First XXI century movie

Rating: 9/10 (10 August 2014)

1999 was an excellent year movie-wise. American Beauty, Fight club, The Green Mile, Being John Malkovich... all excellent movies. Now this is something different. This is not just a great movie, it also marks the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 2000s decade. I mean, just how more 2000s does it get than Keanu Reeves in a black robe avoiding bullets?
The Matrix is a classic. It has already become a classic. From the red-and-blue pills scene to the "I know kung fu" quote (the decade's "We'll always have Paris" or "I am your father", if you allow me the exaggeration), going through Neo's awakening schene, this movie is already deeply embedded in popular culture. And it deserves to: it is beautifully shot, the story is very well-paced, it is entertaining and it does include enough elements potentially iconic (Morpheus' sunglasses, Agent Smith's accent...). But what makes this movie a classic, beyond anything else, is the issues it deals with. What makes a classic is its "timeless quality", as Wikipedia says. And for something to be timeless, it must relate to Humanity's core, those things that can be reach both me and someone who was born in 2 A.D.
Now something that every human can relate to is feelings. Love, pain, fear of death. Which is why most classics are love stories (just think of Romeo and Juliet). But this is not what The Matrix mainly brings about. What makes The Matrix a classic is that it deals with those big questions that have troubled philosophers (and people in general) since Socrates' times. I'm not gonna list all the philosophical issues in here because somebody has probably already done it, but let me quickly enumerate a few from the top of my mind: duality mind-body, evil genius dilemma, freedom as moral self-direction (I cannot set free somebody else but myself), man-machine relationship, Utopia, the issue of fate, the "what makes a human being" question (our own impulses according to Mouse), my freedom's interaction and interdependence with the subjectivities around me... If I was a philosophy teacher, I would totally screen this movie on the first day of classes.
Needless to say this is a must-see, specially that hour between the red pill and the plot's main complication, just before all the action starts. That part of the movie is worth watching three, four times, because it's not something you see everyday.