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The astonishing, angry Matrix Resurrections deals with what’s real in a world where nothing is

A furious Lana Wachowski fights back with a love story

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[ Ed. note: Minor spoilers for The Matrix Resurrections follow.]

The story: A man named Thomas is told that the world is not what he thought it to be, and despite the passion of the messenger and the void in his own life, he refuses to believe. He wants to see for himself. He wants, as the Gospel of John recounts, to feel the wounded flesh of the resurrected Christ, to feel where the nails were hammered into his hands. In his doubt, he becomes a myth, the first man to doubt the gospel, only to believe there is truth there when he’s standing in front of the gospel’s corporeal form.

Another version of the story: A man named Thomas Anderson lives a respectable life at the end of the 20th century, a gifted programmer at a nondescript software company. Everything is as it should be, and yet there is a void in him. Messengers find him and tell him his suspicion is correct, that this world is an illusion, yet he refuses to believe. Not until he takes a pill and wakes up in a nightmare, where he, along with everyone else he thought he knew, is plugged into a machine from birth until death, living in a simulation he never doubted until he could feel the wounds in his own flesh, where the machines jacked him into a digital world called the Matrix. Over the next 22 years, Mr. Anderson’s story in The Matrix becomes a different, newer myth, disseminated through the burgeoning internet and refracted through various subcultures. Depending on which set of eyes it encountered, the story’s symbolism and themes took on new meanings, some thoughtful and enlightening, others strange and sinister.

The Matrix Resurrections ’ third version of this story: Once again, there is Keanu Reeves’ Thomas Anderson, a gifted programmer who suspects his world is wrong, somehow. Once again, he is contacted by people claiming to confirm his suspicions. Once again, he refuses to believe. For a little while, the story seems the same, to the point where it doesn’t seem worth telling. Yet the world it’s being told to — our world, the one where we’ve returned to see a new film called The Matrix for the first time since 2003’s The Matrix Revolutions — is very different. In the final days of 2021, Thomas, just like those watching him, has much more to doubt. And Resurrections finds its meaning.

Directed by Lana Wachowski from a script she co-wrote with David Mitchell and Aleksandar Hemon, The Matrix Resurrections is about doing the impossible. On a very basic level, it’s about the insurmountable and inherently cynical task of making a follow-up to the Matrix trilogy, one that breaks technical and narrative ground the way the first film did. On a thematic one, it’s an agitprop romance, one of the most effective mass media diagnoses of the current moment that finds countless things to be angry about, and proposes fighting them all with radical, reckless love. On top of all that, it is also a kick-ass work of sci-fi action — propulsive, gorgeous, and yet still intimate — that revisits the familiar to show audiences something very new.

Reloading, but not repeating

The Matrix Resurrections soars by echoing something old. A familiarity with The Matrix and its sequels, The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions , comes in handy when entering the new film, as the first task Wachowski, Mitchell, and Hemon go about resolving in Resurrections is extricating Thomas Anderson — better known as Neo — from his fate in Revolutions . Slowly, they reveal how Neo, seemingly deceased alongside his love and partner Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss), may or may not have survived to once again become Thomas Anderson, a blank slate who has trouble telling what’s real and what is not.

This Thomas Anderson is also a programmer, but now a rockstar of game development, responsible for the most popular video game trilogy ever made: The Matrix. These games are effectively the same as the Matrix film trilogy that exists in our world, a story about a man named Neo who discovers that he is living in a dream world controlled by machines, and that he is The One destined to help humanity defeat them.

Like Lana Wachowski, who co-created the Matrix films with her sibling Lilly decades ago, Thomas is asked to make a sequel to the Matrix trilogy, one that his parent company — also devilishly named Warner Bros. — will make with or without their input. So, as Thomas goes about his task, his reality takes on an M.C. Escher-esque level of circuitousness. Was the Matrix trilogy a series of games of his making? Or did they really happen, and he is once again a prisoner of the Matrix? Why is there a woman named Tiffany (Carrie-Anne Moss) in this world with him, one who strongly resembles the deceased Trinity of his fiction? Wachowski layers these questions in disorienting montage with voyeuristic angles, presenting Thomas’ presumed reality with just enough remove to make the viewer uncomfortable, and cause them to doubt, as Thomas does.

Casting the previous films as in-world video games allows The Matrix Resurrections to function as a refreshingly heavy-handed rebuke of the IP-driven reboot culture that produced the film, where the future is increasingly viewed through the franchise lenses of the past, trapping fans in corporate-controlled dream worlds where their fandom is constantly rewarded with new product. That video games are the chosen medium for The Matrix Resurrections ’ satire is icing on the cake: an entire medium defined by the illusion of choice, a culture built around the falsehood that megacorporations care about what their customers think when they have the data to show that every outrage du jour will still result in the same record-breaking profits.

As one of Thomas’s colleagues bluntly puts it: “I’m a geek. I was raised by machines.”

Bugs in the system

The opening act of The Matrix Resurrections is wonderfully confounding, a delicious way to recreate the unmooring unreality of the original to an audience that has likely seen, or felt its influence, countless times. Yet as it replicates, it also diverges. This is not, as the hacker Bugs (Jessica Henwick) notes early on, the story we know.

Bugs is our window into what’s new in Resurrections , a young and headstrong woman dedicated to finding the Neo that her generation knows only as myth. Her zealotry puts her in hot water with her elders; outside of the Matrix, humanity has eked out a small but thriving post-apocalyptic life, resting on the uneasy treaty between man and machine that Neo brokered at the end of the original trilogy. By constantly hacking into the Matrix to find Neo, Bugs threatens that peace — yet it’s a risk that Bugs and her ragtag crew (which includes a phenomenal Yahya Abdul-Mateen II in a role that’s not quite who viewers think he is) feel is worth taking. Because despite the war fought to free humanity from machine enslavement, much of humanity is still choosing to remain in the Matrix. The real world being real is not reason enough for anyone to wake up from the dream world.

But the hope of rescuing Neo is only half of the story. Wachowski makes a dazzling pivot halfway through The Matrix Resurrections , one that underlines a focal shift from individual freedom to human connection: The Resistance learns that it may be possible to free Trinity again as well, although by means never tried before. It’s a mission that isn’t likely to succeed, but in this strange new future, it’s the only one worth living and dying for. In pivoting to a mission to save the theoretical Trinity, Resurrections takes the messaging of the original film a step further. It’s not enough to free your mind; in fact, it’s worthless if you don’t unplug in the interest of connecting and loving those around you.

This back half gear-shifts into something much more straightforward, and frankly, it whips. It’s The Matrix as a heist movie. Because of this genre pivot, Resurrections ’ action takes on a different flavor from that of its predecessors. While weighty, satisfying martial arts standoffs are still in play, they’re not the centerpiece, as “Thomas” and “Tiffany” are the heart of the film, played by actors 20 years older and a little more limited in their choreography. Instead, The Matrix Resurrections chooses to dazzle with gorgeous widescreen set-pieces, big brawls, and visual effects that once again astonish while looking spectacularly real. Wachowski and her co-writers split the action as Bugs and her crew — who don’t get enough screen time but all make a terrific impression — race to find where their heroes may be hidden in the real world, and “Thomas” tries to get “Tiffany” to remember the love they once shared. All of the heady philosophy that these movies are known for is put into direct action, as the machines show off the ways they’ve changed the Matrix in an effort to not just keep a Neo from rescuing a Trinity, but to imprison him again.

In this sequence and throughout, The Matrix Resurrections relishes in being a lighter, more self-aware film than its predecessors, a movie about big feelings rendered beautifully. Its score, by Johnny Klimek and Tom Tykwer, reprises iconic motifs from original Matrix composer Don Davis’ work while introducing shimmery, recursive sequencing, a sonic echo to go with the visual one. While legendary cinematographer Bill Pope is also among the talent that doesn’t return this time around, the team of Daniele Massaccesi and John Toll bring a more painterly approach to Resurrections . Warm colors invade scenes from both the Matrix and the real world; the latter looks more vibrant than ever without the blue hues that characterized it in the original trilogy, while its digital counterpart has now changed to the point where it’s painfully idyllic, a world of bright colors and sunlight that is difficult to leave.

