Rage against the Machine

Rating: 10/10 (26 June 2008)

The Matrix is a modern classic, a great sci-fi film that is bound in its approach in a number of ways. It is intelligent and thought, but also great on an action/adventure level, giving us the famous bullet time sequence.
The film focuses on a computer programme, Thomas Anderson/Neo(Keanu Reeves), who is interested in illegal activities and wants to find out about the Matrix. He meets up with a group of people led by Morphus (Laurence Fishbourne). It is then that he finds out that the world he knows is not real and that it was really a computer programme to keep the human population in subjugation. He learns that during the 21th century man and machine went to war with each other, which the machines won and kept humans alive as a power sorts. Neo was taken out of the Matrix because it was believe that he was the one to save humanity.
The film asks questions about fate and reality. It is influenced by philosophical ideas from people like Plato. It also reminds me of 1984 during the torture scene when O'Brien tells Winston that the party can alter history and reality with ease. I think as long as you are fairly clever and read a little then you would understand it easily enough. The Matrix is also influenced by Postmodernism where reality and images can be alter and are very influential, but if you know this then you yourself and change the world. It can also be seen as a criticism of science and machinery going too far. The film is also very popular with the cyberpunk sub-culture.
This is a great film, but avoid the sequels like the plague, especially the Matrix Revolutions.