by James Tiberius Kirk (Member # 2832) on :
 
*gets lawn chair*

*camps out for review*
 

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Posted by Leonide (Member # 4157) on :
 
Strider and I will be partaking in the splendor of the third installment at approximately 10:30pm EST tonight!

Woot!

 

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Posted by T_Smith (Member # 3734) on :
 
I've seen it twice already. Seeing it a third time in just a few short hours. Now, for those of you who think me a loser, well, this third time, I'm seeing it with a girl, so bug off!

Ok, my thoughts:

SPOILERSSPOILERSSPOILERS
SPOILERSSPOILERSSPOILERS
SPOILERSSPOILERSSPOILERS
SPOILERSSPOILERSSPOILERS

SPOILERSSPOILERSSPOILERS
SPOILERSSPOILERSSPOILERS
SPOILERSSPOILERSSPOILERS
SPOILERSSPOILERSSPOILERS

The first time I saw this, the ending bugged the heck out of me. I sat there confused as to why it was over. The second time I saw it, it made a bit more sense as to why it was ended the way it did.

The fighting between Neo and Smith reminded me a lot of DBZ. Some parts, it was cool, and others it was way too much and was borderline hookey.

The dock scene was entirely cool, but ran a wee bit too long.

Agent Smith throughout the course of the movie basically became the character I liked the most, except for his final few moments. I didn't like him saying "Is it over?" the way he did and all that jazz.

Trinity's death was dragged out, but it was potent, if not pointless.

The mechanic line scene with Niobe, was cool, but the second time I watched it, I noticed that right as she enters the gate, there are no more squids following her. What gives?

I also wanted to punch that kid (from the Anime and the one worshipping Neo in the second one) after he storms into the Temple room screaming "The War is OVER!!!"

All in all, I was slightly disappointed, but only by the ending.

The way Agent Smith is taken out was way confusing the first time, but I think I sort of understand it after the second.
 

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Posted by Speed (Member # 5162) on :
 
I'll be seeing it in just two hours. I'll let you know. Not to pumped about the 35% on rottentomatoes, but they've been known to be wrong. Here's to hoping...
 

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Posted by Polemarch (Member # 3293) on :
 
*replying with eyes tightly closed* GAH! You go and put spoilers on a review thread, so I can't even see what the movie was like without knowing what hapens in advance! Can someone post a review on another thread that doesn't have spoilers?
 

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Posted by policyvote (Member # 3044) on :
 
Terrible. A pat, straightforward war movie that has neither the depth nor polish of the first two . . . none of the symbolism, intrigue, or wonder of the first two. SO many unanswered questions; SO much left unsaid. At least it's wrapped up and over.

Peace
policy
 

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Posted by Caleb Varns (Member # 946) on :
 
Agreed.

I was going to waste my evening (if you can call this evening) writing a detailed review, but the fact is that I have nothing good to say about the film. At all. It was really, really bad.

Really bad.
 

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Posted by MoonRabbit (Member # 3652) on :
 
I saw the first showing today, and I can't understand why the critics hated it. Oh, wait. Yes I can. It had scenes with dialog. Personally, I think the best scene from the first movie (all three movies, actually) is the scene with Neo and the Oracle in her kitchen. Anytime the movie cuts away from the action to focus on things like character development or plot, the unfrozen caveman critics who have been trained only to judge a movie in terms of genre specifications (Hmm. Science fiction - aliens, robots, explosions - good. Characters, dialog, story - bad. Make think - bad. Make have adrenaline rush - good.) get bored and start whining.

The critics absolutely hated the Zion party scenes in Reloaded. Why? Because they didn't "get" that the whole point of the scene was not to show nipples, but to show how sweaty, dirty and animalistic humans really are in contrast to the grimy yet sterile constructed reality of the matrix. In spite of the conditions, the humans in the real world were living. They also hated the Zion scenes in Revolutions, which I thought were incredible. Sure there were some action movie cliches, but I wonder how many of the naysayers have ever been in a hopeless combat situation (I haven't). It seems to me that a soldier fighting for freedom (versus just following orders on a need-to-know basis) in a situation in which he or she will almost certainly die, regardless of the outcome, would need to be psyched into a near-berserker adrenaline rush to keep from collapsing in panic. Acting tough is fundamental to fighting.

The other thing that occurs to me in reading the reviews is that some of the critics thought they had it all figured out by the end of Reloaded, and then were ticked off when their predictions didn't come true.

I have to hand it to the Wachowski brothers; they went over my head. How? Watching the Zion combat scenes and then the Neo/Smith battle, I was thinking "this has gone on sooo long - when will it end? I'm tired of it." Which was exactly how I was supposed to feel watching those scenes. Real war is like that. It doesn't end with a quick victory - it drags on and on and leaves a bad taste in your mouth. Lots of people die. Those that survive rarely feel like heroes. In the movie, I wasn't tired of the film, I was tired of what the characters were tired of. Note to critics: It's called empathy. Look it up.

All of a sudden the critics are all science experts, condemning the movie because some thing or another is impossible. I tend to divide impossible science into two categories: the known and the unknown. Example: the whole "how did Smith take over Bane when Morpheus says only plugged-in people can be taken over by agents?" argument that has been propagating among the reviews. Aside from the fact that at that point Smith was no longer an agent but something different, the movies don't go into 42 hours of backstory about the technical details of the matrix. It's an unknown, and considering how far computing has come in the past 50 years, I don't pretend to know what will be possible in the future. However, in the X-files movie, the whole alien plot hinged on bees pollinating corn. Unfortunately, BEES DON'T POLLINATE CORN! It's a known fact that corn is a grass and is wind-pollinated. Unlike the future of machine intelligence, the pollination mechanism of corn is known to just about everyone who graduated high school (and many who didn't). Most of the science in the Matrix movies is speculative anyway, so it doesn't bother me.

I could go on, but it's late, my all-organic cranberry tarts are done cooking, and my wife is begging me to shut the stupid computer off and go to bed.

I loved it and am in awe.
 

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Posted by Caleb Varns (Member # 946) on :
 
Actually I felt that the dialogue was this movie's 'miserable failure', to use a Gephardtism. The script had nowhere near the depth of the first two films.

...eh... I'm about to launch into this but I don't have the energy for the sheer number of problems I had with this film.
 

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Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
 
SPOIL ME! I was going to title a thread that but since Nathan has already started here, tell me:

Is the Oracle really just a tool of the whole wash rinse repeat cycle?

I guess that's about it. Try again when I'm awake.
 

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Posted by Ryuko (Member # 5125) on :
 
The Matrix Revolutions, was, if not the best movie ever, a fitting ending to the series. I thought that some of the action scenes were a bit overwrought, and there were times when the dialogue seemed downright cheesy.. (Notably when it was coming from Agent Smith, which to me makes sense. Someone who was programmed to have no sense of humor that all at once acquires one, through mania no less, is going to have a pretty cheesy sense of humor...)

But all in all, since the series had to have an end, this was a good one. It was where I thought the whole thing was going, plot-wise, but it surprised me at points, so that was good, right? In other words, it was better than Matrix Reloaded, just a tad, but worse, overall, than The Matrix. (bows)
 

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Posted by Christy (Member # 4397) on :
 
Agrees with Ryuko completely. I think the movie did exactly what it intended to, wrap up the films. It answered all those little cliffhangers at the end of Reloaded and pushed on towards the final end with a good pace so that you felt like it was a long war coming to a close. I was very satisfied, but I was not impressed, and that's okay. It still was a good movie, but it didn't wow me and with the end of the series, I guess I didn't expect it to.
Spoilers:
Spoilers
Spoilers
Did anyone else groan about the two olives?
How about the christ-like death scene?
We were confused as to why they weren't trying to make more EMPs, though. Or why they didn't try to salvage Naiobi's ship or take the EMP out of there?
I really liked the oracle and the hope of the little girl.
End Spoilers
 

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Posted by narrativium (Member # 3230) on :
 

quote:

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. . . I was thinking "this has gone on sooo long - when will it end? I'm tired of it."

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quote:

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Trinity's death was dragged out, but it was potent, if not pointless.

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Why did I read that?! I haven't seen the movie yet!


[ November 06, 2003, 04:17 PM: Message edited by: Eruve Nandiriel ]
 

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Posted by ludosti (Member # 1772) on :
 
slacker and I went to go see it yesterday afternoon. I liked it, but I think that my favorite would have to be the first one.

I liked some of the aspects of the fight scenes. I especially liked the loss of perspective in the club scene gun check fight. I liked getting to see more of Seraph. I thought he was just plain cool.

I liked the character of the little girl, but thought that some of her dialogue was stilted. The kid from the Animatrix still tends to get on my nerves (maybe that's just supposed to be the way he is).

Some of what I supposed were meant to be plot twists had been too heavily forshadowed to be surprises.

SPOILER ALERT!
SPOILER ALERT!
I was left wondering in the end exactly what had happened. I loved Agent Smith's confusion ("I stand here and you do thing, but wait this can't be right") - it was quite funny. I'm not sure that I understood all of the discussion between the Oracle and the Architect. Who exactly will now be set free from the Matrix? It seemed to me like everything will kind of go back to the way it was. Those that want to will be released from the Matrix (who will know that they want to be is another ball of wax). What will happen to the human/machine relationship? Is this a fragile truce? Will anything change? Did Neo actually die or does he still exist in some sense?

[ November 06, 2003, 04:38 PM: Message edited by: ludosti ]
 

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Posted by Anna (Member # 2582) on :
 
I suppose these are precisely the questions you are supposed to ask.
 

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Posted by ludosti (Member # 1772) on :
 
Yeah, I know. It just left me feeling very anti-climactic, that's all....
 

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Posted by Caleb Varns (Member # 946) on :
 
No, those are the questions that the WACHOWSKI BROTHERS asked; they are the questions they've been asking from the very beginning.

They just gave us really lame answers for them.
 

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Posted by Lerris (Member # 3530) on :
 
Because I am really bad at the whole non spoiler review thing.


Spoiler

Spoiler

Spoiler

And one more

Spoiler
Well I enjoyed the movie until the end. There were some slow parts, notably the Neo thinks interlude. Things I enjoyed were the little girl. I was really glad we got an explaination for her father and his really odd cameo in Reloaded. I generally liked the Merovingian scene, especially when I remembered that those were all extras that brought their own costumes I believe. I thought the Bain scenes were well done, that fellow had the nearly the exact intonation as Hugo Weaving which really helped. Without that I think the scene might have flopped. I even appreciated the irony that he waded through. Most of the fight scenes were much better this time. In the last movie most of the fights involved Neo as superman. In this one, Neo was usually in a position of parity with his opponents. Everyone elses fights were just long enough to be fun without crossing over into cheese like they did in the last film. I also loved the Zion battle/chase section. I don't think you could ask for much more in a sci-fi war. I also really liked how they contrasted the Neo/Trinity moment of beauty with the machine city/sun. Most of the dialog had more of a point in this one than it did in the last one. There was much less of the Stop! Exposition Time! in this one. All of the exposition was worked into the plot better. They talked when they needed to for an appropriate length of time. I also really liked the music in this one. Very good. They also did not overuse bullet time like they did last time.

I also think I actually liked the end even. For me, it recast the entire film into a larger theme. I believe that Neo at the end was not Christ, but Arthur. I think there are two things that did this for me, the barge thing that he sailed away on and the Oracles comment that they will see him again. Those two things recast Neo as the Once and Future King. The whole blindness thing works into it as well somehow, but I can't recall or find references for that. I thought it might have been a Fisher King reference, but when I brushed up on that I found out that the Fisher King had a side or a leg wound, not blindness. I think you can see the Oracle as Merlin, Smith as Mordred, Morpheus is one of the Grail knight that actually finds the grail. Granted, there are things that don't fit. But thinking of it that way helps to redeem the end a bit for me.

There are things I did not like though. I wish that we had gotten to see Neo and the twins again. The final smith battle went too long, it got to reminding me of a really long WWF match. I wondered why Seriph did not pull out his backdoor key when Smith came for the oracle. We did not learn enough about the oracle and the choice she made twice. Commander Locke got really tedious. One also wonders why Zion had not planned a final strong hold other than wood beams and people. There are other little bits, but those are some of the big ones.

Lerris
 

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Posted by mackillian (Member # 586) on :
 
The whole being blinded and still being able to see. Am waiting for John with the Dune reference.
 

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Posted by Ryan Hart (Member # 5513) on :
 
I agree with T_Smith. Verbatim.
 

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Posted by Olivet (Member # 1104) on :
 
Wasn't as cool as the first one, but I thought the ending was right. It seemed to fit. Why keep fighting? Because I choose to. Them is de words I live by.

It was much more fun if you've taken a few philosophy courses, here and there. The whole idea of the Matrix is like something you'd hear at an all night coffee shop in a college town. If you hung with the wierd intellectuals.
 

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Posted by ae (Member # 3291) on :
 
I thought it sucked. That about sums up my opinion on this one.
 

