As Inferior to Two as Two Was Inferior To One

Rating: 5/10 (12 November 2003)

As bad as Reloaded was in comparison to the original Matrix, many (including myself) gave the Brothers Wachowski the benefit of the doubt that part three would bring everything together and cleverly resolve things. Instead, we got this disaster. As a local reviewer aptly put it, "how did something that began so cool (in the original) wind up so dorky?"
For starters, many subplots left dangling in the second MATRIX are totally ignored in part three. What happened to the pair of albino rastafarians so prominent (and of seemingly uncertain alliance) in RELOADED? They don't have a second in part three. What the hell happened to the Emperor-like Anthony Zerbe from part two, who also had tons of screen time and was clearly positioned as a key influence on events (and a potential Judas to Zion)? Where the hell did the comely girlfriend of the Frenchman go? They stuffed her into a ridiculously cleavage-enhancing little number in part three, but whatever became of her vampiric soul kiss with Neo from part two? Nothing. Many setups for characters including the Keymaster and the Architect also saw no fruition in part three, particularly disappointing in light of the five minute soliloquy from The Architect in II which professed to open doorways to Neo (and us). In III The Architect appears for a total of four minutes on screen and only at the very end, to typically ambiguous effect.
Worse than these plot point 101 errors and omissions, there is no emotion or connection to the characters anymore. Neo comes closest to feeling human, but Reeves' cold reading is off-putting. Trinity is particularly ineffective; by the time an impaled Carrie Anne Moss lies down to die, the audience I sat with was essentially admonishing her to hurry up and get on with it. Morpheus, the mentor and father figure of the first movie, is reduced to window dressing in this release, playing a glorified assistant to the grating and annoying Jada Pinkett Smith.
The special effects take over even more than they did in the loud second installment, which makes for a second hour of sumptuous imagery but a first hour so deadly, I wish Agent Smith would have taken me before the plot less FX-fest ensued.
One saving grace is Hugo Weaving, whose entertaining and committed performance as Agt. Smith momentarily harks back to the first movie. Overall, however, this lone bright spot is overshadowed by a wretched script rife with overwrought dialogue, unmotivated (or flat-out wrong) characterization and more questions than answers. The special effects are eye popping but they can't save this surprisingly weak finale. 5 / 10.