interesting themes.....but were the directors thinking of that when they made it?

Rating: Null/10 (12 August 1999)

before i saw this movie, a lot of my friends were saying how it was this awesome film, and some others were saying how it was this deep, meaningful, philosophical twaddle that they could describe better then i can. some others think it was just an action flick using special effects to rake in the money, which might be true.
first off, the movie -does- have spectacular effects, and like the comment prior to this one mentioned, they are very believable. it's a cool movie, but whether it's a good movie is debatable. some people think that it's a normal movie about the good vs. the bad; the evil agents vs. the good freedom fighters. i'm not sure if the directors intended this, but i saw the movie as more of a battle between truth and ignorance, much like i believe the film 'pleasentville' to be. now, anybody who's seen both movies will know that the plot is completely different, but perhaps the themes are the same. or maybe it's my own personal conflict between ignorance and truth that makes me interpret these movies like this. but maybe not. if it was the intention to express this theme, a movie like 'pleasentville' would rate higher in my opinion because it expresses the theme more clearly, and delivers a larger moral dilemma then 'the matrix'. and if it wasn't intended, it still rates lower then 'pleasentville' because it's just your average cool action flick. not to mention the fact that the concept of a pseudo-reality (check for misspelling) is intresting, but poorly developed on.
basically, it's a great time killer, but i would say that it would go somewhere on my 'mediocre' list when it comes to good movies. interesting and cool, but only so-so.