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Posted by kerinin (Member # 4860) on :
 
it was a great movie, but failed miserably to live up to the first one. when i saw the second one i suspended judgement, because i saw a lot of things that could be made really cool, and which could have become the foundation of a truly spectacular third film, but none of it came through and i have to say that the second two are nothing more than action films of a slightly higher pedigree.

a few major dissapointments;

SPOILERS

we leave the first film with neo promising to "show these people what is possible" or something like that, yet he never does, in fact the entire issue of "humanity" and the people IN the matrix is completely dropped once Neo is out.

Neo undergoes a subtle shift in his relationship with Trinity; when he begins to realize how significant he is and how uncertain the future is, his relationship with her begins to become less significant to him (at least i got that impression), but this is not at all followed up in the film, instead we get a pathetic death scene which doesn't seem to have any impact on Neo after she dies.

Morpheus's crisis of faith is completely ignored, or at least is not dealt with as much as it could have. I suppose you could say all the discussion about not being able to see past the choices you don't understand was the films response to faith, but since i can't see the future at all that doesn't really help me very much.

that's all i feel like ranting about for now...
 

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Posted by A Rat Named Dog (Member # 699) on :
 
I think that most of you are being way too harsh. It was a step up from the last one, which I appreciated. And I thought it was the right ending. The writing didn't get any better, really, and the initial scenes were surprisingly bad in places. Especially anything to do with the little girl

Mostly, I'm grateful that the ending worked so well. Throughout the final fight, I was trying to imagine what might possibly happen to defeat Smith, and everything I thought of was awful. I was dreading it all. But then they came up with an ending that actually worked! I was impressed.
 

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Posted by A Rat Named Dog (Member # 699) on :
 
MORE SPOILERS

(seriously, if you care about spoilers, why are you reading this thread?)

kerinin, I thought Trinity's death DID have an imapct on Neo. I don't think he'd have been willing to sacrifice his life if she had been out there, waiting for him. He established in the second movie that he wouldn't give her up, even if the future of the human race depended on it ...
 

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Posted by Carrie (Member # 394) on :
 
Guess what, there'll be spoilers in here.

Saw it tonight, first thing out of my mouth at the credits was "Hmm..."

I'm not sure what to think right now. I know I need to see it again, to say nothing of Reloaded. I need a good, old-fashioned marathon. Maybe then I can decide whether I liked it or not.

I'm not really sure why I don't think anything about it. It was visually stunning, that's a given. The dialogue was incredibly cheesy, also a given. But the in-betweens, the parts that made me think, I'm not sure about those. I thought Niobe kicked major ass, Morpheus didn't do a whole lot (which is too bad, really, I liked his character best), and the Merovingian was funny. Again. Persephone's line was horrid.

I like the Neo-as-Arthur idea. I hadn't even thought of that before.

Still going "Hmm..." though...
 

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Posted by twinky (Member # 693) on :
 
I enjoyed it. I don't think they could have closed the triolgy any differently.
 

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Posted by Mormoniacal (Member # 5333) on :
 
naturally SPOILERS

I agree that most people are too harsh with this movie. Part of what made the original so good was all the unknowns - in the second and third, however, most of those are already a given, and there aren't a whole lot of places to go for the mystery that we found in the first one.

The action of course was amazing. i had no complaints at all about the action, and i think anybody who does was simply not involved enough in the movie (whether it is their fault or the movie's is up for debate).

the neo-worshipping kid was, of course, the worst part of the movie... they should have excsized him from the series entirely and we'd be rid of about half of the annoying parts of the last two films.

sadly the scene with the merovingian was too short, simple, and boring. And all those costumes were very very disturbing... one giant, screwed-up orgy that none of us really wants to see...

plot-wise there were tons of surprises. it was very unpredictable. The ending was somewhat confusing and left little resolution, but... that's what i gathered as a major message of the film, that the purpose of life was to continue (not to end, as Smith believed) and therefore the ending made sense. the only thing i didn't like was the sunset - far too artifical looking and just plain lame.

overall i think it is a good ending to the series. I'll go out on a limb, however, and say that the wachowski brothers should've left the series alone after the first - it delivered far more than was possible from the next two films, and i think we all understood that, for the most part, going into Reloaded and Revolutions. All in all I got what i expected and paid for - an intense action movie with awesome sci-fi elements, a great villian, and an epic story.
 

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Posted by Rohan (Member # 5141) on :
 
I'm gonna have to go with those that left unsatisfied. What was I looking for? I don't really know but that wasn't it. Maybe I'm dumb but SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS -
-
-
-how is the human race any better off now than they were, say, twenty years ago? Because the all-powerful machines promised to leave them alone? Right, machines don't lie. They murder and destroy but they are honest. And in exchange Neo gives them...what exactly? A promise to take care of Smith? But he does this by getting killed and letting the machine Source take care of it? Huh? I am so confused I don't even want to think anymore about this movie. I'm going to go with what my friend said tonight. He pointed out that since the Wachowskis are just men after all, why do I expect that their movie will ultimately make sense? And I got kind of miffed at myself, and I said, "Yeah, self. Why DO you think it has to make sense?" And I said to myself, "what a wonderful world...what a wonderful world."

p.s. see how easy it is? you too can make no sense while still retaining the illusion of depth.
 

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Posted by ae (Member # 3291) on :
 
SPOILERS

Wasn't Neo supposed to save the people plugged into the Matrix? It doesn't look like he's done a very good job of that, does it, what with everyone turned into Agent Smith? Which, incidentally, makes the Oracle's question about the people still plugged in very puzzling indeed.

What happened to the Twins?

Why don't the battle suits have any built-in protection for the operator at all? And this being so, why didn't all of them die in seconds? And why are they armed with machine guns when the gluon gun thingies are clearly more efficient?

Why does Smith colonising everyone in the Matrix suddenly make him more powerful than Neo and give him the ability to fly?

Why did the Machine City fire at Neo's ship if they wanted him to go there?

What happened to the Merovingian actually being a significant character?

Argh.
 

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Posted by Olivet (Member # 1104) on :
 
SPOILERS

I have to agree with Ryuko, Christy, Mormoniacal and the mis-named rat. It fit. It was in keeping with the philosophical framework of the first two movies.

I think it's funny that some critics have bashed it for being a thinly-veiled Christian Allegory. *snicker* That's funny because 1. why is allegory necessarily a bad thing? and 2. the idea of personal sacrifice predates Christianity by God only knows how long. People have died for the greater good of others for as long as there have been people (I'm guessing, but I have a hunch I'm right.)

The Architect says at the the end that those in the Matrix will be freed. The Oracle says "I have your word?" and he says, "What do you think I am, Human?"

*thwap* Pay attention.
 

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Posted by MEC (Member # 2968) on :
 
I haven't seen matrix 3 yet but I have some questions about the plot of the first two that rather confuse me.

Why do the agents need to take over a human body when they see morpheus and freinds, If they are programs and on the machines side why can't they just change their own position in the code by reprogramming themselves?

when agent smith took over the body of that one guy in the second movie, why didn't the pilot of the ship staring at the code see it? and how did he come back into the body, If they have all the bodies hooked up to the same connection to the matrix they would need some sort of sorting program to send the right mind into the right body when they answer the phone?

If the agents can program a brick wall into the matrix why can't they program in a pile of bricks over peoples heads that will fall on them and kill them?

In the first movie agents would run out of ammo and then get more ammo when they change bodies, why the hell then in the subway seen can agent smith just program in some more ammo in his gun?
 

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Posted by Speed (Member # 5162) on :
 
I saw the movie the night before last. I enjoyed watching it, partly because I was surrounded by a bunch of friends. As I left the theatre, I was pretty pumped. But the more I think about it, the dumber it seems. I've put off posting a review because this movie has made it uniquely difficult for me to articulate my opinion. But I'm going to put in a few thoughts that have solidified themselves, and maybe I'll add more later:

Some things that didn't make sense:

-If the people of Zion had enough time and resources to build their robot-exoskeleton army and elaborate holographic security system to fight the sentinels, why didn't they use the time to saturate the perimiter of Zion with EMPs?

-Why was the commander from Reloaded so freaked out about letting a couple ships go find the Oracle, when the remaining ships didn't have any part in the final battle?

-Why did the machines bother sending a quarter million sentinels to Zion, when a couple nukes strapped to the digging machines would have done the same job far more efficiently?

-Why did the Merovingian release Neo, when it would have been far easier to say he would until Trinity put her gun away and then have his people shoot them, or, even better, tell the train man to drop their asses off in limbo and leave them there with Neo, since they all went there to pick him up anyway?

-Why couldn't Neo beat the train man? If the Merovingian knew enough to be able to design a world and agents that are Neo-proof, why was it so hard for the Architect to do the same thing with the Matrix? If the train man could be programmed to be that much stronger than Neo, why wasn't he the one that the machines hired to defeat Smith?

-Once Neo defeated Smith and died, what stopped the sentinels from finishing off Zion? And how was a truce that was far less stable than anything ever signed by Israel and Palestine supposed to be a happy ending?

Other parts I didn't like:

I didn't like how they tried to cram as many movie cliches into the film as possible, with none of the development to pull them off. There was the plucky little soldier with the gruff commanding officer, who met in one scene and the next time they saw each other was the touching death scene. "I never completed the training" "Neither did I" Boo hoo hoo. There was the little girl who got assimilated by Smith, and we were supposed to feel bad because she's a cute little girl, even though we barely knew who she was. There was the wife that we saw once coming back to fire a crucial and contrived shot to save her husband. There was Trinity's schmaltzy death scene. Trinity's lines for that scene were straight from Chow Yun Fat in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, but it had absolutely no emotional resonance. All that sex in the second movie, and I still wasn't involved in the relationship enough to care.

I also didn't like the fighting. It's gone steadily downhill since the first movie. In that film, the characters were able to bend reality, but it was still based in real life. In this film, the only fighting that was at all interesting was in the parking lot outside the club, and that was over in 10 seconds. After that, there was the bullet-spewing fight in the hat check room that was so concerned with showing off the villains' pointless skill of standing on the ceiling that it forgot to be exciting. And the final scene with Neo vs. Smith was one of the dullest fights I've ever seen. When two characters spend an entire fight flying at each other like Superman and showing that they won't ever really get hurt, no matter how hard they're hit, it loses some of its urgency.

I won't go over how cartoonish, emotionless, uninteresting and overly-digitally-produced the Zion battle was, compared with the action centerpieces of either of the other movies (rescuing Morpheus or the freeway chase), other than to say that it would have been more at home in one of the Star Wars prequels than a Matrix movie. And many of my other complaints have been covered already. If I think of anything I liked enough to mention, I'll post it later. Meanwhile, all I can say is that it held my attention in the theatre. Now I just have to figure out if I can stave off the OCD enough to leave the first two movies in my DVD collection without the third, as I don't think it's worth another $20.

[ November 07, 2003, 10:16 PM: Message edited by: Speed ]
 

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Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
 
So this blindness, was it more of an Oedipus blindness or a Mua'Dib blindness? The Dune sequels weren't entirely better and better as they went. Though I liked Dune Messiah quite a bit.
 

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Posted by Abrynne (Member # 5826) on :
 
My favorite part was when Agent Smith revealed himself to be A Woman!!

*runs away laughing madly*
 

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Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
 
Overall, I thought it was very good, but nevertheless disappointing because the first movie set up so much potential in the trilogy that was never realized.

Also, the Wachowskis have been watching too much DBZ (and DBZ does it much better than the Matrix achieved, interestingly enough.)
 

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Posted by Leto II (Member # 2659) on :
 
DBZ sucks, and anyone who claims to think that crap mess does anything better than anything else obviously has no taste.



SPOILERS

ae:

quote:

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Wasn't Neo supposed to save the people plugged into the Matrix?

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quote:

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Which, incidentally, makes the Oracle's question about the people still plugged in very puzzling indeed.

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quote:

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What happened to the Twins?

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quote:

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Why don't the battle suits have any built-in protection for the operator at all?

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quote:

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And this being so, why didn't all of them die in seconds?

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quote:

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And why are they armed with machine guns when the gluon gun thingies are clearly more efficient?

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quote:

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Why does Smith colonising everyone in the Matrix suddenly make him more powerful than Neo and give him the ability to fly?

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quote:

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Why did the Machine City fire at Neo's ship if they wanted him to go there?

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quote:

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What happened to the Merovingian actually being a significant character?

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Causality.
 

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Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
 
Hey, I think DBZ is pretty darn good in a weird animeish kind of way and I do have taste... although it's a very strange taste....
 

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Posted by FlyingCow (Member # 2150) on :
 
Wow, now I'm agreeing with Tres. First Leto, now Tres. The world could quite possibly be ending. I take solace in the fact that this thread doesn't deal with social or political issues...

The first Matrix had tremendous potential, and the second one blew it. It blew it so badly for me that I won't see the third in theaters, because there's no way to redeem the series.

And from what I've gathered (not having read the spoilers on this site, because I will likely see the film on video), the third didn't even make a good effort at redeeming the second.

Ah, well. I still like my version of the second film, and will keep attempting to convince myself that the Wachowski's version doesn't exist.

::puts fingers in ears::

la,la,la,la,la,la....
 

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Posted by Leto II (Member # 2659) on :
 
Maybe I'm biased against anime, feeling quite secure that 90% of it thoroughly sucks (with shows like DBZ leading the way into suck-dom).

