Ingenious

Rating: 10/10 (27 June 2003)

The first Matrix movie was, in a lot of sense, pretty conventional. I know it spurred much-imitated style and effects that are not only implemented in other movies that followed but also parodied in comedies. But consider the other elements: premise isn't so revolutionary (as Roger Ebert points out in his 1999 review, the concept is very similar to that of Dark City and Strange Days), storyline follows the quest-of-the-Christ-figure archetype that's been around throughout history, and the climax comes down to the conventional bout between the hero and his nemesis. Fun, but ordinary nevertheless. The Matrix Reloaded takes leaps and bounds in its ingenuity. Action is fiercer and more entertaining (from the thrills of the freeway chase to the sheer fun of watching Neo beat up on 200 copies of Agent Smith with a steel pole), plot thickens in truly revolutionary ways that leaves you both enlightened and dumbfounded, and the climax of the movie isn't some tired old fight sequence but a philosophical discussion and discovery of what the One truly is (or is it really true?). In the end, the movie leaves more questions than it answers, and that is precisely what the part two of a trilogy is supposed to do. It hits at all facets and levels, and turns the Matrix triology, which seemed to be a more or less conventional trilogy, into a truly novel story of a scale grander than you could have imagined after seeing on the first Matrix. This is the best "part two" flick in a trilogy since Empire Strikes Back.