Embodying those changes is Jonathan Groff as a reawakened Smith, Neo’s dark opposite within the Matrix. Groff, who steps in for a role indelibly portrayed by Hugo Weaving, is the audacity of The Matrix Resurrections personified: He nails a character so iconic that recasting it feels like hubris, yet also finds new shades to bring to an antagonistic role in a world where villains only appear human, when in fact they’re often ideas. And ideas are so hard to wage war against.

Systems of control

If the old Matrix films are about lies we are told, the new Matrix is about lies we choose. In spite of its questions, 1999’s The Matrix hinges on the notion that there is such a thing as objective truth, and that people would want to see it. On the cusp of 2022, objective truth is no longer agreed upon, as pundits, politicians, and tech magnates each present their vision of what’s real, and aggressively market it to the masses. Our current crisis, then, is whatever you choose it to be. You just have to choose a side in the war: one to be us, and another to be them.

“If we don’t know what’s real,” one character asks Neo, “how do we resist?”

In returning to the world she created with her sibling, Lana Wachowski makes a closing argument she may very well not get to have the last word on. The Matrix Resurrections is a bouquet of flowers thrown with the rage of a Molotov cocktail, the will to fight tempered by the choice to extend compassion. Because feelings, as the constructs that oppress humanity in the Matrix note, are much easier to control than facts, and feelings are what sway us. So what if Neo fights back with a better story? A new myth to rise above the culture war?

It doesn’t have to be a bold one. It can even be one you’ve heard before. About a man named Thomas who can’t shake the idea that there’s something wrong with the world around him, that he feels disconnected from others in a way that he was never meant to be. And when others finally tell him that he’s living in an illusion, he doesn’t quite believe them — not until he sees something, someone, for himself that reminds him of what, exactly, he is missing: that he used to be in love.

The Matrix Resurrections hits theaters and HBO Max on Dec. 22.

‘The Matrix Resurrections’ Review: A Pop-Subversive Sequel Smart Enough to Realize There’s No Reason for It to Exist

In returning to a trilogy that reached its natural conclusion 18 years ago, Lana Wachowski wonders, 'What if Neo had chosen the blue pill?'

By Peter Debruge

Peter Debruge

Chief Film Critic

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For years, Warner Bros. has dreamed of making another “Matrix” movie, but the Wachowski siblings — architects of a cyberpunk classic whose appeal rests largely on bending rules and questioning authority — resisted the pressure, insisting they’d said everything they wanted to with the original three films. Let’s not forget: By the end of the trilogy, Trinity died, Neo sacrificed himself and the humans were freed from their virtual shackles, which means anyone hoping to continue that story had their work cut out for them.

That explains a clever moment of self-awareness early in “ The Matrix Resurrections ,” a welcome but undeniably extraneous fourth installment — more of a patch than an upgrade on the franchise that came before, reframing déjà vu not as a bug but as a feature of the brand. In said scene, employees of a San Francisco video game company sit around a corporate conference table, brainstorming how to build upon the Matrix saga. “Our beloved parent company, Warner Bros., has decided they will make a sequel to the trilogy,” one says, explaining that the studio is planning to do it “with or without” the creators.

Well, if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em, or so director Lana Wachowski seems to be telling us, slyly stepping back from the dazzling infinity mirror presented in the earlier films to reveal one more layer: the real world in which we the audience reside. Sadly, that’s about as wild and/or meta as “The Matrix Resurrections” gets, while the rest could fairly be described as more of the same: more time- and gravity-defying action, more Goth-geek fashion pointers, more “free your mind” mumbo-jumbo.

Essentially a greatest hits concert and a cover version rolled into one (complete with flashback clips to high points from past installments), the new movie is slick but considerably less ambitious in scope than the two previous sequels. Where those films set out to break sound barriers in our brains — the way “bullet time,” the highway sequence and Neo’s final battle against an apparently infinite number of Agents Smith did — this one largely eschews innovation. Rather, “Resurrections” takes comfort in the familiar, fleshing out the emotional core of a world that always felt a little hollow.

In short, Wachowski doesn’t add much to the rich mythology she and sister Lilly have established, but she’s careful not to mess it up either.

By reviving Neo ( Keanu Reeves ), Trinity ( Carrie-Anne Moss ) and a handful of other key characters (some, like Agent Smith and Morpheus, requiring new actors to step in), “Resurrections” tethers its latest iteration to the “simulation hypothesis” — the theory, given oxygen by Elon Musk, that video game technology is advancing at such a clip that odds are good you’re already living in one. The difference, compared with “Matrix 1.0”: The “sheeple” in the movie’s brave new world have that potentially liberating information, and still they choose to sleepwalk through their lives. Just like … you?

It’s been more than two decades since “The Matrix” issued the wake-up call. So what are you doing chained to whatever career/family/hobby numbs you to what really matters? Like fanboy audiences — who passively watch heroes disrupt the system, watching, rather than participating in, social reform — the humans in this latest simulation stay blind. Neo has reverted to his Thomas Anderson identity, only now, he’s head designer for WB-owned game company Deus Machina and described as a “balding nerd,” though it’s still Keanu that audiences see, sporting rock-star bangs and a surfer-guru beard.

It would’ve been much edgier to present Reeves as an aging incel with receding hair and a dandruff-speckled turtleneck — or better yet, as a self-deprecating version of himself, like the one he played in Netflix rom-com “Always Be My Maybe.” Storytelling has evolved by quantum leaps since 1999, and as futuristic as the “Matrix” franchise once felt, it all seems rather quaint today, what with the advent of “reality TV” (consider Paris Hilton’s recent claim that she’s been playing a character all along) and such ontological series as “The Good Place” and “The OA” (the latter ended with the characters crossing into a new dimension, where they’re all actors on the show we’ve been watching). “The Matrix” may have made 1982’s “Tron” look primitive by comparison, but even that franchise has evolved, leaving this one in the dust.

That’s not to say the sequel is simply “The Matrix Recycled” — although the title is every bit as apt as the more biblical-sounding one they went with, teasing (but never directly addressing) the messianic dimension of Neo’s earlier arc. Off screen, Lana Wachowski has completely reinvented herself in the interim, sharing much of that journey via Netflix’s stunning “Sense8,” whereas Thomas Anderson is stuck back in brainwashed mode, wrestling with relatively mundane midlife-crisis questions.

Self-doubts aside, Anderson drags his feet when Morpheus (now embodied by “Candyman” star Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) kicks open a door and tries to offer him the old red-pill enlightenment. Meanwhile, his shrink (Neil Patrick Harris as the Analyst) has him on a steady prescription of blue pills. And then a spunky young cyber-anarchist named Bugs (Jessica Henwick) shows up, having narrowly escaped an obvious-trap “modal,” or training exercise, where she rescues the new-and-improved Morpheus (Abdul-Mateen is great but seems green vis-à-vis the sage and sorely missed Laurence Fishburne).

Speaking of green, the phosphorescent glow that defined the trilogy (extrapolated from old-school CRT monitors) has been all but banished here. Yes, a stream of green glyphs spells out the opening titles, and the human survivors of Zion (many played by members of the “Sense8” cast) search for signs of Neo and Trinity on outdated screens. But compared with the grim and grimy “real world” spared from a Sentinel attack in “Revolutions,” the dimension where Anderson reunites with Trinity — now married with kids and going by the name Tiffany (but still played by Moss) — is rich in color and detail. Strange then that it should look so cheap, conspicuously lacking a striking visual signature.

Far removed from the shadowy film-noir vibe of the original, it’s easy to imagine humans being seduced by such a setting, especially when presented in the magic-hour glow of recent Marvel movies — and against which the grungy post-apocalyptic realm of spaceships and people pods seems less appealing than ever. That has always been the trouble with the “Matrix” movies: They insist that waking life is far worse than the illusion, asking us to care about the fate of a garbage dump where brain-jacked humans serve as an energy source for the Machines.

