An interesting diversion, but not up to the original

Rating: 7/10 (25 May 2003)

If you're expecting a new, fresh experience like The Matrix, part 1, you'd better lower your expectations a little. Not a bad movie, but not a great or completely original one either.
Very minor spoilers ahead, so if you don't want to know anything about the movie before seeing it, don't read on. I'm not going to give away any main plot points, though.
Zion is a disappointment and doesn't do much for the movie. It seems that people are wandering around Zion making speeches about how we depend on machines, and having Ewok dances that turn into raves. Zion is very George Lucas in his cheez-whiz moments. Also, all the phoney philosophic posturing being thrown around is sure to annoy if you think about it for more than a microsecond. Isn't it brilliant when people say things like "Some things never change, some things do." Yes, and "Sometimes you feel like a nut, sometimes you don't." Save it for the candy-bar commercials, I don't need to have Zen-lite dumped on me. There's a lot of cheap mysticism of the I-just-smoked-pot-and-everything-I-say-must-be-profound variety.
The other main drawback of the movie is that the plotting isn't very tight and it's hard to be very worried about Neo. If he can change the laws of reality to make them do whatever he wants (the ability he gained at the end of Matrix 1), why should the audience be particularly worried about him during his fight scenes? There also seems to be an idea of the writers that obscuring facts and details will make the movie more meaningful. A lot of information is included in the movie that doesn't serve any plot point (yes, I got it that there is some chaos in the Matrix that can't be controlled, free will is possible, blah, blah, blah); it's not a very focused script and seems that the brothers might not have known exactly what they were saying. Lack of clarity doesn't equal deepness.
Since I've gotten all that out, I'll mention some of the good points of the movie.
It's a fun diversion from whatever else you might have going on in your life. If you can ignore the problems, it's still a fun movie to watch. The special effects are, of course, spectacular (they should be after the success of the first movie and the number of $ being pumped in). The acting is generally good and almost carries off some of the bad points of the script. Most of the characters are likeable and I enjoyed watching them on screen. I think it has something to say--though not as much as it prides itself in. You'll be entertained by the movie--which is the main point, I suppose.
I'm still waiting to see if they're going to explain some things satisfactorily in the next movie or if they're going to resort to explaining things away through some cheap plot device to "unexplain" them or "explain them away."
I'll go see the next one to find out, so I liked this movie well enough to see another one. *** out of ****.