The Matrix Reloaded, dir. the Wachowski brothers (2003).  The film is more about what is means to be cool than anything else.  The long priest-like robes worn by the main characters, the cool names of the principals—Neo, Trinity, and Morpheus (which remind me of the late 20^th century penchant for renaming oneself in order to claim an identity), the cool sunglasses everyone wears, the cool weapons everyone fires at everyone else, the cool martial arts moves (aided by digitally erased wires), the cool sets (rusted metal, I suppose, the bankruptcy of industrialization and globalization), the artificial and pompous speech patterns of the principals (if you speak that way, you must be saying something important), the cool ideas about purpose, meaning, fate, change (as if just talking about big ideas is supposed to mean you “have” big ideas), the cool love scene between Neo and Trinity (a perfect kiss, a perfect union, a perfect orgasm)—well, the list goes on.  And I was mostly bored by it.  I don’t really care what the Matrix is or what is supposed to mean, because there is no thread of meaning one can unwind from any beginning to any end.  I’ve heard the spirituality talk in the film referred to as mumbo jumbo, and I would concur.  The film seems to consist of relentlessly boring and uninspired action sequences combined with endlessly talky and boring scenes where characters pontificate about big ideas like change, identity, and one’s purpose in life.  The latter scenes seemed a remake of those scenes in The Phantom Menace that were equally boring.  These scenes ground the film to a halt.  Nothing is more boring that watching authority figures yelling at each other.  That rule of filmmaking has been the downfall of many a television drama about great historical figures. 

I found it noteworthy that the majority of main characters in the film were African American—Morpheus, his copilot, his rival, a former lover who is now with his rival, and the oracle.  Those five characters are balanced by four other powerful characters—Neo, Trinity, a counselor, and the architect.  Despite this balance, the ones with the greatest powers are Neo and Trinity.  I was not moved by this film the way I was moved with the early sections of The Matrix.  When I saw Neo in training in those early scenes, and watched his interaction with Morpheus, I thought I was watching something new.  Here is a character preparing for battle and learning the skills of specialized martial arts rather than blowing people away with big guns.  Of course, all that changed at the end of The Matrix with its shootout in the climactic scene.  But The Matrix Reloaded failed to move me because its main theme, that love conquers all, was presented with all of the subtlety of a lead pipe.  Perhaps that’s the way to appeal to younger audiences—that mythic 15-year-old white male out there whose ticket-buying power runs the industry.  The film also played to a stale formula—for example, the idea of starting the film with a scene that was incomplete and puzzling, and then ending the film with the same scene and playing it out fully so that now we know what it means.  That’s an old idea, and it did not work here.  All of the special effects stuff under the earth in the city of Zion or under the earth with the evil octopus-like critters was boring, a waste of time. A viewing of 2001: A Space Odyssey, should be required for anyone that thought the special effects in this film were imaginative. 

The one scene that captured my imagination was Neo’s visit to the oracle.  She was a lovely old African American woman sitting on an old park bench in an urban setting; and it was a magical interaction between them.  Why did she get only one scene?  I would have moved that scene to earlier in the film and got rid of most of the stuff about the humans stuck in their under earth setting.  Oh, but those scenes were boring!  And what to make of the lovemaking scene between Neo and Trinity as it is crosscut with the provocative dance number with the rest of the earthlings rubbing up against each other in a massive conga line?  Was this comparison supposed to be intimacy vs. orgy?  Whatever it was, it seemed offensive to me.  After the scene with the oracle we have the obligatory digital effects piece de resistance!  Neo fights an infinite number of Mr. Smiths, and the more the scene goes on the more I was bored with its staginess, the  repetitive nature of the martial arts moves, the pounding uninspired sound effects, and the overall unimaginative construction of the scene.  Every once in a while the scene goes either to slow motion or to a quick still image: will someone please tell me why that was interesting or unique?  The action scenes in this film were stultifying.  I never became emotionally involved.  But then, does a video game player really become emotionally involved after a while?  Don’t they have the same stare as the video poker player or the pinball-machine player or the roulette-wheel player or the slot machine player—that dead stare of unanimated longing for something to happen that will never happen?  After all of the fighting, what does Neo do?  He simply rockets up into space.  “He does his Superman thing,” as one of the characters said earlier.  So why did he fight at all.  If he can’t really destroy the Mr. Smiths, then what is the point of fighting?  I suppose the point is that Neo becomes a program fighting other programs and thus becomes the star of a video game that is being played for high stakes.  No, scratch that idea. 

Now we have to find the keymaker.  Don’t even ask why.  Another uninventive scene.  We have lots of posturing.  Villains (bad programs) posture.  They smirk.  They talk tough.  Again, I suppose that’s for the 15-year-olds.  But after all of the tough talk, what does it matter.  Neo makes things happen.  There is no tension here.  There is no drama here.  Just lots of money spent on sets, special effects, costumes, and sexy guns.

Now we have the chase scene that is supposed to become as memorable as the chase scenes from Bullit, The French Connection, and Ronin.  Not even close.  It reminded me of the chase scenes from T2—lots of cars crashing, lots of bullets flying, and no one being hit by the bullets.  We have all of the components—shut down a section of the freeway so that we can have wrong-way traffic, big trucks exploding, fast motorcycles (motorcycles are sexy to that 15-year-old), lots of special effects.  What is memorable to me is how much I did not believe the special effects in this scene.  And how come every other person turns into another Mr. Smith.  Why don’t we know how that works?  Oh, I forgot—I’m watching a video game.  Or perhaps I’m supposed to be playing a video game.  “We do only that which we are meant to do!” someone intones.  Wow!  That was a big idea!  But back to the action.  Big explosion at the end—and Neo is Superman to the rescue. 

Now onto the meeting with the architect.  Neo walks through the blinding light into the source—of what?  The architect claims that he built the Matrix.  He claims that Neo is the 6^th incarnation of Neo.  What does all of this mean?  I think it means nothing—it just sounds like it means something.  And we learn that Neo is an anomaly, a kind of mutant, perhaps.  Does that mean he is part human and part program? In the Matrix he acts like a program and does exactly what he is supposed to do—he always escapes destruction.  But then in one scene we see that he can bleed—just like a human being.  So what am I to think?  Then the architect becomes a game-show host and offers Neo two doors—but each door offers mixed outcomes.  One offers Trinity, but at the cost of the entire human race.  In other words, Neo is responsible for the entire human race.  Wait a minute.  I thought Noah was responsible for the entire human race.  I thought God was responsible for the entire human race.  Of course, he chooses the door for Trinity.  We’ll worry about the human race in the next installment.  But I won’t be in the theaters to watch it.  I will remain unplugged from the Matrix.