Of course we’d rather spend time in San Francisco — or Berlin, where shooting shifted. These days, instead of battling actor Hugo Weaving’s square-jawed man in black (the original Agent Smith appears only in flashback), Anderson works for a snappily dressed human Ken doll also named Smith (Jonathan Groff, whose good looks reinforce the notion that everything got a major aesthetic upgrade). Once Neo starts to question his reality, it’s Smith he must face off against, again. The subsequent showdown feels overly choreographed, stuck in late-20th-century Hong Kong mode, versus the brute-force fighting style we’ve since seen in Bond movies. Even Neo’s ability to stop bullets and blast energy waves from his hands pales against so many of the superhero abilities to which we’ve been desensitized.

The great irony of “The Matrix Resurrections” is that a property that was once so appealing for being cutting-edge is now being mined for its nostalgia value — what a screenwriter friend of mine has dubbed “CuisinArt,” wherein studios are forgoing fresh ideas in order to rehash everything audiences love about the past.

Lana Wachowski has said she agreed to make a “Matrix” sequel after her parents died, taking comfort in being reconnected with fictional family Neo and Trinity. Many viewers will agree, even if it would have made more sense to reboot with an all-new cast of characters. But in a world where “Space Jam” can hack into the “Matrix” IP, this far-from-radical add-on seems distractingly preoccupied with justifying its own existence, rather than seeking a way to take fans to the next level.

Reviewed at Imax, Los Angeles, Dec. 14, 2021. MPAA Rating: R. Running time: 148 MIN.

• Production: A Warner Bros. Pictures release, presented in association with Village Roadshow Pictures, Venus Castina Prods. Producers: James McTeigue, Lana Wachowski, Grant Hill. Executive producers: Garrett Grant, Terry Needham, Michael Salven, Karin Wachowski, Jesse Ehrman, Bruce Berman.
• Crew: Director: Lana Wachowski. Screenplay: Lana Wachowski & David Mitchell & Aleksandar Hemon, based on characters created by the Wachowskis. Camera: Daniele Massaccesi, John Toll. Editor: Joseph Jett Sally. Music: Johnny Klimek & Tom Tykwer.
• With: Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Anne Moss, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Jonathan Groff, Jessica Henwick, Neil Patrick Harris, Jada Pinkett Smith, Priyanka Chopra Jonas, Christina Ricci, Lambert Wilson.

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'The Matrix' Review: Neo's Saga Resonates Louder Than Ever Before

Over 20 years later, ‘The Matrix’ reminds you to unplug from the machine and free your mind.

When film historians and cinephiles look back on the most influential years in cinema, it’s hard to argue against the impact of 1999. The last year before the new millennium ushered audiences into the modern age of cinema with films such as The Sixth Sense , The Blair Witch Project , and Magnolia . While there were advances in visual effects, there was a groundswell of stories about dissatisfaction and restlessness born out of the mundanity of the corporate structure. Though films like Office Space and Fight Club explore these themes, there’s one film that stands above the rest when it comes to innovative visual effects and tackling themes of conformity all while transforming the sci-fi genre forever – The Matrix .

Written and directed by the sister duo of Lana and Lilly Wachowski , The Matrix is the story about a computer hacker in a dystopian future who, in his attempts to find an answer, becomes the savior he didn’t know he could be. The film brings together the talents of Keanu Reeves , Carrie-Anne Moss , Laurence Fishburne , and Hugo Weaving . The success of the first Matrix movie would spawn its own franchise , with two sequels being released in 2003, The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions respectively, and The Matrix Resurrections released in 2021.

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One of the more impressive features that makes The Matrix stand apart is its visual effects. Though we’ve had decades of action blockbusters known for its CGI, the effects in The Matrix hold up surprisingly well. The Sentinels are threatening and the agents’ morphing ability is fairly seamless given the time when it was made. However, the stand-out visual effect that put The Matrix in the history books is “bullet time,” an effect where a shot proceeds in slow motion while the camera appears to move at normal speed. With this effect, it highlights the power a person can wield over their oppressor within their false reality. It’s also the reason why Neo dodging bullets during the third act fight on the roof will be parodied until the end of time.

The action of The Matrix is a loving homage to kung fu. The Wachowskis’ love of kung fu cinema ran so deep they hired legendary martial arts choreographer Yuen Woo-ping to coordinate the fight scenes and train the actors months before production. It’s evident in the final product the actors’ dedication to the martial arts, something Reeves would carry on with him in the future John Wick movies.

Apart from the technical achievements mentioned, the story of itself is laced with philosophy. Works of Plato , Descartes , and Immanuel Kant are interwoven in a way that’s accessible to the audience. The Wachowskis pack their script with themes of fate versus free will, existentialism, the dangers of technology, and the power of choice; yet, these themes don’t weigh down the plot or narrative. It creates a richness that keeps the conversation going long after Neo ascends to the sounds of Rage Against the Machine . There’s a sense that with each watch of the film, an audience member will find another idea to pick apart and ponder.

As members of the transgender community, the Wachowskis’ film also acts as an allegory for trans identity and struggle. As Morpheus describes the splinter inside the mind, it’s clear to see the connection to gender dysphoria. Though there’s a heavy commentary on technology and artificial intelligence, there’s a clear undertone about the struggle for freedom to be your true self in the face of tyranny and oppression.

One of the weaker aspects of this titan of modern sci-fi is the subplot of Cypher ( Joe Pantoliano ) betraying Morpheus and the group. Cypher serves as the avatar for wanting to return to ignorance; his character serves as a reminder that once you learn something, you can never go back. Though he drives the plot forward for Agent Smith to capture Morpheus, there lacks a connection to his character to make his betrayal matter. Not to mention, Cypher admitting to Trinity that he had a crush on her feels very tacked on.

On the flip side, the chemistry between Reeves and Moss makes the romance between Neo and Trinity work. Where Cypher’s admission to Trinity is treated as an afterthought, the budding feelings between Neo and Trinity are well-paced and come together naturally. As Neo is coming into his own, so too does his bond with Trinity grow. It’s the love between them that unlocks his true power as “the One'' in order to defeat Agent Smith and begin his mission to free humanity from their enslavement.

The legacy of The Matrix goes beyond its film franchise. It’s rare for a movie to hit pop culture with lightning precision and alter it forever. Within two years of its release, the film was being referenced in the likes of Scary Movie and Shrek . The red pill vs. the blue pill, the action, the iconic lines, even the costuming of the futuristic world has ingrained itself in pop culture to the point that most people today probably know about The Matrix without actually seeing the film.

The Matrix has more to say now about society than it even did back in 1999. As a society, we are more dependent on technology than ever before. With the rise of fake news, it’s normal to question our reality and what is happening around us. We are living in our type of matrix, where we have the power to select what enters our own bubbles and echo chambers; virtual reality can be accessed in seconds and offer an escape from reality. Documentaries like The Social Dilemma expose how social media has created a system by which its users are a product to advertisers, not a consumer. For a film from 1999 to speak directly to our current reality is a testament to how The Matrix was ahead of its time.

From its distinctive action and its timeless themes, The Matrix is a paragon of the sci-fi genre and its endless possibilities. The Wachowskis set out to make their live action version of Ghost in the Shell , directed by Mamoru Oshii , and what they created has sparked commentary and influence on pop culture for decades since its release. Just as Morpheus reveals to Neo, The Matrix is everywhere (and for good reason).

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‘The Matrix Resurrections’ Review: Slipping Through Dreamland (Again)

Keanu Reeves plunges down the rabbit hole once more in this familiar-seeming mind-game movie, the fourth in the series.

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By Manohla Dargis

After she chases the White Rabbit down a very long tunnel, Alice enters a low, dim hall. There are doors up and down the passageway, but they’re all locked. As she walks through the hall, Alice wonders how she’s ever going to get out. You may find yourself asking much the same question while watching the fourth movie in “The Matrix” series, as it alternately amuses and frustrates you with its fantastical world.