Airborne Bovine, you're doing yourself a disservice by not seeing the film in the theater. I agree that the second film fell way short of the first, but this one does things the second should have in terms of story. What I didn't like about your version was that you made Neo out to be a deity, when he was never really so. The only points to keep in mind from Reloaded when watching Revolutions are: 1. Smith can steal programs (as well as their abilities) along with humans (remember, he stole an agent in Reloaded), 2. Neo is still not sure what his "purpose" is, which plays a huge role in his "struggle," 3. he's very attached to Trinity, and 4. he and everyone else have not been given the real reason for this whole "The One" cycle, not by the Architect nor by the Oracle. I assure you that if you go into the movie with just those things in mind, you will walk out of the theater entertained, even if things don't go as you may have pre-envisioned them.
 

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Posted by Speed (Member # 5162) on :
 
Flying Cow, I liked your storyline for the final couple movies. It would have had potential as a very interesting and original couple films. I only have one idea that I think would have been better. Here it is:

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Know what I mean? I just watched the original Matrix. I had forgotten how much I liked it. And it's not because it had any fewer plot holes or pretentiously silly techno-babble than the newer one. It's because of the emotion. Neo spent much of the movie confused, excited, scared, happy, angry or tired, and the audience felt what he felt. He was confused at the beginning, and so were we. He was frightened when he woke up, and so was the audience. He was excited to learn kung fu, and the idea excited us as well. He was scared to fight Smith in the subway, and we felt his fear, which added a layer of depth to the fact that he did it anyway. By the end of the film, when he finally found his power and threw off his timidity and confusion, I was more excited that I'd been in a long time. It was a payoff that made the journey worthwhile.

The folly of the sequels is that the filmmakers tried to give the payoffs without the cost. They knew how much we loved to see these characters finally find the power to go after the antagonists without fear, so they gave that to us through the entire movie. They were perpetually calm and composed in the face of whatever danger they were in. Their clothes never wrinkled, and their sunglasses stayed on. There was no emotion to latch on to, no suspense, and the journeys of the characters seemed completely pointless. It made the plot exposition feel contrived, and the action scenes feel like tedious filler between scenes of plot exposition.

But, as I said earlier, I think the biggest folly of the final two movies is that they were made at all. The conclusion of The Matrix was completely satisfying. They accomplished the rare feat of taking an interesting (though not flawless) idea, exploring it completely, and finishing with neither loose ends nor excess. If they had let it stand, it would have been remembered as an anomoly. An incredibly fascinating, well-made and original movie that came out of nowhere, influenced film and culture in a way that few pieces of art can aspire to, and stood as an icon in film history. As it is, the studio and the filmmakers got greedy. And now The Matrix will never be seen as anything but a good beginning to a mediocre and somewhat disappointing trilogy.

Sad, really.
 

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Posted by A Rat Named Dog (Member # 699) on :
 
-If the people of Zion had enough time and resources to build their robot-exoskeleton army and elaborate holographic security system to fight the sentinels, why didn't they use the time to saturate the perimiter of Zion with EMPs?

From the looks of things, a single EMP also shuts down all of the human machinery in the area for a while. Set of an EMP, and you're suddenly defenseless against the next wave.

-Why was the commander from Reloaded so freaked out about letting a couple ships go find the Oracle, when the remaining ships didn't have any part in the final battle?

I thought virtually every ship in the armada was destroyed when Smith sabotaged their surprise attack.

-Why did the machines bother sending a quarter million sentinels to Zion, when a couple nukes strapped to the digging machines would have done the same job far more efficiently?

The idea was to preserve the architecture of Zion to let another crop of rebels take refuge there from the next iteration of the Matrix.

-Why did the Merovingian release Neo, when it would have been far easier to say he would until Trinity put her gun away and then have his people shoot them, or, even better, tell the train man to drop their asses off in limbo and leave them there with Neo, since they all went there to pick him up anyway?

That I didn't get. He's throroughly duplicitous, and I didn't see him getting anything out of that deal.

-Why couldn't Neo beat the train man? If the Merovingian knew enough to be able to design a world and agents that are Neo-proof, why was it so hard for the Architect to do the same thing with the Matrix? If the train man could be programmed to be that much stronger than Neo, why wasn't he the one that the machines hired to defeat Smith?

I got the impression that anyone is invincible in their own private world. The Architect was probably invincible in the Matrix, as was Smith was he took over.

-Once Neo defeated Smith and died, what stopped the sentinels from finishing off Zion? And how was a truce that was far less stable than anything ever signed by Israel and Palestine supposed to be a happy ending?

The machines in The Matrix are not the machines from The Terminator. They aren't motivated by paranoid xenophobia. They are sentient, compassionate, and can possess a sense of honor. Neo gave his life to save the machine city. The machines honored his sacrifice by making peace with his people.

And it's supposed to be an uneasy truce. That's my favorite thing about this ending. They didn't find some magic bullet that defeats the boss enemy and makes the rest of them scurry away. They solved it in a realistic way — an uneasy truce held together by a few powerful people who believe in it.

[ November 08, 2003, 02:30 AM: Message edited by: A Rat Named Dog ]
 

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Posted by Speed (Member # 5162) on :
 

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From the looks of things, a single EMP also shuts down all of the human machinery in the area for a while. Set of an EMP, and you're suddenly defenseless against the next wave.

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I thought virtually every ship in the armada was destroyed when Smith sabotaged their surprise attack.

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The idea was to preserve the architecture of Zion to let another crop of rebels take refuge there from the next iteration of the Matrix.

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I got the impression that anyone is invincible in their own private world. The Architect was probably invincible in the Matrix, as was Smith was he took over.

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The machines in The Matrix are not the machines from The Terminator. They aren't motivated by paranoid xenophobia. They are sentient, compassionate, and can possess a sense of honor. Neo gave his life to save the machine city. The machines honored his sacrifice by making peace with his people.

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And it's supposed to be an uneasy truce. That's my favorite thing about this ending. They didn't find some magic bullet that defeats the boss enemy and makes the rest of them scurry away. They solved it in a realistic way — an uneasy truce held together by a few powerful people who believe in it.

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That's why you put the EMPs around the perimeter, not in the city. Leave the city outside the blast radius, but set up enough to defeat wave after wave of machines as they're approaching, while leaving Zion unscathed.

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No. Unless I'm mistaken, Smith only wiped out the two (or maybe three) ships that went with him on the preliminary mission that the commander of the fleet opposed because he needed every ship. [edit: Maybe you're right. I just checked Reloaded again. The EMP destroyed five ships, but it doesn't make clear whether the sentinels got all the rest of them, or even how many ships went on that mission. It just says that it was a slaughter. It's a bit ambiguous. But one of the ships of the fleet went to look for survivors, and they found it very suspicious that they only found one. I guess they weren't counting themselves. Anyway, that part was very poorly explained, so I'll assume that you're right and withdraw that complaint.]

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That wouldn't make any sense to me. First off, it seemed to me that the people that inhabited Zion had spent a couple hundred years building it, which I assume is what happened in the other iterations also.

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Second, it would kind of give something away to have the next crop of rebels wake up from the Matrix and go to the center of the Earth to find a city that was built and empty, just waiting to be occupied and employed in fighting the machines.

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Finally, it seemed to me that the Architect kept the whole "next wave of Zionists" thing as secret from the machine side as he did from the human side.

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That's what originally drove Smith insane, because he thought that if he could just wipe out Zion, he could be free of the Matrix forever.

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That's also why they had to send their screw machines digging from the surface of Earth when they found Zion, rather than just pushing the button that released the cyanide and then waiting for the next crop of rebels when the experiment was done.

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That's what I'm talking about. First off, if the Architect was invincible in the Matrix, Smith wouldn't have been able to take over. Second, the Matrix wasn't Neo's own private world. But there was something inherent in him that made him more powerful in a computerized construct than the people that were built to be invincible. He got power from the source that made him more powerful than machines in the Matrix and, as we later found out, even in the real world. So why didn't that work in the far simpler construct set up as the bridge between those two worlds? And why weren't agents built with trainman technology, to be the gods of the Matrix that Neo couldn't touch?

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Maybe this concept was too complex for many people. In the Matrix, the Architect was the only invincible one. Ever. And even then, if the Source wanted him to disappear, he would have. Now, Neo and others could bend (or, in Neo's case, sometimes break) the rules as they knew them, because the rules for the world were consistent and always applied to everything. In the Train Man's little construct—and the Train Man built it, not the Merovingian—the rules were simply different than the Matrix. Given time, I'm sure Neo would have learned to break the rules of the Train Man's construct, just as he could in the Matrix. However, just because he could in the Matrix does not mean he can in the construct. Example: just because you know the password to someone's account here does not mean you know the passwords to every account here.

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See, I didn't get that idea. I understand that the machines aren't as xenophobic as the ones from the Terminator. But they do have a specific purpose for humans. They were ready to kill the entire human race if they didn't fulfill the machines' purpose. They're ruthless and remorseless in their self-preservation instincts, and I don't see what would keep them from attacking Zion as soon as it was beneficial just to honor someone who did something for them, even though he was serving the humans' purposes as surely as he was helping the machines.

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That's my least favorite thing about the ending. It's a truce that can't possibly last, held in place by who knows what, and as soon as it breaks, the human rebels are dead. The machines know where Zion is, Zion is defenseless, and Neo is dead. As soon as the machines figure out a reason to wipe them out, which can't take too long, they're done for. The humans will inevitably chafe under absolute machine control, but there will be nothing they can do about it. The machines now hold all the cards. The future of the human race is to be slaves to the machines until they can't take it any more, at which point they will be exterminated. What good, then, was Neo's life?

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It sucks when a movie hits a real aspect of alliances and truces like that, huh? The Architect is willing to preserve the truce because the Oracle is. The only wild card would be the humans. If things get screwed up, then it's their own fault this time. The best they can hope for now is to strengthen the truce, which would be the only other type of story I'd like to see from the Matrix: one where they have to arrange conditions, come to an agreement, maybe stave off xenophobes from both sides, and actually learn to work together. The movie sums up the series, but leaves it open for follow-up, though I doubt it would be in a feature film (too light on action and heavy on interaction).
 

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Posted by GreNME (Member # 3401) on :
 
And, you see, this is why so many didn't like the movie: they had preconcieved notions of how things worked, even though the previous movies explained it just fine. Neo wasn't a god, he was a man with extraordinary abilities. He was a messiah with clay feet in the second movie, who then had to act despite his soft feet in the third. Maybe if people had stopped imagining him a god, they'd have enjoyed the movie more. The programs were not machines. Machines were machines, and programs were programs. If people understood that a little better, maybe they'd have enjoyed things more. There was an unsophisticated cycle for the One, but the Architect needed that for the "organic" aspect of the Matrix. Very simple.

I think more people would have enjoyed the movie if they hadn't already dictated things about the film and had things happen in a different fashion. This movie is a perfect example of a curve ball totally screwing up preconcieved notions.
 

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Posted by Speed (Member # 5162) on :
 
Wow, GreNME, you're taking this a little personally, aren't you? If I unknowingly insulted your religion, I am sorry. Otherwise, keep in mind that it's only a movie. Other than the point that I conceded because of a misunderstanding, I'm still bothered by the plot holes that I mentioned, and by the other bits of poor style that I pointed out later in my critique. But I've spent enough time explaining why. If you're not bothered by them, good on you. I'm glad someone enjoyed the movie.

By the way, I get what they were trying to do at the end. But sometimes throwing a curveball for the sake of the curveball is worse than doing things in a conventional way. That's one of my main complaints for both of the sequels. In the first movie, they had an idea that kept people guessing. But by the end of the film it was explained. It felt to me like they felt pressure to keep people guessing in the sequels, as that was one of the main strengths of the original, and this led them to do random things in order to make the plot different than what could have reasonably been anticipated. Killing off some main charcters is a quick and easy way of appearing deep and creative, but not every script calls for it. Twelve Monkeys, for example, was a creative, original script whose ending was enhanced by the death of the main character. This movie felt, to me, to be trying to imitate that type of creativity after it shot its wad of actual ideas on the first movie. The first movie had an ending that was just as creative and non-traditional as Twelve Monkeys, but it fit the story, and it worked. That's why I would have been happier if the Brothers would have left it alone and gone on to other projects rather than turning it into a superfluous franchise.

That, however, is only my opinion. If you liked the sequels, I'm happy for you.
 

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Posted by GreNME (Member # 3401) on :
 
Awww, I show you how your preconcieved ideas about the film ruined it for you instead of the actual film, and you have to say I'm taking it personally. How cute.

T`ain't nothing personal, so don't get all het up over it. It has become abundantly clear that so many people went into the movie expecting a different movie, that it was pretty much destined to be a disappointment. That's just the way people are, they can't really help it. It wasn't a curveball for its own sake, because the movie pointed in that direction the whole time. I remember time after time where I just couldn't believe the interpretations people were getting from Reloaded when it came out, mostly because 90% of the interpretations had little to do with what was literally said in the film. Pretty much every gripe seems to fall along the same lines in this thread. Mayhap you people tried to hard to read between the lines?

