Not as 'together' as the first, but also some improvements

Rating: Null/10 (16 May 2003)

I won't comment on the technical effects, as anyone who has seen the 'burly brawl' or the head-on highway collision scene will tell you the effects are a generation ahead...
The movie has a lot of action and several well-choreographed fight sequences but of course the philosophy is still there and takes up most of the beginning of the movie. The story is actually a bit more complicated than the simpler we-have-been-living-a-lie plot that the first movie followed. Memorable scenes include the talk with the oracle and the architect.
However, while I enjoyed reloaded more than the first matrix (tho the two are complementary and anyone who owns one should have the other) there are some loose threads. In the first matrix, basically everything was concluded, yet in reloaded, we don't really know what happened with the twins, or with Niobe, for example. Of course, they may appear again in the third film, but left me wondering...
Also, the trailer shows some scenes that are absent or redone (or maybe I was too engrossed to notice them?) in the movie, namely the upside-down cartwheel gun sequence, and a shot of the group firing akimbo towards the camera.
Overall, great fun to watch, but you gotta enjoy the talk as well as the action.