Poor Example of a Poor Style of Film

Rating: 4/10 (14 December 2004)

As far as 'interesting,' 'intriguing,' and 'mysterious' go this film seemed to miss them all. It attempted to be mysterious by making up bizarre occurrences along the way, culminating in, essentially, nothing.
It was more of a glorification of one, single, solitary human character who, for some unknown reason, was chosen by fate (seemingly) to bring down an evil system that you progressively learn more and more about throughout the course of a film. For a style of film, it is not a very good style; and for execution of this style, it is not a very good film. It is often overly dark and cold without any purpose. It is often an exercise in futility by Proyas to get the viewer to feel something.
People consider it philosophical, deep, thrilling, etc. but I find it to be none of the above. Occasionally, a film that is pretty to look at, it is just one of the poorer examples of its genre: a parade of dark-looking figures in a gloomy world with the hope of humanity hinged on a man endowed with special abilities. Naturally, I do not have to tell you how the film ends for you to accurately predict it. And naturally, I do not have to hint at how overdone of a genre it is, and how disappointing it is when push comes to shove.
You will find that this film is long-winded and tries to be psychological & philosophical but would only convince me that Mr. Proyas is not a very good director. Do not bother watching this film.