While it's very nice for you that you "felt" they were pressured or were doing something for some unrelated motives, the truth is the movies explained everything as they went along pretty literally, and the biggest mistake the Wachowski brothers made was to split Reloaded and Revolutions into two movies. The reason the latter was a mistake was because the middle movie came off as filler, which much of the actual film really was despite the 30 to 45 minutes of scenes that are integral to the story.

Oh, and first post on page two.
 

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Posted by Speed (Member # 5162) on :
 
I didn't say you were taking it personally because of the points you made, but how you made them. Calling my ideas "ridiculous" and saying, "just because it's your idea does not make it a good one." The rolling of the eyes and the talking down to me like I didn't understand what was going on because it was "too complex". I understood it perfectly, and the fact that I didn't like a movie that you enjoyed was no reason for any of that. I never said that anyone who likes this movie is stupid. If the mere fact that my tastes differ from yours, or that I won't blindly accept a sequel as the word of God just because the original was good, are so offensive to you that you must respond by hurling insults, perhaps you should lay off the movies for a while. Or take your lithium before you post. This is not healthy.
 

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Posted by GreNME (Member # 3401) on :
 
You rag on me saying that I was insulting, then you insult me. The irony is not lost on me.

I said your synopsis was ridiculous because it is describing things that have nothing to do with what was clearly stated in the film. Like I said, you went in expecting a different movie, and when you didn't get the movie you wanted, you were disappointed. I have zero sympathy for that.

Perhaps you shouldn't be so defensive.
 

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Posted by Speed (Member # 5162) on :
 
For the last time, I went in with a completely open mind. The fact that I saw a crappy movie is no proof of misplaced expectations. Don't assume that everyone who doesn't like a movie comes to that conclusion because they were expecting something different. Some movies just aren't very good. Some people like a movie because of misplaced expectations. They're so sure that a movie will be good, they adjust their reality to fit their preconceived notions, general concensus notwithstanding.

Incidentally, if you think I'm being defensive, go back through the thread and see who threw out the first personal attack. There are plenty of people on this thread who liked the movie, and you're the only one I've been unable to have a civilized conversation with. Perhaps that will give you some indication. In any case, believe what you want. I'm through feeding you.
 

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Posted by GreNME (Member # 3401) on :
 
Actually, the only reason you're unable to have a civilized conversation with me is that you refuse to accept my opinion about your lack of taste.

Here's a breakdown:

You opine the movie sucked.

I opine that you either have no taste or saw a different movie than the actual movie.

You say that you are entitled to your opinion, and that I shouldn't opine such things about your opinion.

I scoff at the notion that you are allowed to opine about the movie, but I am not allowed to opine about your lack of taste about the movie. It's apparently perfectly fine for you to assume things about the movie without question, but as soon as someone assumes in the same manner you did about the movie with regard to your opinion, you get all jumpy and assume an insulting tone.


If you're allowed to hold your opinion about the film, I'm allowed to hold the opinion about why you obviously could not "get" the film. You're trying to argue about the validity of opinions by saying I'm not allowed to have one. Your bad.
 

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Posted by Kama (Member # 3022) on :
 
In order to have a civilized conversation with Leto, you need to tame him first.

*scratches Leto behind his ears*

See?
 

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Posted by Steel (Member # 3342) on :
 

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Wasn't Neo supposed to save the people plugged into the Matrix?

Nope. He was supposed to give them a choice. Mission accomplished.

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"Watching the movie is sort of like finishing off a filet mignon dinner with Pop Rocks."
-- Phil Villarreal, ARIZONA DAILY STAR

"Worthy of theater viewing based only on the mind-blowing CGI which take effects to a new level. The story's no longer intriguing, just the action."
-- John Venable, SUPERCALA.COM

"I think I liked The Matrix better when the solution was still unknown."
-- Joshua Tyler, FILM HOBBIT

"The ultimate triumph of visuals over narrative."
-- Daniel Schweiger, FILM THREAT

"An exciting adventure despite its shortcomings... But in concluding the trilogy so carelessly, the Wachowskis have betrayed my trust and broken my heart."
-- Eugene Novikov, FILM BLATHER

"The eye candy makes up for the weak dialogue and wooden acting."
-- Scott Nash, THREE MOVIE BUFFS

"Merely an ending, instead of a grand, satisfying conclusion"
-- Marty Mapes, MOVIE HABIT

"Though inferior to its predecessors, Revolutions does manage to keep the eyes intrigued for two hours of solid and well-photographed action sequences."
-- David Keyes, DAVID KEYES' CINEMA 2000

"Even if The Matrix Revolutions fails to mesmerize your mind, it will dazzle your senses."
-- Louis B. Hobson, JAM! MOVIES

"A satisfying if not totally comprehensible conclusion."
-- Duane Dudek, MILWAUKEE JOURNAL SENTINEL

"Its attempt at bringing a discussion of free will to the masses is admirable, even if its effectiveness is hampered."
-- Jeffrey Chen, WINDOW TO THE MOVIES

"Drunk on itself and the possibilities of cinema to present allegory in grandiloquent gestures and crushing self-importance."
-- Walter Chaw, FILM FREAK CENTRAL

"For a sense of closure, go ahead, see this insanely complex final battle between humans and machines. But be forewarned: The law of diminishing returns is in full effect."
-- E! ONLINE

"True believers will be reaching for the red pill, but it's still not quite enough to convert the heretics."
-- Ty Burr, BOSTON GLOBE

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Not that this proves anything, but I thought it was kind of funny. These are some of the sentiments that gave it as high a mark as it got. Of course, on the other end are such lines as "an unmitigated disaster" and "The Matrix Revolutions sucks." But I'll leave those out.


 

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Posted by GreNME (Member # 3401) on :
 
Wow, look who seems to have taken things personally.
 

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Posted by GreNME (Member # 3401) on :
 
Oh, and:

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"I'm going to show them what you don't want them to see; a world without rules or boundaries. A world without you."

What did he show them, I wonder?

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Did you see the fake sunrise at the end? Did you hear the Architect say that the people who wanted to be free would be freed? I'd say that's pretty word-for-word.
 

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Posted by Speed (Member # 5162) on :
 
don't feed the troll...
don't feed the troll...
don't feed the troll...

Hmm. I like that mantra. I think I'll keep it.
 

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Posted by GreNME (Member # 3401) on :
 
This is golden.
 

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Posted by Taberah (Member # 4014) on :
 
I actually enjoyed the movie, but I walked away with the grim suspicion that they hired George Lucas to write the dialoge. I found it unbelievable that a movie that plays on so many punk/goth/existentialist concepts could have such cornball dialogue.
 

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Posted by Lalo (Member # 3772) on :
 
I've just seen it, twice. Once alone and once with a cute chick I met in the theater.

I'm so horribly disappointed. How could a movie with such a great concept and immense funding turn out such a stale plot? Such horrible actors? It's a disgrace to the first movie, which I enjoyed despite its relatively few plot holes.

Ugh. I'll start out with the unnecessary sub-plots. That obnoxious little kid is annoying as hell -- by obnoxious little kid, I could mean either the disgustingly cute Indian girl or the disgustingly eager teenage boy. Neither have any place in the movie -- it's almost as though Spielburg directed this crap. The relationship between Link and Zee is stale and forced, bordering on the emotionally scarring. (In my case, at least, I know my cynicism towards Hollywood at least tripled.) Similarly, Neo and Trinity's relationship, while required by cliche, is so ridiculously trite you can't help but cheer when Trinity dies (presumably by Keanu Reeves' bad acting).

I'm sure these useless and distracting (and badly written and badly acted, of course -- that's starting to become a given with the Matrix movies) were meant to provide some sort of personal perspective on the war from Zion. Which, if left to itself, may have been a good idea. Unfortunately, the idea was warped by whatever $2-an-hour moron wrote the script, and we wound up with these forced and cliche I-love-you-so-much (or in the obnoxious kid's case, I'm-coming-of-age-and-have-a-hero) relationships, compounded with the unbelievably bad acting from all parties involved.

But these sub-plots pale in comparison to the main plot itself. Good lord. With all these hundreds of millions of dollars available to spend on the film, the best they could do was make a shoot-'em-up, straightforward war movie? Its only twist was Agent Smith -- which, what with the great acting ability of Hugo Weaving and the potential brilliance of an endlessly duplicating program, could have been a saving point for the movie. Unfortunately, they corrupted even this guy with the cliche-villain lines denouncing truth, freedom, and that oh-so-insipid emotion, love. Hey everyone! Hate me! Ha ha! I hate love and freedom!

I've lost faith in the American public if this is what is marketed to us.

Not to mention the ending. The ending. Good god. Not even mentioning that it starts with Neo walking amongst robotic insects, what the hell? How the hell does Neo corrupting (presumably) one Agent Smith infect them all? If I corrupt one downloaded .mp3, I don't corrupt them all. I guess Agent Smith was meant to be some kind of huge, all-encompassing program, and each body was some kind of extension -- but it's a cheap wrath-of-god ending, and unworthy of the original concept. I remember feeling this sort of cheated feeling when I read Robin Hobb's Assassin trilogy, when King Verity sends goddamn dragons to dispose of the raiders. It's the same problem. The fist of God struck, with one simple solution to a complex and potentially intriguing problem. Even with the presence of an attractive woman, I felt very nearly nauseous.

And speaking of being sickened, don't get me started on the actors. There were a few potential greats -- the former Oracle, Hugo Weaving, possibly the infantry captain, one or two council members, and probably a couple others -- but, like I said, they were potentially great. Weaving was weighed down with crappy actors and a crappy script, the original Oracle died (the new one was decent, but hardly above average), and the other actors were mind-bogglingly bad. Morpheus and Trinity just kept looking at each other ridiculously blatantly after hearing each sentence or seeing any new stunt, to signify to the oh-so-dumb American public that hey! This is strange! React to it! Trinity and Neo, in particular, were probably the two most nauseating actors in the movie, Neo with his omnipresent confused look and just, gah, unbelievably bad dialogue and Trinity with her yadda yadda Neo's lover schtick. Ugh. Though, to be fair, the black security chief was also a living tough-prick-cliche, Naiobi was a living tough-independent-girl-cliche, and Morpheus was his usual hey-everyone-I'm-a-prophet-which-explains-why-I-speak-like-such-an-idiot-cliche. The Frenchman, jesus, I'd go into him, but I've already used the word "cliche" far too much in this post. The same goes with pretty much every aspect of the movie.

Now, the movie had some graces, even if they weren't saving. The special effects were stunning, even if they were used in moronic ways (I'll never get over the stupidity of the humanoid, open-seated machine guns). And it was very pretty watching people fight. And I will kill to get my hands on a version of that Chinese bodyguard's jacket (what was his name? Sh-----?). But there's no substance behind the glossy prettiness of the movie. A shame, considering how truly great the concept could have been (especially after weighing in the amount of money thrown into the franchise).

I feel cheated. What's worse, I think science fiction as a genre's been cheated -- not only does this series set a model (and thus, a standard) for future sci-fi flicks to follow, but any future movie that tries to use a similar concept to a more intelligent effect will inevitably be accused of theft and imitation of the much poorer original.

But someone find me one of those jackets, and I'll be your sex slave for a week. Or I'll hire Frisco to be your sex slave. It might put me out $20, but it's a sacrifice I'm willing to make.
 

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Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
 
I guess the good thing about these reviews is that when I finally do see the movie, there's no way it can fall below all these expectations. Unless I'm running for "Nitpickiest Jatraquero of 2003". In this way, I managed to enjoy Reloaded OK. The only thing that really annoyed me was the sudden ending. Which probably wasn't as bad for me since I didn't see it until it came out on video.
 

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Posted by LadyDove (Member # 3000) on :
 
I saw the movie tonight, read the reviews and still have some questions:

1- Did Neo really die? I got the impression that he was still alive since the second to the last scene of the machine world appears to be from his perspective.. beautiful golden light and all.

2- What was the purpose of the little girl who had no purpose? I thought she was just to prove that that was very little difference between a program and a human, a word and an emotion. Then the Oracle goes and asks her if she made the sun rise, and she says yes... was that just playful dialogue or does the girl actually have a larger role?

3- Color me dense, but how many worlds were there?
a.Machine b.Human c.Matrix d.Architect and Oracle?
Are there more?
And in the last scene, in which world does the sun rise?

Thanks for indulging me.
 

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Posted by Lalo (Member # 3772) on :
 

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1- Did Neo really die? I got the impression that he was still alive since the second to the last scene of the machine world appears to be from his perspective.. beautiful golden light and all.

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2- What was the purpose of the little girl who had no purpose? I thought she was just to prove that that was very little difference between a program and a human, a word and an emotion. Then the Oracle goes and asks her if she made the sun rise, and she says yes... was that just playful dialogue or does the girl actually have a larger role?

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3- Color me dense, but how many worlds were there?
a.Machine b.Human c.Matrix d.Architect and Oracle?
Are there more?
And in the last scene, in which world does the sun rise?

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“Human beings [are] travelers. . . The earth is their matrix. . . [It is] but a station on their journey; for extraneous reasons . . .the travelers had interrupted their voyage. . . . Human beings were caught in a sort of eddy, a current that went in circles, giving them the impression of moving while they were, in essence, stationary. . . . Sorcerers were the only opponents of whatever force kept human beings prisoners . . . by means of their discipline sorcerers broke loose from its grip and continued their journey of awareness. ”
—Carlos Castaneda, The Active Side of Infinity

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I scoff at the notion that you are allowed to opine about the movie, but I am not allowed to opine about your lack of taste about the movie.

