Sci-Fi Action at its best

Rating: Null/10 (2 May 2003)

Simply put, if you don't like action movies and don't like sci-fi, then you probably won't enjoy this movie. On the other hand, if you do enjoy both of those, buckle your seatbelts and get ready for the ride of your life.
At the time of this writing, the special effects that were awesome in 1999 are so pervasive now that some of the awesomeness has been replaced with "Been there, done that." However, if you saw this movie in 1999, you were likely blown away. Enough said about special effects, in my opinion, because the hundreds of other posts have done a fine job explaining them. Additionally, the styles were very stylish at the time, but people viewing it 10 years from now may laugh at the costumes, simply because styles and technology change.
When I first watched this movie, my first reaction when I saw Trinity disappear from the phone-booth was that this was some new virtual-reality/lawnmower-man crap rehash. Boy was I wrong! In fact, a superficial viewing of this movie will miss 90% of what makes it a great movie. Science fiction at its best, forces the viewer to view himself/herself from a different perspective. As a story, this movie placed the viewer into a perspective that most of us had never imagined before, and asked many fundamental questions from this very unique perspective. What is reality? This was perhaps the basic question, and the viewer quickly realizes that the answer is not as simple as it may seem.

Further on throughout the movie, the viewer is confronted with similar questions. What is the Oracle? Why didn't she simply tell Neo what he was? Did she not know? If you're very quick, you may be able to answer some of these the first time through. I watched it several times before really getting a good grasp on the Oracle, and exactly what she was communicating to Neo. I don't think I could discuss it in a couple paragraphs, however, and indeed, you should draw your own conclusions anyway.
I can imagine that for a younger viewer to watch this, they may be impressed by the action sequences, the styles, the effects, but that later on in life they will be impressed by a completely different set of ideas that are much deeper. In fact, I get the impression that there are things in this movie that even I (34 yrs old) don't quite grasp yet.
On a side note, what I don't like to hear is for people to pick apart science fiction by saying, "You can't do this or that." Think about this. Could Alice have really entered a looking glass (mirror)? No. So does that mean that the entire tale of Alice in Wonderland is stupid?
Follow the white rabbit...