A modern classic.

Rating: 10/10 (18 January 2007)

What is The Matrix? Well, after it took the whole movie world by storm, and spawned a series of copy cat action movies, you would have to be living in a cave to not know what The Matrix is.
Basically (and I mean basically), a simpleton named Thomas Anderson, is contacted by his hacker alias Neo by someone who is connected to Morpheus: a person who he is looking for. In a series of strange events, he finally meets Morpheus, who turns the world he knows upside down. He is told that the world he had been living in was not real; a dream world, and that the real world was nothing like it. Cue in some smart dialog, philosophy to engage the average person, and some mind boggling visual effects and that is the essence of The Matrix.
The lead actors do an impressive job as uber-hackers, and Keanu Reeves gives us his defining performance as Neo. Laurence Fishburne plays the ever-wise Morpheus and Carrie Anne Moss gives us a warrior woman worthy of a place amongst Sigourney Weaver and Linda Hamilton as Ellen Ripley and Sarah Connor respectively.
The Wachowski Bros. did an astounding job of directing this movie. They brought out the "cool" in the geeks (most of them are hackers), and made some of the most scariest antagonists ever to grace a film; the ubiquitous agent is a relentless machine, tracking down any rogue person in the system. They have an uncanny ability to give The Matrix multiple layers: the first layer is purely action. Peel that off and you have a very good story. Peel it even more and you have some fundamental questions that may make you even question whether or not you live in a dream world.
Arguably their greatest pieces in this movie are the action sequences: The lobby scene and bullet dodging scene stand out the most, but the rest are of high quality as well. I expect everyone thought Episode I: The Phantom Menace would outshine all other movies visually in 1999, but that is not so.
Whether you want to see a pure action movie, a smart sci-fi flick or some subliminal messages to really screw with your mind, watch The Matrix. It's definitely worth your time.