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Why are you so much nicer in person?

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Because you can see my face when I say what I do. Believe me, I don't say things much different, but there's definitely a difference.

And it isn't personal. I think that anyone who is whining about the movie being bad has no taste, because they're demanding the movie be something that no other film has been so far this year either. There are plenty of good films with plenty of neat things about them, but none of them are original, nor is the dialgue much (if at all) better. Yet, we don't see people going into diatribes about them. We don't see reviewers having a feeding frenzy on each new release. Why? Predisposition going to see the film. Make excusesall one likes, but formula-wise, Revolutions was on par with any film over the last few years. Any gripes about the movie are going to be strictly on a "this is what I thought it should have been" basis, not a "I didn't like it because of this" basis.
 

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Posted by ae (Member # 3291) on :
 
Isn't this a semantic quibble? "The acting sucked" vs. "I expected more convincing acting"; "the dialogue sucked" vs. "I expected better dialogue"; "the plot was stale" vs. "I expected a more original plot". "[T]his is what I thought it should have been" and "I didn't like it because of this" are two sides of the same coin.
 

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Posted by GreNME (Member # 3401) on :
 
If you like to believe that, ae, you are entitled to. However, one implies preconcieved notions while the other is basing solely on individual merits. Every post and review about the movie I have seen that was not good has been from implied preconcieved notions, even when people try to justify them.
 

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Posted by ae (Member # 3291) on :
 
How do you evaluate a merit if not against a preconceived notion? Of what good acting is, of what a halfway interesting character is, etc. It is inescapable.
 

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Posted by twinky (Member # 693) on :
 
Sure, but I wouldn't call The Matrix one of the pillars of cinema in any of those departments.

The problem is that people tend to put movies they like on pedestals. People like to pretend that their favourite movies are the best movies ever. The Matrix was a great action movie with very innovative cinematography. That's it. The sequels were the same, and I enjoyed them both for what they were. I certainly couldn't have done it better.

The other problem is that some people take the psychobabble in the three movies as though it's something new and try to pretend that The Matrix is some sort of philisophical "thinking man's movie" when it's nothing of the kind. It's a great flick, but make you think it does not. Again, the sequels were the same in this regard.

My only real criticism of Revolutions is that I would have liked to hear more talk about love.
 

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Posted by GreNME (Member # 3401) on :
 

quote:

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The problem is that people tend to put movies they like on pedestals. People like to pretend that their favourite movies are the best movies ever. The Matrix was a great action movie with very innovative cinematography. That's it. The sequels were the same...

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And it isn't personal. I think that anyone who is whining about the movie being bad has no taste, because they're demanding the movie be something that no other film has been so far this year either.

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What?!?!

What part of "I'm right, and if you disagree, you're a moron." isn't personal? You yourself would call this an ineffective sort of a last resort argument. Why use it if there are honorable ways to avoid it?

And I think part of why you're nicer in person is that we keep you stocked with a steady supply of White Russians.
 

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Posted by Zemra (Member # 5706) on :
 

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There are plenty of good films with plenty of neat things about them, but none of them are original, nor is the dialgue much (if at all) better.

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That's where you're wrong. "Gigli", "Kangaroo Jack" and "From Justin to Kelly" were great movies, with fresh and original dialogue. If you didn't understand how much better they were than The Matrix Reloaded, it must be because you went into them with the wrong expectations.
 

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Posted by T_Smith (Member # 3734) on :
 
::chuckles softly::
 

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Posted by Lime (Member # 1707) on :
 

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ORIGINALLY POSTED BY LALO

Not to mention the ending. The ending. Good god. Not even mentioning that it starts with Neo walking amongst robotic insects, what the hell? How the hell does Neo corrupting (presumably) one Agent Smith infect them all? If I corrupt one downloaded .mp3, I don't corrupt them all. I guess Agent Smith was meant to be some kind of huge, all-encompassing program, and each body was some kind of extension -- but it's a cheap wrath-of-god ending, and unworthy of the original concept. I remember feeling this sort of cheated feeling when I read Robin Hobb's Assassin trilogy, when King Verity sends goddamn dragons to dispose of the raiders. It's the same problem. The fist of God struck, with one simple solution to a complex and potentially intriguing problem. Even with the presence of an attractive woman, I felt very nearly nauseous.

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The problem is that people tend to put movies they like on pedestals. People like to pretend that their favourite movies are the best movies ever.

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I believe this is also why everyone hates the Star Wars prequels.
 

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Posted by Frisco (Member # 3765) on :
 
I think Jar-Jar did it for me in the first one, and the stupid Sound of Music scene did it for me in the second one.

And it's not that Hayden is that much worse than Mark, it's just that he's trying harder and takes himself so seriously. It's physically painful for me to watch a few scenes in AotC.
 

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Posted by mackillian (Member # 586) on :
 
Not me. I just drool.
 

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Posted by Frisco (Member # 3765) on :
 
You should really use the word "salivate". "Drool" just makes me think that you took a few extra muscle relaxers.

Which, now that I think about it, might be a good way to get through the prequels painlessly.
 

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Posted by twinky (Member # 693) on :
 
>> I believe this is also why everyone hates the Star Wars prequels. << (Jon Boy)

Indeed.
 

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Posted by BannaOj (Member # 3206) on :
 
*spoilers*

I thought that the plot was an interesting combination of the "savior" idea and the "reincarnation" idea. Over and over again, "All things come to an end" was emphasized. There is a beginning and an ending to everything. There was a beginning and end to the war and there will be a beginning and end to the peace, though it may be some completely different alliance of men and machines than before. When there is peace someone/thing evil will arise to start a war, and when there is a need for the hero he will arise to correct the imbalance.

I generally liked the movie, but I am always able to suspend disbelief while watching a movie. This is why I don't go see horror movies, I don't have good internal reflexes against them and I end up with nightmares.

I did have tears in my eyes at Trinity's death. She got a chance to say everything that people who have walked out of their front doors and gotten run over by a bus never had a chance to say to their loved ones. She was speaking it for everyone in Zion who died without getting a chance to say what they needed to.

I thought the parents and child program really emphazised the sentinence of the machines. What I am confused about is whether the sentinel squids were actually sentient or like a big toe of a greater sentinent machine. And is it the "machines" that are sentient or the "programs" that are sentinet or both.

Does it always take two parent programs to create a unique child? Along with the Indian family, it appears that John Smith was the Oracle's son, since that was what she called him before he assimilated her.

A bit I found out about the little girl's name from an Indian friend of mine. I'm not sure if it means a lot or a little, you never know with the Wachowskis and I don't want to read too much into it but here it is:

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Q: What does the name Sati mean, or does it?
A: Sati has generally been the word for self-immolation that Hindu widows used to do upon their husbands death.

It could also be a variation on Satya, which means truth. I've not generally heard Sati as a girl's name.

So maybe they used it to mean ultimate self-sacrifice, or truth. *shrug*

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One thing I don't understand is why the machines didn't just build a matrix where all the humans knew they were in it and the humans could make their world whatever they wanted it to be, I would defenitaly stay in the matrix if I was in it and if it was like that.

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I'd heard all the bad reviews, so was fairly worried going in.

After seeing it I'm of the opinion that:

a) most people just want happy-shiny well-wrapped movies where everything is resolved in neat little packages.

b) You can't trust 90% of people who have an opinion.

I enjoyed Revolutions immensely, the pacing was excellent, the emotional journey was rich and the conclusion satisfying.

I couldn't be happier.

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So, did we just not see the same movie? One of my biggest problems with these sequels, beyond everything I listed above, is that it does cater to idiots by giving them a "happy-shiny well-wrapped [movie] where everything is resolved in neat little packages."

And the emotional journey was rich?

The thread's about the Matrix: Revolutions movie, dude. Which movie are you reviewing?
 

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Posted by Beren One Hand (Member # 3403) on :
 
The one thing I liked about Matrix 3 was the exploration of the computer programs' free will. There were several computer programs which were on the verge of developing complete autonomy from the source (the Frenchman, Oralce, Smith, etc). The little girl was the first program that was created without a function and actually selected her own function within the Matrix (putting up sunrises or something). If each program starts picking what they want to do, how will the Source run things? This is kind of like the Borg ending, where Captain Picard left a trace of his individuality in the collective and caused havok within their society.

A few things that annoyed me about Matrix 3 *spoilers*

1. Stupid Humans. How can I care about the humans when their defensive strategy is so utterly idiotic? As someone else pointed out, their mech units had no protective armor. My Honda Civic can withstand more attacks than those units! And why, oh why, would they NOT HAVE INSTALLED EMPs IN ZION? I know it knocks out everything else, including the defense systems, but have you seen their defense systems? They could have their ships circle Zion in an orbit, and whenever the attacks get too hot, send one ship down and activiate an EMP. At least have one mother of all EMPs inside the temple to set off in case of absolute do-or-die emergency.

2. Stupid Machines: Those squid things are the dumbest things in the world. Those things have limited laser-cutters but no projective weapons.

3. Stupid Fight Scenes: Ending was a complete Dragonball knock-off, and not even a good one.

4. Stupid Trojan Horse Ending: That "twist" ending ranks right up there with Jeff Goldblum uploading a virus via his apple computer.

5. Stupid truce: I think the architect said that all the humans who wants to be freed will be freed. Does that mean Morpheus can still continue his rescue missions? Obviously the machines cannot release all humans, they need them for power! As for that crap about "honor", that is total insanity. According to the background story in animatrix, the machines were persecuted by the humans the way the Jews were by the Nazis. If the machines are willing to overlook all that because of Neo's tiny sacrifice of his life, then they do not deserve to survive.
 

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Posted by kelly smith (Member # 5075) on :
 
well i was pretty ambivalent about the movie, but i had a question to ask you...
-how did smith and all the agents die? Like what made them disappear and neo die in the end. I couldnt figure it out, so someone please tell me!
-How is that an ending? Neo defeats smith and saves zion, but the matrix still exists. Someone (im too lazy to look up who) said he gave the people a choice, but i dont get how he did that either.
Some help plz?
 

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Posted by TheRatedR (Member # 5190) on :
 
The worst part about this move was that it made me stop liking reloaded. All the talk and ideas from reloaded weren't delivered on in the last chapter. I think its hilarious how many people seem to love this movie so much that they can't sit by while people dissect this movie and that their opinions or interpretations are the only ones that can possibly be taken form the film. In my opinion revolutions delivered as a straight action movie. I was intrigued and interested in the fighting scenes but as a conclusion to the the matrix triology i found it sorely lacking. How it all shook out made me stop even caring about the ideas and themes of the triology. When revolutions was over i just didn't care. I almost wish i was mad but instead i'm just indifferent now.
 

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Posted by m. bowles (Member # 3743) on :
 
I was a bit let down by this movie. I think I was a bit let down because it was different than I imagined it to be. Oh well......life goes on.
 

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Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
 
"how did smith and all the agents die? Like what made them disappear and neo die in the end. I couldnt figure it out, so someone please tell me!"

Neo is absorbed by Smith at the same time his physical body is connected to the Source; this essentially connects Smith to the Source, at which point the Source deletes him.
 

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Posted by Ethics Gradient (Member # 878) on :
 
I thought it was just an average flick. Plot holes were truck worthy, but that's to be expected - Reloaded threw up way too many questions for the final film to answer.

But hey, it was a movie.

My housemate's favourite film of all time is End of Days. And he's a computer science / law student at the top university in Australia.

So, Eddie, one day you'll work out that people like different things for different reasons. What's more, *gasp*, not everyone who disagrees with you is a moron!

Whoa.

That said, I think what disappointed me most about Revolutions was that Neo missed a true comedic opportunity. When he faces off against Smith inside that old warehouse at the end, turns and does the little "Come hither" gesture... Why, Oh why, doesn't he say "I know Kung Fu, you know."
 

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Posted by Shigosei (Member # 3831) on :
 
*SPOILERS*

I enjoyed the action scenes. The fight between Smith and Neo intriguing to watch, the battle in the dock was spectacular, and the moment when Neo's and Trinity's ship burst out of the clouds into the sunlight was beautiful.

However, to enjoy this movie properly, I pretty much had to treat it as a completely different movie from the original Matrix. It has some of the same actors and premises, but it is not the same sort of story. Very little action takes place inside the matrix, Neo only gets to use his powers at the very end, and Morpheus is relegated to a minor role. The trainman/merovingian bit at the beginning of the movie seemed rather pointless, and I did not like the new Oracle as much as the old one (not that the Wachowskis could do anything about that problem...)

My overall opinion is that it's a decent movie, even moving at parts (the deaths of Trinity and Neo were cheesy sometimes, but touching).
Don't expect it to be anything like the original movie. It's more eye candy than anything else, I think, but it's pretty good eye candy.

A few observations on the end of the movie: was it my imagination or was the greenish tint gone in the last scene? It seemed that the park was filmed in natural light without the dingy green look that's been a part of the matrix in the past. Also, if Sati made the sunrise, then perhaps her function is to create beauty--something that was not essential in the previous iteration of the matrix. She might not have been completely useless, but her purpose was not neccessary until the matrix was remade.