The series first invoked Lewis Carroll’s elusive bunny in the first movie, the 1999 genre game changer that was jointly directed by the Wachowski siblings and soon set audiences’ heads on fire. “ Follow the white rabbit ” Neo, a.k.a. the One (Keanu Reeves, cinema’s ideal savior), reads on his desktop monitor, shortly before doing just that. The chase continued and at times seemed never-ending as it endured through two sequels, comics and video games. It also provided grist for reams of articles, dissertations and scholarly books (“The Matrix and Philosophy: Welcome to the Desert of the Real”), taking its place as one of contemporary pop culture’s supreme interpretive chew toys.

The series resumes in “The Matrix Resurrections,” which nudges the cycle forward even while it circles back to swallow its own tail. Once again, Reeves plays both Thomas Anderson and Neo, who exist in separate yet conjoined realms. Anderson’s world resembles our own (though airlessly art directed) but is a software program called the Matrix that’s run by artificially intelligent machines. Here, human avatars go about their business believing themselves free. In the series’ wittily perverse take on the circle of life, these machines keep human bodies — Anderson’s included — imprisoned in goo-filled vats, using the energy from these meat puppets to power the Matrix.

Directed solely by Lana Wachowski, “Resurrections” announces its intentions after the opening credits, with their streams of cascading green code. Somewhere in the illusory world, a woman with short hair fights unsmiling men in suits and shades, a setup that mirrors the banging preliminaries in the original film and makes you ache for Carrie-Anne Moss’s Trinity, Neo’s comrade in arms. Don’t worry, she’s onboard, too, just wait. Now, though, two others are also watching the action along with us, including a guy wearing a headset (Toby Onwumere) who analyzes the action like a sports commentator just before Bugs (Jessica Henwick) jumps into a very familiar fray.

What follows plays like a loving, narratively clotted tribute video to the “Matrix” cycle itself complete with innumerable bullets and almost as many flashbacks to the younger Neo. (You don’t need to revisit what happened earlier in the cycle, the movie does it for you.) Once again, Anderson is in dreamland writing code, this time for his role as a video game designer working on a project called Binary. Speaking of which: As before, he also has an apparent choice to remain ignorant about his existential condition or embrace its painful truth. He also meets a mysterious figure called both Agent Smith and Morpheus (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, whose velvety, sepulchral voice adds shivers of danger).

There have been some significant cast changes since the third movie. Alas, missing in action are both Hugo Weaving and Laurence Fishburne, who added gravitas and much-needed wit. Instead, a silky Jonathan Groff now prowls around menacingly, his boyishness having been nicely weaponized for his role as a sly trickster. A less happy addition is Neil Patrick Harris, who delivers an unhelpful, one-dimensional performance as the Analyst. Still, not much here is different other than some of Reeves’s facial creases and salt-and-pepper hair. Characters still wear fetish clothing or nubby threads, and still keep fighting the fight as they brawl and yammer through the labyrinth.

Some of that yammering is amusing simply because “The Matrix” (and its successors) are exemplars of what’s been called mind-game movies, “a ‘certain tendency’ in contemporary cinema,” as the film theorist Thomas Elsaesser put it. Like others of this type, “The Matrix” plays with the perception of reality held by both the protagonist and the audience, poses questions about the limits of knowledge and addresses doubts about other minds and worlds. What makes mind-game movies especially fascinating — and helps explain their cultish appeal — is how they draw spectators into the game, partly by showing them worlds that they recognize. Or, as Morpheus put it once upon a time: “You’ve felt it your entire life, that there’s something wrong with the world.”

So, yes, “You have many questions,” as a character called the Architect tells Neo in “The Matrix Reloaded.” No kidding! That movie offered some persuasive, or at least tantalizing, answers: The world is an illusion, a simulation, an ideological prison, but it’s possible to escape with lots of guns and cool kids in black, that is until the sequel. The first movie offered viewers doors that they — unlike Alice — could open, allowing them to enter more rabbit holes. Once there, one of the more resonant readings, as the critic Andrea Long Chu has explained, is that “The Matrix” has been embraced by trans women as an allegory for gender transition. In this take, the world of illusions is the gender binary.

Whatever the limits of allegory, this interpretation is both intriguing and touching. (Lana’s sister Lilly Wachowski has said “that was the original intention.”) It adds emotional resonance to “Resurrection,” which gets a great deal of mileage from its — and our — nostalgic yearning, appreciatively stoked by Reeves and Moss’s reunion. The actors’ sincerity and effortlessly synced performances have always been this series’ greatest special effects, and watching them slip back into their old roles is a pleasure. The movie they’re in is still as beholden to the same old guns and poses as the earlier ones, the same dubious ideas about what constitutes coolness, the same box-office-friendly annihilating violence. But it’s still nice to dream of an escape with them.

The Matrix Resurrections Rated R for extreme gun and other violence. Running time: 2 hours 28 minutes. In theaters and on HBO Max .

An earlier version of this review misidentified the movie in which the Architect was a character. It was “The Matrix Reloaded,” not   the first “Matrix.” 

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Manohla Dargis has been the co-chief film critic since 2004. She started writing about movies professionally in 1987 while earning her M.A. in cinema studies at New York University, and her work has been anthologized in several books. More about Manohla Dargis

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Review: Lana Wachowski’s ‘The Matrix Resurrections’ is a deeply felt, colorful remix

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When the Wachowski siblings, Lana and Lilly, changed the film landscape (and popular culture) forever with 1999’s “The Matrix,” a philosophical sci-fi film that questioned the very nature of existence itself, it was no surprise that Warner Bros., the studio behind the movie, asked them to make a few more. They obliged in 2003, with “The Matrix Reloaded” and “The Matrix Revolutions,” though the sequels effectively killed off the idea that we’d ever hang with Neo and Trinity again.

But the powers that be will always want more, and so a sequel to the trilogy, “The Matrix Resurrections,” arrives 18 years later. But this isn’t just another rehash. Rather, the film asks us to question the utility of sequels, reboots and the constant churn of intellectual property, especially when the original lesson of “The Matrix” was to awaken oneself to the system, and then bring the whole thing crashing down.

Lana Wachowski enthusiastically takes on this almost impossible task of plugging back into the Matrix to mine the code for new ideas. Lana’s sister Lilly sits out “The Matrix Resurrections,” but Wachowski has brought on writer David Mitchell, who wrote the novel “Cloud Atlas,” which the Wachowskis adapted to the screen in 2012 , and a writer on their Netflix series, “Sense8,” to co-write the script. The result is a swift, self-reflective, often funny and always original reimagining of the material, which sees Wachowski reassessing the existing characters and lore of “The Matrix” while embroidering the text with new ideas and details. It’s less of a reboot than a remix, and this time, it’s a bop.

Wachowski has infused the world with an exciting new cast of characters, playing roles both familiar and fresh. It feels good to be back with these beloved characters, some of whom have taken on new and, it must be said, hotter forms (looking at Jonathan Groff and Yahya Abdul-Mat een II , specifically).

The story of “The Matrix Resurrections” is indeed familiar too. A man named Thomas Anderson ( Keanu Reeves ) leads a repetitive, uninspiring life behind a desk and has the nagging feeling that there’s something else out there for him. But this time around, he’s a video game designer, the brains behind a revolutionary game called “The Matrix,” the narrative of which is essentially the first trilogy of films. The game came from his memories of his time as Neo, not that he’s necessarily aware of that. As his boss, Smith (Groff) presses Thomas and his team for a remake of the game, a new group of Matrix-hopping hackers, including the awesome Bugs (Jessica Henwick), is ripping through the code, searching for Neo. When they find Thomas and once again offer him the red pill to escape the Matrix, the renewed Neo only has one goal: go back and find his one true love, Trinity ( Carrie-Anne Moss ).

