[This post contains mild spoilers. Btw, I never played a Matrix game.]
A little more than a year after its somewhat disastrous and baffling release, I decided to give another watch to The Matrix Resurrections – the fourth instalment in The Matrix film series. This was, for the most part, a planned action. The Matrix films had always been ones that bring a different perspective each time I re-watch any one of them, provided enough time had passed since the last viewing. That’s just one of the many reasons why it’s one of my absolute favourite film franchises; it still beats easily a good number of other films on that level alone. Therefore with all the expectations, promo noise, release troubles and inevitable disappointments by fans this latest movie needed to wait for all that dust to settle, so that I could watch it again with a mind that’s free of anything that’s been seen and read by me between The Matrix Revolutions and this new blockbuster.
For the most part I wasn’t disappointed with my above decision; it felt like watching a different film with some occasional deja vu moments.
First of all, hair style, costume design and visual effects award nominations to the respective people from The Matrix Resurrections team all make sense. Obviously, there is a certain bar in all those categories that Warner Bros. can’t have The Matrix to go below, and if there’s someone who’d know how to efficiently put it all together in a movie with an immense legacy, it’s one of the original film’s directors Lana Wachowski.
The visual effects that, in my opinion, need distinguishing here are ones with mirrors and reflections because exactly those are an innovation as far as Matrix films go. The effects are called Digital Self-Image (DSI), crafted like Easter eggs, the meaning of which had been taken a bit too literally (the best Easter egg though in Resurrections is, in my opinion, Christina Ricci). DSI concept in TMR is like a symbol for that what lies at this film’s foundation idea-wise because the whole Act 1 of Resurrections is The Matrix meta movie, meaning, it looks at the franchise’s concept and characters, downing proverbial red pills, striving to find the truth about everything that has to do with The Matrix.
Was that altogether a good idea?
I think the first one to answer that was the box office. Next important one to answer that is going to be time. As far as my inconsequential opinion and two cents go, this should have been planned in a somewhat similar manner to how the two previous Matrix movies were made and released. The Act 1 could have been a separate movie, released on a streamer with a view of hyping the Matrix up for upcoming cinema release of another sequel. What encourages me to believe in a successful outcome of such a venture is not only the difference in tone between the Acts 1 and 2, but also the fact that The Matrix is one franchise, which can take liberties of not tying up loose ends plot-wise (as Resurrections with “we don’t know” sentences, Gwyn de Vere and only partly told story about Zion also attests to), therefore leveraging such an advantage in a more planned manner could have perhaps increased the odds of profit making.
The Matrix Resurrections movie still. Source
The idea that someone again needs to be freed from the Matrix is one dispiriting deja vu though. Even if it helps to pull off some compelling storywriting.
Yes, Keanu and Carrie-Anne having conversation about how they love what they are doing – designing computer games and building motorcycles respectively, is deep and awesome; particularly taking into account how everything revolving around the lead protagonist has the context of psychoanalysis, including those same above mentioned reflections and mirrors. Hopefully it would help people to turn their attention inwards, at their own realities there. Although I think I should also point out here that there could be a need for some kind of balance in that regard because our beloved Keanu looks a bit too much an inwards guy these days. As for the hope, implied earlier; that especially goes for all the alt-right zealots – supposed fans of The Matrix. (You can read more about The Matrix impact on alt-right in their Matrix here.)
Yes, the idea that a program ends up facing its creator in order to escape the Matrix is brilliant.
The Jefferson Airplane tune sequence with Deus Machina team of developers is equally brilliant.
And yet.
With all those answers and opinions about what Matrix is, it never addresses the problem of the idea and message of the movie franchise (because all the talk is about game, not the movie). Ok, there’s Andrew Lewis Caldwell’s Jude Gallagher mentioning that supposedly “Bullet time” is on everyone’s mind as soon as they hear the word “Matrix”. However there is nothing in the Jefferson Airplane sequence that would feel relevant to me as someone who’d want to go and see the new Matrix movie at the cinema. The humour filled with meta, starting from Analyst’s (Neil Patrick Harris) black cat to the phrase “we kept some kids entertained” feels refreshing and authentic enough, but as the film enters the Act 3, where Trinity is being rescued, the contrast regarding quality of the ideas between the Act 1 and the finale becomes increasingly and painstakingly clear. I have already mentioned before in some other commentary of mine about how off-putting in a Matrix movie the overcrowding and over-itemising can be, but what makes it even worse is how all that is used to maximize the stakes. From that point on Resurrections follows the 21st Century blockbuster rules to a fault, where even the quality work of visual effects team and the signature visual Wachowski flair of action sequences do not save the whole enterprise from becoming an antithesis of The Matrix. At this point it is time to ask questions that aren’t the part of meta in Resurrections. Do you remember what you thought The Matrix as a movie was about? What was its message? Where was its appeal as an action movie? What made it a phenomenon of pop culture? Because Resurrections just feels being too comfortable with forgetting that it used to be a cutting edge, groundbreaking action movie. Because I remember and Resurrections counts on that. But it does so in a manner which I can’t say I like. In fact, I don’t like that feeling at all.
The Matrix Resurrections movie still. Source
Since I wouldn’t like to wrap this review up on a note of negativity, I want to mention a character who I thought had the best resurrection in TMR: Sati, which is played by Priyanka Chopra Jonas. The reason the character left an impression on me in the first place was its unexpectedness. If you’ve seen The Matrix Revolutions, you’d likely remember a little girl at the train station, who appears early on in the film. Well, that little girl turns out to have an important role to play in this latest Matrix film. The way Sati is made part of the film indeed tops any other already familiar character’s introduction in it, and hints at power the Sense8 series team of writers possess. If Sati is an oracle in the making then even more power to them with a hope they don't get stuck in a blockbuster Matrix with a loss of memories and mojo-less against the challenge.
In case, after reading all this, my dear reader, you wonder if I can only write reviews, or do I have some actual ideas, i.e. loglines and pitches, then here is my idea for a Matrix spin-off – it’s under the second subheading. An idea about troll programs used as a weapon by rebels can be read here.
Read my review of Johnny Mnemonic, a 1995 cyberpunk action thriller with Keanu Reeves in the title role here.
Read my review of Smile, a 2022 horror flick, which features themes of psychotherapy here.
Read my review, mentioning both, the virtual reality and mental health, of 2021 horror film Demonic, written and directed by Neill Blomkamp here.