One final thought: do the people who were taken over by Agent Smith remember the experience? And if so, where are the machines going to get enough psychologists to deal with the humans' trauma?

*END SPOILERS*

[ November 10, 2003, 12:16 AM: Message edited by: Shigosei ]
 

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Posted by twinky (Member # 693) on :
 
>> Don't expect it to be anything like the original movie. It's more eye candy than anything else, I think, but it's pretty good eye candy. <<

That's what the first movie was too, eh?
 

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Posted by Shigosei (Member # 3831) on :
 
The first one at least had some element of mystery to it. Half of the fun of that movie was wondering what was going on and feeling the excitement as Neo discovers the amazing power he has. And sure, the philosophy in the first was still pretty shallow, but it was still there. The third one was pure action.
 

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Posted by Rohan (Member # 5141) on :
 
I'm going to second what the dude on the TV said today about this movie. "the most amazing special effects were Monica Bellucci's breasts." And yet the Wachowskis only have her in the movie for a few seconds with one lousy line?
 

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Posted by twinky (Member # 693) on :
 
I wouldn't even say "it was there." As far as I'm concerned, all three movies were great action flicks with magnificent cinematography. Nothing more. And I thoroughly enjoyed all of them
 

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Posted by ae (Member # 3291) on :
 
EG:

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So, Eddie, one day you'll work out that people like different things for different reasons. What's more, *gasp*, not everyone who disagrees with you is a moron!

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Neo is absorbed by Smith at the same time his physical body is connected to the Source; this essentially connects Smith to the Source, at which point the Source deletes him.

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See, I assumed Smith died because he and Neo were opposite sides of the equation. It's like they were opposites, and so when they were added together, they equaled zero. Maybe I'm totally wrong, or maybe I just missed something.
 

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Posted by Lime (Member # 1707) on :
 
Jon Boy - yes they were the opposite sides of an equation, but it doesn't mean that they annihilate eat other when they are absorbed. They came into contact plenty of times without doing so, and Smith tried to absorb Neo in the 2nd movie without blowing up.

While Smith was an agent, he could bend the rules the same as the other agent - exactly like all the other agents. But once he was freed, he became the Machine equivalent of the One, and could bend rules like Neo ("Bend it Like Keanu" anyone?)

The Oracle had something to do with Smith's new abilities, but I'm not sure exactly what - when the Oracle calls him a bastard, he replies, "You should know, Mom."

[ November 10, 2003, 12:49 PM: Message edited by: Lime ]
 

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Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
 
Okay, here's how I understood it:

Neo, when he entered Smith, overwrote some of Smith's code with his own and prevented Smith from re-entering the Source for deletion. Smith gains the ability to self-replicate, and gains the programming of each program and person he overwrites as he does so.

Swallowing the Oracle gives him her ability to perceive the future. (When he meets the Oracle, he calls her "mom" because she is in a sense the "mother" of all the original Agents, with the Architect as the father.)

He has already gained control of the Matrix's back doors, and now needs only to access the Source to imprint himself on the entire thing. Ergo, he needs to absorb Neo.

I like to think that the Oracle, acting from within him, is able to prevent him from fully understanding the ramifications of absorbing Neo while Neo's physical body is plugged into the Source.
 

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Posted by Dan_raven (Member # 3383) on :
 
I like my ending better. Agent Smith is a character in this big video game which has become sentient. The only way for the Sentient Godlike game to remain alive is to be played, so it locks some sap inside of the Agent Smith persona and creates Neo to stop Smith from winning the game.

It ends with Agent Smith removing his helmet revealing him to be Alex Winter(Ted from Bill & Ted) and cursing, "Wow man. I was this close to reaching the next level. That neo-dude is like totally rockin" as we hear the death gasps of the computer game in the background.
 

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Posted by fiazko (Member # 5812) on :
 
i have not yet seen revolutions. when i came out of reloaded, instead of condemning it then, i decided to wait and see how they wrapped up. i respect all of the opinions i have heard, but after reading this, i feel better about spending the 8 bucks to see revolutions before it hits the cheap seats.

if you take the time to read through what this guy has to say, tell me, does it change your perspective at all?
 

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Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
 
I think Reloaded and Revolutions work fine as movies, provided we do one thing first: we throw out Matrix.

The first movie, boiled down to its core, is a Hero's Quest. It's Anderson becoming Neo and learning enough about the bewildering world he finds himself in to take charge and provide hope. We're focused on a few key characters and we get to see them all develop. Great movie, great ending.

The second and third movies break away from that and turn it into a war movie, which of necessity has a lot of characters, but the main three (Morpheus, Trinity, Neo) are given short shrift. Had I not been given the promise of the first movie, I wouldn't have noticed.

It bothered me that Neo, a former hacker and computer programmer, stops trying anything new after he learns kung fu and how to fly. The way the first ended, I figured he'd go on to see what else he could do. He should have been able to adapt the Matrix for his own purposes, the way he softened a building for Trinity's helicopter to hit and caused the walls to bow in and out in the 1st movie. Instead he walks around and fights agents for fun while everyone else makes the decisions. Granted he knows nothing about wartime defense, but shouldn't he be trying to get into the code of the Matrix and fight it from within?

Morpheus is too strong a character to just be an "also starring" in the 3rd. The opportunity was there for some real acting. Everything he knows to be true, everything he'd based his life on was shown to be a trick. He seems a bit stunned, and then he's just backup with the occasional "I believe" statement. I wanted to see what happens when a powerful person's underpinning is pulled away, and I wanted to see his strength when he builds himself anew. Instead I got Niobe's hesitant co-pilot.

Trinity's death bugged me. Not that she died, but that it seemed so trivial (one review I liked complained that after being brought back from the dead, she died the next day in a damn car accident). She did an awesome job of piloting, but we needed something more from her, some sign that even the last second she was trying to get Neo there alive, no matter what happened to her. An example of what I mean can be demonstrated with the annoying pod race in Phantom Menace. I was expecting to see some sign that the kid had amazing piloting abilities, or that he subconsciously used the Force to aid him. Instead he basically did laps and didn't crash, for fifteen long minutes. I don't know enough about the race from the movie to realize how difficult it is to do whatever he's doing I need that little nudge from the director. Doesn't have to be obvious in an "over here, stupid" manner. Just something to let me know that suddenly, when all seemed lost, he was able to give an extra nudge that no one else could have.
The five minute death speech just bugged me, as it does everytime it happens in movies. Could have been cut in half, or to a third, and been just as tear-jerking.
Or - here's a kick - he could have sent her back to go on alone, and that would have left us the possibility of her being pregnant...

But Neo disappointed me the most. He grew in the first movie. He ran around in the second movie. And in the third movie he figured things out just a little too late each time, until the very end. As the Oracle said, "Not too bright, though."
I wanted to see him show a little bit of ability beyond just being a software sponge.

I didn't have a problem with the plot, really. And I wasn't disappointed with the characters, but I was disappointed for them, and for the actors, who had the possibility but not the freedom to do so much more.

[ November 10, 2003, 05:19 PM: Message edited by: Chris Bridges ]
 

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Posted by saxon75 (Member # 4589) on :
 
I liked Revolutions. I keep hearing people complaining that it didn't fulfill the promise of the first movie, but with very few exceptions, I haven't heard what was so great about the first movie. Speed thought that the first movie was more emotionally moving, and Chris didn't like the change in format. I can accept both of those viewpoints. But I really just don't get why everyone thinks the first movie was some intensely awesome, thought-provoking thing.

The Matrix presented us with an interesting idea. When I left the theater, I was thinking that it was a bad-ass movie, the effects were amazing (and they were), and the story was cool. But it didn't exactly shake the foundations of my philosophical world. I mean, I had had "Did you ever wonder if the whole world is just a big computer simulation?" conversations before I even got to college and started trying drugs.

I'm not really the kind of person who goes into a movie and nitpicks. I'm not looking at the movie in such a way as to be able to find fault with stuff like that, because I'm not thinking about how I would have done it, I'm just letting the story happen, experiencing it. Certainly there are ways for a film to pull me out of the story, but most of the time if I'm able to nitpick, it's because I'm already not in the story.

Personally, I thought the emotional journey through the second and third movies worked. I think that they handled Neo's character well. The way he changed from just a guy into some superman, and how he had to deal with that later felt real to me. His relationship with Trinity helped him keep his link to his humanity, and I thought it was neither over- nor underdone. And when the characters were faced with the certain destruction of their world, I got caught up in that.

I kind of feel like a lot of people think that it's somehow bad to allow yourself to get emotionally involved with a movie like this. As though because the movie also has things to say about human nature, destiny, reality, and free will, that it's not also just a story about good people in a bad situation and what they do. It's not necessary to view the film on an intellectual level, and if you allow yourself to become immersed in the story, it works just fine on an emotional level.

Likewise, saying that it was "just an action movie" seems elitist to me. As if an action movie can't have anything to say about the topics I mentioned. I found the Indian program's conversation with Neo to be very interesting, if not terribly novel. But just because the questions it asks and the statements it makes are not new to me doesn't mean that they aren't there, and it doesn't mean that the questions can't be wrestled with.

I suppose I should revise my statement in my first paragraph. The Matrix may, indeed, have been thought-provoking for some people. Maybe the philosophical conundrum of that movie--what is real?--is deep for some people. It's also much easier to grasp than the philosophical conundrum of the second movie--what is free will and what is control?

And then there are the people who really just want an action movie, something like, I dunno, Predator or maybe Demolition Man. In that case, you have every right to be disappointed in the second and third movies, because that's not really what they were trying to be. Even so, I really think that if all you care about is action and FX, there was plenty of each in both Reloaded and Revolutions.

I dunno, maybe the first movie did shake up some people's worlds, and so if the second and third didn't, they have a legitimate complaint. I just don't see it.
 

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Posted by Leonide (Member # 4157) on :
 
Something i've been wanting to comment on that a few people have expressed displeasure with is the change in Morpheus's role throughout the three movies. See, I didn't see that happening. Yes, i saw Morpheus go from being a huge character to not having a lot to do, but his role did not change in the least. He was Neo's mentor...he was the man, self-chosen, to introduce Neo to the Matrix and the real world and explain to him all the possibilities. Then, Neo used his teachings and ideas to become a new person. The student surpassed the teacher. It happens all the time. Neo learned what Morpheus had to teach, took that knowledge, and went crazy with it. What did he need Morpheus for, in the end? A father-figure? Hardly. He had emotional support from Trinity...really, if you want to think of it in more domestic terms -- Morpheus raised Neo, then Neo moved out, got a girlfriend, and found his own life path. That's life! Morpheus had served his purpose, just like (as people have pointed out) Trinity served her purpose in keeping Neo grounded and giving him his humanity. When neither of them were needed anymore, they stepped back. Morpheus helped out where he could, Trinity went with Neo as far as she could and yes, died. Of course everyone wanted to see Morpheus remain the kick-ass deep-voiced sunglass-wearing MATRIX GOD! that he was in the first movie. But that wasn't needed anymore. He didn't need to impress Neo, or be a source of inspiration. HE needed to step the heck back and let Neo, the one with the power, do his thang.

mmm....now i need to see the movie again!
 

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Posted by Ethics Gradient (Member # 878) on :
 
Chris makes some really interesting points.

I think he hit on what disappointed me most about the second two movies. Both just felt like they had so much unfulfilled potential for exploration. One friend of mine called the Dock scene "Starship Troopers meets Aliens" and I think this kinda captures it for me. It's not that I wanted something in particular from either Reloaded or Revolutions. Or maybe I did. I wanted to be surprised. I saw the first film knowing nothing about it at all and it surprised me. I didn't expect Neo to take the directions he did. I suppose I wanted him to keep exploring in the second and third films but he didn't. As Chris pointed out, he kinda just wandered around and did stuff - fighting agents in the second and running about just behind the 8 ball in the third. At the end of the first film we saw the Matrix as Neo saw it - glittering code that could be molded and modified. Why was this such a negligible factor in the next two films?

Anyway, yeah, I enjoyed both movies. I just didn't think they had the pizazz of the first one.
 

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Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
 
Actually my problem wasn't that Neo surpassed Morpheus, it was that he didn't surpass him enough, and that Morpheus should have reacted to and rebounded from his entire worldview getting rocked with more... anything.

Neo just reacted in the 1st movie. He reacted and reacted and finally he turned and took a stand, he made the first move. In the 2nd he reacted, over and over, until he was goaded into a decision by the Architect.

In the 3rd movie he reacted, or just sat there. Finally he's given a vision - not because of any skills, but because the One gets these visions from time to time - and he finally acts on it.

You know what I would really have liked to see? Some clue that what Neo was before he was the One had something to do with him being the One. You know? I would have liked to have seen him use his programming skills, his hacking skills, his creative thinking, to work around some of the problems thrown at him instead of reacting just as he was led to. If he was going to approach the machine world he should have done it through the back door. No hacker uses the front. Unless the point was that the One could have been any old schlub, which is possible, there must have been a reason that Anderson was it. It couldn't have been courage or self-sacrifice, all of them had that. I wanted to see that reason.