This film is all about the “re” — the reboot, remix, reimagining, reassessment, the (literal) resurrection of the man who died for our machines — and the Neo myth has influenced a whole new generation, including Bugs and her tough, androgynous, multiculti crew. The new blood brings new life to the text, which could otherwise be just a clever dig at sequel culture, but the film is also deeply earnest and deeply felt, especially when it comes to the core love story, the swooning romance between Neo and Trinity.

Wachowski brings this unapologetic earnestness and sense of pleasure to “The Matrix Resurrections,” which is also a welcome reminder that big action films can be well lit, stunningly designed and, yes, colorful too. She invites the audience to have as much fun as she’s having revisiting this world that initially defined her career, and she seems to apply her full self to this text, bringing an irreverent and infectious zeal to the resurrection. The fact that this ends with an exaltation to “paint the sky with rainbows!” tells you all you need to know about her attitude in this latest trip into the Matrix.

Walsh is a Tribune News Service film critic.

‘The Matrix Resurrections’

Rated: R, for violence and some language Running time: 2 hours, 28 minutes Playing: Starts Dec. 22 in general release; also available on HBO Max

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"The Matrix" is a visually dazzling cyberadventure, full of kinetic excitement, but it retreats to formula just when it's getting interesting. It's kind of a letdown when a movie begins by redefining the nature of reality, and ends with a shoot-out. We want a leap of the imagination, not one of those obligatory climaxes with automatic weapons fire.

I've seen dozens if not hundreds of these exercises in violence, which recycle the same tired ideas: Bad guys fire thousands of rounds, but are unable to hit the good guy. Then it's down to the final showdown between good and evil--a martial arts battle in which the good guy gets pounded until he's almost dead, before he finds the inner will to fight back. Been there, seen that (although rarely done this well).

Too bad, because the set-up is intriguing. "The Matrix" recycles the premises of " Dark City " and " Strange Days ," turns up the heat and the volume, and borrows the gravity-defying choreography of Hong Kong action movies. It's fun, but it could have been more. The directors are Larry and Andy Wachowski , who know how to make movies (their first film, " Bound ," made my 10 best list in 1996). Here, with a big budget and veteran action producer Joel Silver , they've played it safer; there's nothing wrong with going for the Friday night action market, but you can aim higher and still do business.

Warning; spoilers ahead. The plot involves Neo ( Keanu Reeves ), a mild-mannered software author by day, a feared hacker by night. He's recruited by a cell of cyber-rebels, led by the profound Morpheus ( Laurence Fishburne ) and the leather-clad warrior Trinity ( Carrie-Anne Moss ). They've made a fundamental discovery about the world: It doesn't exist. It's actually a form of Virtual Reality, designed to lull us into lives of blind obedience to the "system." We obediently go to our crummy jobs every day, little realizing, as Morpheus tells Neo, that "Matrix is the wool that has been pulled over your eyes--that you are a slave." The rebels want to crack the framework that holds the Matrix in place, and free mankind. Morpheus believes Neo is the Messianic "One" who can lead this rebellion, which requires mind power as much as physical strength. Arrayed against them are the Agents, who look like Blues Brothers. The movie's battles take place in Virtual Reality; the heroes' minds are plugged into the combat. (You can still get killed, though: "The body cannot live without the mind"). "Jacking in" like this was a concept in "Strange Days" and has also been suggested in novels by William Gibson ("Idoru") and others. The notion that the world is an artificial construction, designed by outsiders to deceive and use humans, is straight out of "Dark City." Both of those movies, however, explored their implications as the best science fiction often does. "Dark City" was fascinated by the Strangers who had a poignant dilemma: They were dying aliens who hoped to learn from human methods of adaptation and survival.

In "Matrix," on the other hand, there aren't flesh-and-blood creatures behind the illusion--only a computer program that can think, and learn. The Agents function primarily as opponents in a high-stakes computer game. The movie offers no clear explanation of why the Matrix-making program went to all that trouble. Of course, for a program, running is its own reward--but an intelligent program might bring terrifying logic to its decisions.

Both "Dark City" and "Strange Days" offered intriguing motivations for villainy. "Matrix" is more like a superhero comic book in which the fate of the world comes down to a titanic fist-fight between the designated representatives of good and evil. It's cruel, really, to put tantalizing ideas on the table and then ask the audience to be satisfied with a shoot-out and a martial arts duel. Let's assume Neo wins. What happens then to the billions who have just been "unplugged" from the Matrix? Do they still have jobs? Homes? Identities? All we get is an enigmatic voice-over exhortation at the movie's end. The paradox is that the Matrix world apparently resembles in every respect the pre-Matrix world. (I am reminded of the animated kid's film " Doug's 1st Movie ," which has a VR experience in which everything is exactly like in real life, except more expensive.) Still, I must not ignore the movie's virtues. It's great-looking, both in its design and in the kinetic energy that powers it. It uses flawlessly integrated special effects and animation to visualize regions of cyberspace. It creates fearsome creatures, including mechanical octopi. It morphs bodies with the abandon of "Terminator II." It uses f/x to allow Neo and Trinity to run horizontally on walls, and hang in the air long enough to deliver karate kicks. It has leaps through space, thrilling sequences involving fights on rooftops, helicopter rescues and battles over mind control.

And it has performances that find the right notes. Keanu Reeves goes for the impassive Harrison Ford approach, "acting" as little as possible. I suppose that's the right idea. Laurence Fishburne finds a balance between action hero and Zen master. Carrie-Anne Moss, as Trinity, has a sensational title sequence, before the movie recalls that she's a woman and shuttles her into support mode. Hugo Weaving , as the chief Agent, uses a flat, menacing tone that reminded me of Tommy Lee Jones in passive-aggressive overdrive. There's a well-acted scene involving Gloria Foster as the Oracle, who like all Oracles is maddeningly enigmatic.

"The Matrix" did not bore me. It interested me so much, indeed, that I wanted to be challenged even more. I wanted it to follow its material to audacious conclusions, to arrive not simply at victory, but at revelation. I wanted an ending that was transformational, like "Dark City's," and not one that simply throws us a sensational action sequence. I wanted, in short, a Third Act.

Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert was the film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, he won the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism.

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The Matrix (1999)

Rated R For Sci-Fi Violence

135 minutes

Joe Pantoliano as Cypher

Laurence Fishburne as Morpheus

Gloria Foster as Oracle

Keanu Reeves as Neo

Carrie-Anne Moss as Trinity

Hugo Weaving as Agent Smith

Written and Directed by

• Andy Wachowski

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The Matrix Resurrections Is a Messy, Imperfect Triumph

After all this time, what does the blockbuster have left to offer? At its platonic ideal, a big-budget, mass-marketed movie induces pleasure. With swift and bright characterization, it allows actors to operate in a grander register, aching to fill the space of dizzying visual landscapes around them. Bombast and awe on all fronts. Maybe it’s difficult to identify an ideal blockbuster in contemporary Hollywood, drawn as it is to weak craft, characters with little interior dimension, and an understanding of representation that reduces gender, race, and sexuality to items on a marketing checklist rather than world-building attributes of a story. This is the cinematic reality into which The Matrix Resurrections enters, over 20 years after its original incarnation debuted in 1999: A universe laden with sequels and reboots and constantly updated IP. A universe in which imagination has curdled into what can most easily be bought and sold. And yet here is Lana Wachowski, pushing back against the tired form and offering audiences something fresh, curious, and funny as hell.

Teetering between a meta-reckoning with the legacy of the first trilogy and a sincere blooming of a whole new story that feels boldly romantic, Lana Wachowski’s first solo feature is a thrilling triumph. It is impossible to overstate the influence of the previous three movies — particularly 1999’s The Matrix — on American culture, launching “red pill” into dark internet circles, prompting the kids I grew up with to nonchalantly wear latex and leather in the Miami heat, forcing action films of its time to claw upward in the direction of the Wachowski sisters’ cyberpunk-inflected aesthetic, which itself pulled from a wild array of influences. The world has changed dramatically since Neo first bent out of the way of incoming bullets, and yet The Matrix Resurrections easily makes a case for its own existence. After decades of audiences attempting to slot the franchise into one category of interpretation or another, the film argues against any imagined binary to show that beauty is found between such extremes. Wachowski builds on what of the greatest and most singular aspects of the original trilogy: its queerness.