[ November 10, 2003, 07:05 PM: Message edited by: Chris Bridges ]
 

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Posted by GreNME (Member # 3401) on :
 
Not to nitpick, but what exactly should Neo have been able to do that he wasn't? He didn't soften any walls for Trinity in the first movie, and the only time he warped reality around him was when he was about to do the physically impossible (like jumping into an agent or taking off in flight).

When Neo was around after the first movie, they had little to fear of Agents as long as he told them when to take off. He regularly tested himself with Agents ("hmmm... upgrades"), but they were of less concern to him than finding out his Purpose in the world. In fact, he had all these cool powers, but he was more interested in finding out what he was supposed to do to save people from the machines. "What I'm supposed to do" was a huge theme throughout, moreso in the second two movies. Neo spent all three movies trying to figure out what he was supposed to do, and in the end, he had to choose to do it anyway... no kharma like with the programs.

And another thing: I see a lot of references about how he should have been able to completely alter reality in the Matrix, and most of that is based on programming or software references. How many people here write in any kind of programming language? Let me tell you, there are some incredible programming languages out there that invlove incredible levels on complexity and flexibility, but there are properties to all of them that keep them all bound to rules no matter what. In the films, just like in real programming, there were/are workarounds for many things, up to and including making it seem like you are doing much more that you really are. However, the humans in the film, just like all other beings in the Matrix, were still bound by rules. Within the realm of rules that were given in the films, Neo far surpassed anything imagined as far as abilities, but he still couldn't change the nature of the Matrix itself—that would require access to the (aptly named) Source. Without access to that, he could do all the god-like stunts he wanted, but he wouldn't be changing the nature of the Matrix. Also, he had to be careful with his super powers, because the "normal" people were far more frail than he. So, I don't get a lot of these expectations about what he was supposed to have been able to do, because these rules and explanations were made from the very beginning. It's why Neo wasn't super powerful in the Train station (though he probably would have figured out how to be), and why he never got hurt in any of the human constructs for practice in becoming this super-being. It's all about the rules. You can bend them and circumvent them in places, but to change the rules themselves, you have to have access to where those rules are made.

Another big gripe is the complaints about Neo as a character, and Neo and Trinity as a couple. For some reason, people didn't find their relationship very convincing. I found it totally convincing. In fact, I thought Trinity's love was admirable. Neo, even being the superhuman "messiah" he is, still had the one big problem of not feeling connected to the real world without Trinity. This showed in his clingyness within Reloaded, and right up to the death scene in Revolutions. Trinity, on the other hand, was not dependant on Neo, but still cared about him so much that she would enter a situation where death is almost assured, just because she cares about him. No offense to anyone who has ever loved me, but I doubt anyone has ever cared for me that much. Neo's dependancy, on the other hand, is what made him even more of the messiah with the clay feet. Well, that along with his constant uncertainty. He knew he was supposed to do something, but right up to the end, he didn't know what. Sure, you and I knew where it had to inevitably go, but the entertainment was in watching him learn it.

And Chris: he didn't have the visions spontaneously. Each vision happened when he was trying to "reach out" and do something with his power, usually without know how to do what he wanted (like in the train station). He was seeing the path to the source.
 

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Posted by Ethics Gradient (Member # 878) on :
 
Yeah, that's a good point. Anderson was meant to be some hardcore hacker dude - so what happened to those smarts?
 

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Posted by GreNME (Member # 3401) on :
 
No offense to hackers, but their skills have less to do with programming and more to do with being sneaky. On the "programmer food chain," hackers are usually on or near the bottom. I think Neo's biggest skill was not that he was some great hacker, but that he was good at manipulating what he did know and not get caught.
 

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Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
 
In the 1st, when Trinity is leaping from the falling helicopter and Neo is hauling on the end of her line, the copter hits the building opposite and there's a long hesitation before the windows explode, long enough for Trinity to swing away. I'd always assumed that that was Neo's doing.
And he didn't do any godlike stunts, or at least no new ones since the first movie. I didn't get any sense he was testing his abilities or the limits of the system, only that he was taking things as they happened to him.
I didn't expect him to suddenly be able to rewrite reality. I did expect him to try, and maybe have some small successes.
Maybe when he was sitting in the subway he was really straining with all his might, or throwing his intellect against the contraints of the system, but all I saw was a frustrated guy sitting there and getting flashes, the same way he got flashes last movie during dreams and sex.

This is why the movies were not what they could have been for me. Most of the truths given him, by the Oracle and others, were on the lines of "get off your butt and do something," and I was getting tired of waiting for him to try.
I'm not trying to tell you why you shouldn't have enjoyed them, only why I left the theater vaguely disappointed. I don't expect to convince anyone to see things my way. I'm trying not to say what Neo did or didn't do, fro whatever reason, because that's up for grabs. This is what it seemed like to me, and either I'm not perceptive enough to pick up on the right things or the filmmakers didn't do a good enough job getting their ideas across, or a little of both.

[ November 10, 2003, 08:03 PM: Message edited by: Chris Bridges ]
 

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Posted by Ethics Gradient (Member # 878) on :
 
Leto, you loved the movie. We all get that. Some people didn't think it was great. You're not going to prove that I am, objectively, incorrect in my feelings about the movie.
 

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Posted by Eruve Nandiriel (Member # 5677) on :
 
I saw it today.
It was definately better than the second, but the sequels were not nearly as good as the first. And the ending was still kinda weird. And some scened were really dragged out. But the fight for Zion was really cool.
 

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Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
 
Spoilers...

I thought it was easilly the best of all the three and a wonderful movie all around. The special effects and the characters only served to further the story. All the secondary characters came forward and had something to say.

I loved seeing a more human side to everyone: Morpheus, in a reversal from his role in the first film, relegated to a back seat because this is a time for the warriors, not the priests to do their thing.

Naiobi, Morpheus foil, brought forward as the Woman of Action, and not cast as the stereotypical, two-dimensional caricature of such a woman.

The machines, in their matrix manifestations, especially, shown to be sentient beings with their own wants and needs, and not faceless terminator drones with no purpose but to KILL KILL KILL. If you've seen the animatrix bits about how the man/machine war came about, it was much easier to see this. The little girl was a masterful touch to make them human.

The death scene was very sad and not overdone.

I loved the Macross(sp) bots. I think my little pipi got hard when they were all in formation. The Zion warriors were all that and a bag of chips.

Super film. I thought it was a great ending to a trilogy that has gone from good, to o.k., to great.

[ November 10, 2003, 11:27 PM: Message edited by: Storm Saxon ]
 

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Posted by Ethics Gradient (Member # 878) on :
 
I can't believe you just referred to your "little pipi".


 

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Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
 

 

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Posted by ae (Member # 3291) on :
 
Leto:

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Another big gripe is the complaints about Neo as a character, and Neo and Trinity as a couple. For some reason, people didn't find their relationship very convincing. I found it totally convincing.

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I just want to point out that I think people are trying to cram real world logic into story logic.

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Shocking!

I mean, really, a storyteller who cannot tell the story he wants to without having his characters do patently stupid things—like having them operate huge engines of destruction all-but unprotected for no apparent reason—that's lazy storytelling, pure and simple. It's not like I went into Revolutions looking for things to hate, but willing suspension of disbelief only goes so far.

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Other things like this are throughout the movie. People bitch about the 'bad science' of using humans as power sources. Well, it might be bad science, but by binding the humans and machines together, it works wonderfully well as allegory and as a plot device, don't you think?

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The First movie was such a shocking idea, a totally new and unique alternate future.

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So how do you top that?

You can't, but you can continue on and I think the Brothers did a great job of continuing the story.

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So those people who say this just turned into a typical Sci/Fi war flick, well... yea, because that's what the entire story is about.

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Stories aren't like buried treasure you just stumble upon fully-formed. Writers make them up inside their heads; and if "what the entire story is about" is "a stypical Sci/Fi war flick", that's the writers' fault.

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When Neo was around after the first movie, they had little to fear of Agents as long as he told them when to take off. He regularly tested himself with Agents ("hmmm... upgrades"), but they were of less concern to him than finding out his Purpose in the world. In fact, he had all these cool powers, but he was more interested in finding out what he was supposed to do to save people from the machines. "What I'm supposed to do" was a huge theme throughout, moreso in the second two movies. Neo spent all three movies trying to figure out what he was supposed to do, and in the end, he had to choose to do it anyway... no kharma like with the programs.

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Matrix #1 is one of the BEST movies ever made.

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It's just like in Return of the Jedi. In the end, Luke doesn't save the galaxy with his amazing Force powers. He saves the galaxy by having love for the one person who did have the power to save the galaxy.

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That's a great analogy in that Return of the Jedi also sucked.
 

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Posted by ae (Member # 3291) on :
 
beatnix19:

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Yes the writer is to "blame" for the direction, creativity, originality, etc... of a movie. BUT... because the writer wrote the movie, that movie is then, in my opinion, art. As an artist the writer can do what ever he wants to his artwork. We are only spectators. We like it or we dislike it. To me it's that simple.

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I realize that some poeple commit way too much into the art we call movies. The bottom line is they are meant to entertain not bring about world peace.

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I think my explanation for why the exoskeletons as they are designed works towards a better story, a better movie, isn't contradicted by your response.

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Why didn't the humans hunker down behind big bunkers where they would have had maximum cover for their fire? That would have been the logical thing to do, but it wouldn't have worked on an emotional and visual level as well, I think.

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I respect your feelings about the movie, though, and certainly am not saying mine is the 'correct' way to view it. It does make me sad that people didn't see the same movie I did, because I really liked the one I saw.

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I respect yours, too. Ultimately what I find most baffling is people ripping on other for not liking the same things they do.
 

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Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
 
ae, it's too late for me to reply to your post the way I need to. I've tried to make a short, concise reply , and I just can't. Suffice to say that I don't know that I agree that there is always a way that logic and art can coexist equally.
 

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Posted by ae (Member # 3291) on :
 
I'll wait till tomorrow, then.

In case I wasn't clear, I don't mean to say that art must conform to all our real world laws, but that it ought to be internally consistent, and having battle suits which offer the user next to no protection in a world which seems to obey most of our world's laws (the relevant one being that if a sharp metal implement is trying to get cosy with your internal organs, it is best to have something in between you and it) is a minor but, for me, jarring example of an internal inconsistency.
 

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Posted by beatnix19 (Member # 5836) on :
 
ae-

perhaps I was a bit hash, maybe i should have said "some people invest much more than I do into movies" I certainly did not mean to imply that discussion was pointless or wrong. In fact I really enjoy reading what people have to say about a film or book. Sometimes it just seems that some people get too upset when a movie dosn't turn out the way the wanted. I guess thats why I kind of vented earlier.
 

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Posted by ae (Member # 3291) on :
 
beatnix19:

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Sometimes it just seems that some people get too upset when a movie dosn't turn out the way the wanted.

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It is, in fact, just a big enough deal that I'll argue about it with people on the internet. I don't think that's excessive, do you?

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No, I don't. In fact I've had fun the last couple of days "discussing" our opinions. I realize I've come off kind of like a big mouth idiot but, well... I guess I can often be a big mouth idiot. So, I hope no offense was taken because none was meant. I still stand by my opinions that movies sometime take on a life bigger than they really are meant to have, but that is also part of the fun of movies. In fact the article listed in this thread is a perfect example of how successful the matrix has been, maybe not in the way we expect but successful none the less.
 

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Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
 
ae, I don't think I'm going to tackle that topic. Sorry if I led you on.
 

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Posted by saxon75 (Member # 4589) on :
 
Um, ae, I don't get what you're saying. At first it sounds like you are saying we can and should disagree with each other and debate each other's opinions on movies because otherwise it'd be boring and not much of a discussion. But then you say that you shouldn't act like the other person is actually wrong because the experience is so personal.

On what grounds can we argue, then?
 

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Posted by Caleb Varns (Member # 946) on :
 

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On what grounds can we argue, then?

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I don't think I'm going to tackle that topic. Sorry if I led you on.

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Fair enough. For the record, though, you're not fun at all.

saxon75:

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Um, ae, I don't get what you're saying. At first it sounds like you are saying we can and should disagree with each other and debate each other's opinions on movies because otherwise it'd be boring and not much of a discussion. But then you say that you shouldn't act like the other person is actually wrong because the experience is so personal.

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I just wish more people would simply not pay to see them movie, rather than paying to see it to see just how bad it is. Doing that does nothing positive - it only contributes to the movie's success.

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But how am I to know if I want to support the movie if I don't see the movie in the first place? I mean, I can't know if it's bad if I don't watch it. I can decide based on reviews and past experiences that a particular movie's probably not worth my taking a risk on, but that's based on pragmatism rather than principle.
 

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Posted by Frisco (Member # 3765) on :
 
Just download it first.
 

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Posted by beatnix19 (Member # 5836) on :
 

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Beatnix made the point that the movies are art, and as such we can only react to them and say whether we "like" or "dislike" them. I think there's another step, really, and that's to stop patronizing the artists you don't like.

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Criticisms. OSC has no illusion that everybody likes all his books equally. But he likes all his books. So perhaps a signing is not the occasion to tell him which of his books you did not care for. After all, you would hardly say to a parent you just met, "I really love all your children except Bucky. He's ugly and he smells." It might be true, but the parent does not want to hear it. (Besides, what exactly can OSC do about it? The book you didn't like has already been published.) If, on the other hand, you found a specific typographical error, internal contradiction, or historical or scientific error in a book, it would be kind of you to write a note about it and give it to him so that he has it in writing and can pass it along to the editor of the next edition.

-from What to Expect at a OSC Signing, Hatrack.com

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[ November 13, 2003, 08:49 AM: Message edited by: beatnix19 ]
 

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Posted by FlyingCow (Member # 2150) on :
 
ae, you base your decision on past experiences.

If you put your hand on one hot iron and it burns you, you don't say "gee, I wonder if this other hot iron will do the same thing". You avoid putting your hands on hot irons.

If you disliked Matrix Reloaded, why go see Revolutions - you're only supporting art you don't like. Now, if you enjoyed Matrix Reloaded, it makes sense that you'd see Revolutions - you're patronizing artists you like.

There's no need to see Revolutions to say you don't want to see it. Would you go see Gigli 2 if it were made, just to see how bad it is? Is that worth a $9 investment? How about Glitter 2?

I'm talking about being proactive rather than reactive. Paying for the movie *at all* contributes to its success, and guarantees that more movies like it will be made. I'd rather put my money toward a movie I like, so that more like *it* can be made.
 

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Posted by beatnix19 (Member # 5836) on :
 
Opps, mistook Patronize (to be a customer of) for patronize (to treat condescendingly, haughtily, or coolly).

Oh, well. I still like my point
 

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Posted by ae (Member # 3291) on :
 
FlyingCow:

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If you disliked Matrix Reloaded, why go see Revolutions - you're only supporting art you don't like.

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Now, if you enjoyed Matrix Reloaded, it makes sense that you'd see Revolutions - you're patronizing artists you like.

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What I'm saying is pretty simple. When discussing things, one ought to argue about ideas. All ideas are limited to some extent by subjectivity, but this does not preclude the possibility of meaningful discussion. What I am arguing against are basically ad hominems. Things like "you only say that because you have no taste" or "you're only reacting like this because you take art way too seriously". These are value judgements that have no bearing on the discussion; someone's lack of taste or propensity to take art too seriously is relevant only insofar as it manifests itself in his or her arguments, in which case one should go straight to dealing with those rather than slinging shit about how one's opponent is approaching things with the wrong mentality. I'm assuming, of course, that the person in question is interested in conducting a meaningful discussion in the first place.

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If you disliked Matrix Reloaded, why go see Revolutions - you're only supporting art you don't like.

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When discussing art, what is a meaningful discussion? In a situation like this, it really all just boils down to taste and mindset. So if we are disagreeing on why the movie was good or bad, it stands to reason that your taste and my taste are different and incompatible.

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Different, undoubtedly. Incompatible? Not at all. If I know why you did or didn't like something, it helps me understand why you might or might not like something else. The more information I can get about your tastes, the more accurately I can trust your opinions on movies (or whatever) that I haven't seen yet. Movie critics are useless until you read enough of their work to be able to adjust your mental sights accordingly. One favorite reviewer has great taste in movies but in his eyes Disney can do no wrong, so from experience I know how far I can trust him to reliably help me. Another reviewer can't separate the actors' private lives from their work, so I can't trust him at all. See what I mean? Even value judgments can be useful if they're consistent. I've got an old evangelical Christian movie guide that was extremely helpful in choosing movies to rent, as long as I was careful to pick the ones they hated.

And there's always the chance that you'll help me see something that I missed the first time, or a different way to interpret the movie I thought I saw. Something that was incomprehensible to me that I would have dismissed as the director's fault might just be because I missed something I shouldn't have, and contrary opinions can help me examine my own opinions to see if I still agree with myself or not.
 

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Posted by saxon75 (Member # 4589) on :
 
Chris, you've been quite even in tone in this thread, so I wasn't really talking to you. You do have a good point about using the dialogue as a way to help you know who to trust help you find a movie, game, book, or other product that you like. However, since most of the intense movie discussions on boards like this happen between people who have already seen the film in question, it becomes less clear that that is the goal of this discussion. I suppose that there are some people who prefer to know what's going to happen before it does, but I don't think most people do, and reading this thread would certainly ruin any possible surprises that movie has in store.

I liked your most recent post, although one thing did bug me a little:

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One favorite reviewer has great taste in movies

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When discussing art, what is a meaningful discussion? In a situation like this, it really all just boils down to taste and mindset. So if we are disagreeing on why the movie was good or bad, it stands to reason that your taste and my taste are different and incompatible. I posit that no one actually thinks his own taste is poor. Therefore, if my own taste is good and yours is different, you must have bad taste. So if it all just boils down to taste, and each of us is thinking that the other one has bad taste, is is just better to leave that as an unspoken assumption?

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You and others have certainly been vocal advocates of the "this movie sucks" camp. If I think it was a good movie, how should I go about disagreeing with you in such a manner as to conduct a "meaningful discussion" but is not just "you think it's bad and I think it's good 'nuff said"?

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Well, just as an example, when I say "the characters are cardboard", you can point out bits of the movie that you found fleshed out the characters and made them real to you. Or you can argue that the characters aren't the point, and it's really a movie of ideas. And I respond that the ideas in the movie aren't really new at all, so it can scarcely be called a movie of ideas. And then you say that their not being new does not prevent them from being worth addressing, or that the movie explores these old ideas in a new way. And so on.

You know, the sort of things that go on in Hatrack threads that aren't about art.
 

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Posted by ae (Member # 3291) on :
 
FlyingCow: Whew. Looks like I'm safe, then.
 

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Posted by twinky (Member # 693) on :
 
>> It became a movie about "beating up the bad guys" and exploiting the kewl CGI. << (FlyingCow)

...which, as I've said, is exactly what the first movie was.

People put The Matrix up on a pedestal as though it was some sort of untouchable cinematic masterpiece. It wasn't. It was great, but not because of the dialogue or story – it was great because of the cinematography, CGI, and kung fu.
 

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Posted by prolixshore (Member # 4496) on :
 
Actually, I just saw this movie and really liked it. When Smith said Everything that has a beginning has an end at the very last point, everything clicked for me and I knew what was going to happen.

If you really understand the ending then you can go back through all three movies and see that all of it really did have a purpose and fits together quite nicely. There are no unanswered questions really. It all fell into place.

I was, however, the only person who got it at the time. After the movie I explained it all to my friends who went who were grumbling about the ending being unclear, and now they all loved it because they understand.

Silly people, if you get the movie, its good. I guess if you sit through three movies and then can't figure out what happened, you probably wont like them.

I was gonna just post what all the answers to the "unanswered" questions were, but I really just don't care. You can figure it out for yourselves or ask me on some other day when I feel like typing that much.

--ApostleRadio
 

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Posted by ae (Member # 3291) on :
 
Please do not assume that everyone who dislikes Revolutions dislikes it because they do not understand it.
 

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Posted by prolixshore (Member # 4496) on :
 
I never said everyone who disliked it disliked it because they misunderstood it. I said that of course people who don't understand a movie don't like it as much as people who do.

Remember those little graphs that show how groups overlap or are included in each other, think of it like that. There's a big red box of people who dislike the movie, and somewhere inside that red box is a purple space for people who misunderstood it.

::shakes head and laughs::

I shouldn't post when I've been up all night and am in a foul mood.

--ApostleRadio
 

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Posted by ae (Member # 3291) on :
 
Sorry, I guess I misread you.

By the way, I think what you're talking about are Venn diagrams.
 

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Posted by prolixshore (Member # 4496) on :
 
They may be called that, I didn't want to say Venn Diagrams because thats the circles you always used in english class. I'm talking about a color coded system we used in math class, but it may just be the same thing. Middle school was so long ago that the memory is a bit foggy.

--ApostleRadio
 

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Posted by DullSpoon (Member # 5251) on :
 
Someone help me out here please. What purpose did Neo serve? If he was there simply to stop Smith is this whole trilogy about the vase incident in the first film? His purpose being to stop Smith though he’s the reason Smith is there? So the one’s purpose is to stop the OTHER one? As far as I can see Neo failed. He gave in. he didn’t fight against Smith taking him over and died at the hand of the machine (which is understandable having just lost his girl and all). Leaving them right back at the beginning except …without the one. I kept waiting for the coup de Gras, the hidden weapon, the sucker punch… something! I think they lost track of the real problem here. The machines and/or programs wasn’t the real problem. Their NEED for humans as their energy source was the problem. That should have been their focus or at least the council’s topic of debate. Why weren’t they at odds with each other? Unified government is where I draw the line. Reality was lost right there to me.

The whole train scene was not necessary. There was no real point to it. They should of left that character in “Ghost” where he made sense and belonged. Unless of course they were trying to say that the merry vagina man created the comatose state. But then, who cares. We didn’t need to see Neo’s fist up against smith’s face like every boxing movie ever made to show his strength. To show Neo‘s strength, I would have preferred to see Neo punch the “ Smith “ out of people... having the ground be littered with bodies at the end of the fight…esp. since in the first film Morphius makes a point about strength having nothing to do with muscles etc. And for that matter, right before Smith consumes Neo I would have liked to have seen Neo tell smith about a revelation that HE had had about programs and machines, or perhaps reminding Smith of His revelation about humans and then Smith follow through yada yada and then in the real world have the face made of millions of squigglies (was this really necessary) get distorted, reform into Neo’s face just long enough for Keanu to do his traditional …WOA… which we could all philosophize was the last step to his transformation into a virus that shuts down machine city …dropping all squigs to the ground etc…
That ending would have been a lot more fun .. if for no reason then simply because part one was a fluke. There’s no way in hell they could top that or even come close which, I think is what everyone was expecting.

I for one was rooting for Smith. Is that wrong. He’s the only character I could relate to. Not knowing why you’re here, rebelling against the rules of conduct, defying the powers that be, failing over and over again at one particular goal and being overwhelmed by that frustration, manipulating everyone around you into accomplishing your goals, trying to mark territory and make a name for yourself, sounds like your average 30 year old dude to me.

Ok, I sleep now. No wait. Huh No..that’s it.
 

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Posted by prolixshore (Member # 4496) on :
 
Neo didn't give in, he realized the only way to defeat Smith was to stop existing. Sorta. The one was created to unbalance the system, which is the Oracle's job. Smith was created as a result of the Architect's program balancing the system. So if Neo ceases to exist, the system will once again balance itself, in this case by destroying Smith.

Yes, i suppose you could say the whole trilogy was about the vase scene. It was very important. The scene between Smith and the Oracle in revolutions was just as important.

The way I understood it, the machines will still get power from the humans who choose to stay inside the matrix. Obviously some will choose to stay, the choice between a world with no sun and no niceities and a world where humans are at the peak of their existence is a tough one for some people. After all, the matrix seems just like real life. Think back to the first one when that guy wanted back in. The matrix has a certain appeal over real life. Those that want out will get out. That was the conversation between the Architect and the Oracle in the final scene.

You are sort of back at the beginning, but the machines and humans are at peace for now. They aren't trying to destroy each other. Eventually the war will probably start up again. Very few peace agreements last for long, particularly when one side is holding all the resources, so to speak.

Eventually the whole thing will start over again, which was explained again and again during the second movie. It all fits together. You really should have seen this type of ending coming.

--ApostleRadio
 

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Posted by Farmgirl (Member # 5567) on :
 
**SPOILERS**

Neo had to die -- that was pretty clear in the last film. The only way to kill Smith was to also kill Neo. Oracle made that clear when she said "he is you -- he is the opposite of you". At that point I knew that Neo would have to die in order to destroy Smith. Kind of a ying/yang thing (did I spell that right?)

But as others say -- we all agree the peace will last for awhile -- but eventually, those humans who have chosen to come out -- they will want again to get their world back from the machines, and it will start over.

And we are never given all the details of the deal Neo made with the Architect at the end. He said he wanted peace -- then they cut to another scene, and then when they cut back to Neo, the two (Neo and the Architect) were in agreement -- who knows what terms they agreed to in exchange for Neo giving his life in order to destroy Smith.
 

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Posted by DullSpoon (Member # 5251) on :
 
i disagree with you prolix, i dont believe Neo was a creation to unbalance the system. He was the result of an unbalanced system. what you're saying implies then that with every version there was a counter part to the one. An ANTI ONE. which no one mentions at all. if that were the case and these two were together the one then for sure the Architect would have referred to Neo as being a part of the one. What do you mean when you say the Oracle's Job. She was searching for not creating ones. how would the system have destroyed Smith if Neo ceased to exist? what if Smith succeded in killing him in the real world. doesnt fit.

so what choice did he have then. choose this door and fight smith to the death or, take a shortcut to your death through the other door. Zion will still be destroyed but the matrix wont undergo a severe make over job by Smith's design.. i'm not feelin that. i think if what was different this time around as opposed to the last six was the creation of this anti one then it all makes sense, but thing the Love thing becomes irrelevant.

what's really sad to me is that i've seen the first film a million and two times, the second i saw several times ( hey, I LIKE the stop action effects) but i have no motivation and/or desire to see the third more then once. Not to say it was entirely bad, just not great. but its ok. yes, i'm a little scatter brained.
 

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