Playing with ideas of memory and nostalgia could have led Resurrections to have a self-satisfied, airless quality. Instead, it feels emotionally expansive and intellectually sly. Much of the first act works to actively critique nostalgia for nostalgia’s sake, and how it is exploited by those in control, whether machine overlords or Hollywood studios. (“Nothing comforts anxiety like a little nostalgia,” Yahya Abdul-Mateen II’s Morpheus says.) Resurrections is messy and imperfect, too, often eschewing easily digestible plotting in favor of an ambitious eccentricity, a reminder that bombastic storytelling is best translated by artists who are willing to fail. From the revelatory production and set design to the warmth of the cinematography by John Toll and Daniele Massaccesi to the updated action scenes, Lana Wachowski proves how powerful a blockbuster can be in the hands of those with vision and ambition. But it’s the kind of film whose very foundation makes it tricky to discuss in depth without tracing the narrative and emotional shape of it. I recommend going into the film with an open heart, an open mind, and little knowledge of the nitty gritty turns in the story, some of which I’m about to examine. You’ve been warned.

Early in the film, inside a slick high-rise office overlooking the nearly too-perfect San Francisco skyline, a gaggle of video game developers argue about what the Matrix is an allegory for. Is it trans rights and politics? Is it capitalist exploitation? The scene has a rhythmic dexterity, as the developers volley forth opinion after opinion. It’s poised to be hilarious, and it is. Among the developers is Thomas Anderson (Keanu Reeves), who in this new world is a famous video-game designer who created a game called The Matrix to much acclaim. He’s a suicide survivor, having once lept from a building on a clear sunny day believing he could fly. When his business partner (Jonathan Groff) says he must design a new Matrix game despite his vowing not to, his reality starts to slip. Is he losing his mind or is the Matrix he supposedly created something more than a game?

Wachowski and co-writers David Mitchell and Aleksander Hemon play out this anxiety with a consistent intrusion of clips from the previous films, a strategy that doesn’t always work. But when it does, it’s sublime. Like in the scene where Thomas Anderson slips from this therapist’s (Neil Patrick Harris) grasp and realizes he is indeed the Neo of his video game. His memory of meeting Morpheus (Lawrence Fishburne then, Abdul-Mateen II now) is projected onto a ripped projector screen that acts as a doorway, figuratively and literally. Freed from a prison once again, Neo learns it has been 60 years since he and Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss) traveled to the machine city, sacrificing their lives for their revolutionary cause. He must determine: Can he free Trinity, too, or is she happy in this false new world where she is a married mother of two with a penchant for motorcycles? Neo never truly believed in himself as the One, but Trinity did. How can he be what everyone believes him to be without her?

The Matrix Resurrections might lack the ground-shaking originality of its 1999 predecessor, but it manages to chart a stunning, divergent path, philosophically and cinematically. Whereas the previous Matrix films were committed to a green-dominated, cool-toned color palette, Resurrections simmers with far greater warmth — amber-hued sunlight streaming through the real world. The fight choreography, from John Wick ’s Chad Stahelski (Reeves’s Matrix stunt double, who plays Trinity’s husband in the new film), is more chaotic and rough-hewn; bodies crash into one another haphazardly, lacking the grace and fluidity Yuen Woo-ping brought to the original movies. The costume design led by Lindsay Pugh brings back gothic sensibilities with restraint, forgoing fetish wear but remaining committed to the epic-ness of flowing silhouettes. The sets are littered once again with mirrors that glisten with thematic resonance. The film commits to granting audiences joy in ways that feel primal (exceedingly hot, well-dressed people are kicking unholy amounts of ass) and earnest (Wachowski does not abandon the previous films’ core belief in hope and community building).

That joy emanates through the cast. Harris’s naturally haughty, self-satisfied miasma works perfectly. Groff is cheeky and charismatic as a rebooted version of Agent Smith, his fight scene with Neo in an abandoned building being one of the highlights of the film. Decked in finely tailored suits the color of marigolds and deep ocean waters, Abdul-Mateen II slinks and struts with the grace of a true movie star, winking at Morpheus’s love of theatrics. (The fact that Fishburne wasn’t asked to be a part of the franchise rebirth hangs over the performance, though.) Jessica Henwick exudes hope, grounding the unexpected coalition that pins the movie together. The new actors, even when they’re playing old characters, are so much more than energetic doppelgängers of the Matrix heroes and villains who came before them, absorbing well the aesthetic differences between this reboot and the trilogy.

But for all its strengths — retreading and remixing the franchise while charting a bold new course for the canon — The Matrix Resurrections would fail if it wasn’t for the chemistry of Reeves and Moss. The former has by now solidified his place as a major movie and action star several times over, seamlessly moving from tickled bewilderment to sincere fear to absolute control on screen. Watching Moss, with her cutting gaze and sharp physicality, I can’t help but mourn for the career she deserved. Together, there is an inherent optimism — about the human spirit, about the will to overcome a narrowing force — that flits open when they share a scene. It’s along the arc of Neo and Trinity’s romance that Resurrections separates itself from its recent blockbuster brethren. Behind a meta-narrative storytelling approach and all that stylistic gleam, The Matrix Resurrections is ultimately a love story — romantic, yes, and a paean to the community necessary for that romance to blossom into resistance. Wachowski is bold enough to argue that in a strategically queer-fashioned world, where boundaries break and the limits of the human body are rejected, choosing love is still a radical decision.

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The Matrix Resurrections review – drained of life by the Hollywood machine

Keanu Reeves is back as cyberpunk icon Neo but fans of the original will find this cynical reboot a bitter pill to swallow

E ighteen years after what we thought was the third and final Matrix film, The Matrix Revolutions , Lana Wachowski has directed a fourth: The Matrix Resurrections. But despite some ingenious touches (a very funny name, for example, for a VR coffee shop) the boulder has been rolled back from the tomb to reveal that the franchise’s corpse is sadly still in there. This is a heavy-footed reboot which doesn’t offer a compelling reason for its existence other than to gouge a fourth income stream from Matrix fans, submissively hooked up for new content, and it doesn’t have anything approaching the breathtaking “bullet time” action sequences that made the original film famous.

The first Matrix was a brilliant, prescient sci-fi action thriller that in 1999 presented us with Keanu Reeves as a computer hacker codenamed “Neo”, stumbling across the apparent activity of a police state whose workings he scarcely suspected. Charismatic rebel Trinity ( Carrie-Anne Moss ) brings Neo to the mysterious figure of Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne) who offers our reluctant hero one of the most famous choices in modern cinema: the blue pill or the red pill. The first will allow Neo back into his torpid quasi-contentment, the second will irreversibly reveal to him the truth about all existence. He swallows the red and discovers all our lives exist in a digitally fabricated, illusory world, while our comatose bodies are milked for their energies in giant farms by our machine overlords.

A vivacious and underrated sequel, The Matrix Reloaded , appeared in 2003 and later in the same year The Matrix Revolutions, in which the idea ran definitively out of steam: the awful truth was that the drab “reality” in which the rebels were fighting their tedious intergalactic war against these machines looked like Battlefield Earth , the dire sci-fi movie starring John Travolta.

But the red pill and the blue pill was an irresistible meme gifted to political discourse at the dawn of the online age. Christopher Nolan’s Inception was surely influenced by The Matrix and when Succession ’s digital media baron Lukas Matsson, played by Alexander Skarsgård, contemptuously compares social media users to Roman slaves, he is echoing ideas touted by the original film. Jeff Orlowski’s documentary The Social Dilemma , about social media serfdom, comes with Matrix-esque imagery – and Mark Zuckerberg is attempting to craft a new digital world called Meta. Moreover Lilly Wachowski, the original’s co-director, has intriguingly discussed the world of Matrix and its relevance to the dissenting politics of gender.

The fourth movie wittily begins by showing us Neo in haggard and depressed middle age, operating under his normal name Thomas Anderson: he is an award-winning but burnt-out game programmer. But there are weird eruptions from within his alt.reality: an activist called Bugs (Jessica Henwick) tries to make contact with him, along with a renegade government agent (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) who has assumed the persona of Morpheus. Meanwhile, Thomas’s obnoxious billionaire employer Smith (Jonathan Groff) seems a parallel version of the sinister Agent Smith played by Hugo Weaving in the original films. But Thomas’s analyst ( Neil Patrick Harris ) is on hand to assure him that this is all just his imagination. But is it? And is Thomas still deeply in love with Trinity, whom he sees every day in his local coffee shop?

In some ways, The Matrix Resurrections has a degree of charm as a love story of middle age, and usually returning action franchises give their ageing male lead a younger female co-star. Not here: it’s a pleasure to see Moss return, but a shame to see her given so little interesting to do. The Matrix is an idea that is most exciting when it is starting to come apart: when there is a glitch. But the franchise is now a glitch-less narrative: we basically know all about the illusion and the “Battlefield Earth” reality out there in space which is where we are largely marooned: a huge, dispiriting crepuscular ruined cityscape glowing at its rocky edges, like the Verneian interior of a volcano. And the nature of the machines’ thinking and their motivations is not really solved by this fourth film, despite some playful new ideas about whether some of them are disloyal to their side. Lambert Wilson’s character The Merovingian, a veteran of the Machine War, returns, ranting enjoyably about the superiority of art, music and pre-digital conversation.

Really, Resurrections doesn’t do much to remove the anticlimax that hung like a cloud over the cinema auditorium at the end of the third film in 2003. This movie is set up to initiate a possible new series, but there is no real creative life in it. Where the original film was explosively innovatory, this is just another piece of IP, an algorithm of unoriginality.

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Intense, but many teens will be able to handle it.

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

"Reality" may not be what you think it is. If you'

Morpheus tells Neo he's "the One" who was prophesi

The film casts actors of different races and ethni

Many fight sequences involving knives, guns, kicks

Brief scene with scantily clad characters, cleavag

"S--t" and "goddamn" many times. Also "ass," a--ho

The Oracle smokes, one character has a drink.

Parents need to know that The Matrix is an exciting, sometimes confusing, sci-fi adventure with a brooding Keanu Reeves and a mysterious Laurence Fishburne at it center. It's heavy on special effects and has a lot of action violence (some of it pretty gross, including an icky bug that enters the hero's body…

Positive Messages

"Reality" may not be what you think it is. If you're called to save others, you have a choice to accept or reject a destiny that others tell you that you have. Never give up, even against great odds in an ever-changing reality. Teamwork is important for winning.

Positive Role Models

Morpheus tells Neo he's "the One" who was prophesied to end the war between machines and humans. Neo accepts his destiny, trains hard and makes tough, brave choices. Morpheus looks out for Neo and at one point sacrifices himself to protect him. Trinity believes Neo is “the One” more than he does. She becomes his main ally and teammate.

Diverse Representations

The film casts actors of different races and ethnicities. While it has a few female characters, they're in supporting roles, sidekicks to the two leading men. Though the film is about a global calamity, all the characters are American. The character of Switch is androgynous, originally scripted as trans . Behind the camera, the film was written and directed by sisters who are transgender -- Lana and Lilly Wachowski.

Did we miss something on diversity? Suggest an update.

Violence & Scariness

Many fight sequences involving knives, guns, kicks, punches. Deaths during battle scenes. An icky bug enters the hero's body through his belly button.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Violence & Scariness in your kid's entertainment guide.

Sex, Romance & Nudity

Brief scene with scantily clad characters, cleavage, passionate kissing.

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"S--t" and "goddamn" many times. Also "ass," a--hole," "hell," "crap" and "Jesus" and "Jesus Christ" used as exclamations.

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Parents Need to Know

Parents need to know that The Matrix is an exciting, sometimes confusing, sci-fi adventure with a brooding Keanu Reeves and a mysterious Laurence Fishburne at it center. It's heavy on special effects and has a lot of action violence (some of it pretty gross, including an icky bug that enters the hero's body through his belly button) and strong language ("s--t," "goddamn," "crap," etc.). Most teens should be able to handle it without a problem, though the plot can be confusing as it unfolds.

Parents need to know that The Matrix is an exciting, if sometimes confusing, sci-fi adventure written and directed by sisters Lana and Lilly Wachowski. It stars a brooding Keanu Reeves , a mysterious Laurence Fishburne , and a strong Carrie-Anne Moss . It's heavy on special effects and has lots of action violence including many gun fights. There are also gross elements, including an icky bug that enters the hero's body through his belly button and strong language ("s--t," "goddamn," "crap," etc.). The film emphasizes perseverance and teamwork. To stay in the loop on more movies like this, you can sign up for weekly Family Movie Night emails .

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Community Reviews

• Parents say (88)
• Kids say (434)

Based on 88 parent reviews

Confusing for kids

Great fun movie, what's the story.

In THE MATRIX, Keanu Reeves stars as Neo, a computer programmer with a sideline as a hacker, who gets mysterious messages that lead him to Morpheus ( Laurence Fishburne ), leader of a ragtag group that lives aboard a rocket-style craft. It turns out that it's not 1999 but about 100 years into the future. All of humanity has been turned into a source of energy to keep machines "alive." The Matrix is a massive computer program that has the humans believing that they are still living in a world that has actually been destroyed. Special agents, led by Smith ( Hugo Weaving ), seek out Morpheus and his followers to destroy them.

Is It Any Good?

This film is heavy on special effects and brooding paranoia, light on plot, dialogue, character, and even coherence. THE MATRIX challenges what's real and what's part of an elaborate, fake cyber-reality, so it can be confusing for both the audience and the characters in the movie. But it's certainly an ideal pick for the kind of teen who wishes that video games could come to life. Though it's rated R for violence (some pretty gross, including an icky bug that enters the hero's body through his belly button) and language, most teens 14 and up who are begging to see it should be able to handle it without a problem.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

Families can talk about the relationship between humans and machines. Why was the first Matrix program, creating the perception of a utopia-like society, unacceptable to the humans?

What do you think of the violence in The Matrix ? Is it too much or appropriate to the story?

How well do you think The Matrix deals with the philosophical issues it raises, such as destiny vs. free will and loyalty vs. self-interest?

Movie Details

• In theaters : March 31, 1999
• On DVD or streaming : September 21, 1999
• Cast : Carrie-Anne Moss , Keanu Reeves , Laurence Fishburne
• Directors : Lilly Wachowski , Lana Wachowski
• Inclusion Information : Female directors, Transgender directors, Female actors, Asian actors, Polynesian/Pacific Islander actors, Black actors
• Studio : Warner Bros.
• Genre : Science Fiction
• Topics : Magic and Fantasy , Adventures , Robots , Science and Nature , Space and Aliens
• Run time : 136 minutes
• MPAA rating : R
• MPAA explanation : sci-fi violence and brief language.
• Last updated : March 10, 2024

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In Theaters

• Keanu Reeves as Neo; Laurence Fishburne as the freedom fighter leader Morpheus; Carrie-Anne Moss as Trinity; Hugo Weaving as the Machines' Agent Smith

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• Andy Wachowski|Larry Wachowski

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Movie Review

“How would you know the difference between the dream world and the real world if you didn’t wake from the dream?”

So goes the question posed in The Matrix . Is life real or illusion? Twentieth century life flows on as normal. Or does it? This is revisionist history—in the future. Late in the 21st century, man develops artificial intelligence (referred to simply as the Machines). The Machines take control of Earth. Man fights back. In the resulting power struggle, the world is decimated. And the Machines win.

After discovering they can subsist using electricity generated by the human body, the Machines create a grand illusion to fool humans into serving them. The world “seems” to still be normal, but in fact the bodies of humans are contained in chambers on large “farms” and their minds are linked into a worldwide virtual reality computer program called the Matrix. Nothing is real.

It’s at this point that the film opens with a select group of men and women who have hacked their way out of the Matrix, discovering their true identity. They form a colony called Zion in the real world (which is otherwise lifeless). A few of them re-enter the Matrix to battle the Machines which present themselves in the form of humans. Since nothing is real inside, laws of physics need not apply. Everything centers on how much your mind can disbelieve. If you think you are falling from the top of a skyscraper, you are. If your mind can transcend the illusion, you can leap tall buildings in a single bound.

Enter Neo, the One whose appearance has been prophesized by the Oracle (an old woman with psychic powers). Plucked out of the Matrix by the freedom fighters, he is trained to fight. Then reintroduced into the Matrix, Neo must defeat the Machines.

Positive Elements: Truth is worth more than life itself for the freedom fighters. Reality, regardless of how dreary, is better for man than the mindless exercise of comfort and luxury easily provided by the Matrix.

Sexual Content: Virtually none. (Pun intended.) A short conversation occurs in which one computer programmer offers Neo an interlude with a digital woman. Neo does not accept.

Violent Content: Excruciatingly drawn-out sequences feature slow-motion gun battles and hand-to-hand combat including kung-fu fighting. Bodies are repeatedly bludgeoned, ripped apart by machine-gun bullets, slammed through concrete walls, burned with electrical blasts, exploded and hit by a train. One man is stabbed in the head.

Blood drips from mouths as internal organs are pummeled in one scene, but the remainder of the fighting is highly choreographed and largely gore-free. That doesn’t mean gore isn’t a problem though. Especially when a bug-like creature penetrates Neo’s belly and is later forcibly extracted.

Action is often shown with slow-motion dream-like clarity, firmly planting the images in moviegoers minds. After over two hours of almost non-stop fighting, viewers are left with the feeling that the characters of the film have played a distant second to the special effects-filled action scenes.

Spiritual Content: Mysticism and prophesies play a large role in the freedom fighters’ worldview. Almost everything they believe is based on what the Oracle says. Her psychic powers are trusted without hesitation.

A loose comparison to Christ is presented inasmuch as Neo is the “chosen one” destined to save mankind. One character even addresses him as his “own personal Jesus Christ.” Universal ponderings abound, some of which parallel the Christian worldview. A defiled Eden. Intertwined realities. Messianic prophesies. A Judas figure. There’s even a girl named Trinity whose kiss “raises Neo from the dead,” a ship dubbed Nebuchadnessar and a city of destiny called Zion.

But for every part Christian allegory, there are equal parts Buddhism, Greek mythology, Alice in Wonderland and The Terminator —a contemplative stew lacking any purity of focus. As savior, Neo uses Jesus’ name as profanity, hoists a middle finger at police and strafes buildings with gunfire, leaving countless corpses in his wake.

Crude or Profane Language: Amazingly, no f-words mar the dialogue of this R-rated film. But multiple uses of that particular vocal abrasion occur in soundtrack music by Marilyn Manson and Rage Against the Machine. A significant number of s-words (about 20) pepper the script, however. And there are more than a dozen inappropriate uses of the Lord’s name.

Drug and Alcohol Content: Neo and a compatriot drink homemade liquor. Neo chokes and spits most of his swig out, not realizing how strong the concoction is. The hallucinatory drug mescaline is mentioned once as an escape from the drudgery of life.

Other Negative Elements: Portrayals of human infants attached to the Machines with tubes comes across as intentionally disturbing. A scene in which Neo’s body is rescued from the human “farm” is a cross between a Marilyn Manson video and what it would be like if a full-grown man were to be born. Mucus, blood, suction tubes, violence, etc.

Summary: Despite all the hype, I still have to chalk up this chaotically violent head trip as just another post-apocalyptic war thriller. It’s a cyber-reality update of Bladerunner . It’s an attempt to win the hearts of moviegoers who wish somebody would make another Clockwork Orange . Its visuals are unique and possibly trendsetting. But its flimsy allusions to theological truth are far from inspiring.

Steven Isaac

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The Matrix Movies, Ranked by Tomatometer 

The Matrix Reloaded celebrates its 20th anniversary!

The defining sci-fi event of 1999 was supposed to be  Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace , the long-awaited and super-hyped kick-off to the  Star Wars  prequel trilogy. Yet, while that film did rake in plenty of cash – and generate plenty of discussion – it was the kick-off of a different trilogy that year that would ultimately become  the sci-fi moment of the year… if not the decade… and the next couple of decades to come.

Lana and Lily Wachowski’s The Matrix  was a phenomenon. The story of Neo’s (Keanu Reeves) awakening to the truth of his existence – that he and the rest of humanity had been interned by sentient machines in a virtual reality system known as the Matrix – was a box office success, a critical smash, and just really, really f–king cool. The movie had style to burn (those muted green colors, those leather trenches) and introduced western audience to cutting-edge Eastern action choreography thanks to the efforts of fight choreographer Yuen Woo-ping. Action cinema hasn’t looked the same ever since.

Sequels were, of course, inevitable, and in 2003 Matrix  fans got two of them, both shot concurrently in Sydney, Australia: First came  Reloaded , which expanded the lore of the franchise and delivered one of the most epic highway chase scenes ever recorded; then came  Revolutions … and that rave party. That same year, fans were able to dig even deeper with the excellent animated anthology film,  The Animatrix , in which seven top filmmakers told stories in the  Matrix  universe using the latest in CG animation and Japanese anime techniques.

Now, with Certified Fresh films first, we’re ranking the Matrix movies by Tomatometer!

The Matrix (1999) 83%

The Matrix Reloaded (2003) 74%

The Animatrix (2003) 89%

The Matrix Resurrections (2021) 63%

The Matrix Revolutions (2003) 34%

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The Matrix Resurrections Reviews

A sleek, meta, & complex return to this franchise makes for an ALMOST Perfect sequel even if it’s second half could of been stronger

Full Review | Jul 26, 2023

Lana Wachowski delivers a surprisingly meta, self-aware movie about the original trilogy packed with bold, fascinating ideas but an absolutely terrible execution.

Full Review | Original Score: C- | Jul 25, 2023

The Matrix Resurrections can be merited for its attempt to honor its predecessors, even if it becomes distracted by trying to please its parent studio.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/10 | Feb 23, 2023

I especially love the costuming in the film. This isn’t a standard legacy-quel, and it’s all the better because of that.

Full Review | Feb 10, 2023

Out of everyone in Resurrections, my two favorite characters are Jessica Henwick as Bugs and Jonathan Groff as Smith. They give the best performances in the movie, though the whole cast is strong, and they offer us something fresh within the Matrix lore.

Full Review | Original Score: 8/10 | Dec 30, 2022

"Resurrections is a film that argues against its own existence while bringing new weight to a universe that has captivated audiences for two decades."

Full Review | Nov 19, 2022

Never mind blue pills and red pills. The bitterest pill to swallow is the fact that The Matrix Resurrections is okay but it is not The One.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Nov 12, 2022

At best, The Matrix Resurrections comes off as a bad parody. At worst, it ruins The Matrix films that came before. I hated every single second of it.

Full Review | Sep 18, 2022

The ways in which it was commenting on itself and how the world has evolved since the last film came out, and the state of entertainment, and the world, and politics... I felt like I was on the same page and that made this an enjoyable viewing for me.

Full Review | Sep 11, 2022

A high octane, nostalgic thrill ride with a little bit too much self awareness and an unnecessarily convoluted (even by Matrix standards) plot.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/5 | Aug 22, 2022

“Resurrections” is a slog, overburdened by endless exposition and lacking anything that feels remotely fresh.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Aug 16, 2022

Daring, evolve[s] its franchise while mining nostalgia with care and savvy, and make[s] the utmost of its biggest strengths — Reeves and Moss, clearly, who could melt faces with their chemistry.

Full Review | Jul 8, 2022

... Distills brilliance and intelligence. [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Jun 28, 2022

An uneven film that starts out unprejudiced and self-referential, comfortably and happily winking at the first three films of this saga, but then gets stuck in and endless loop trying to explain the unexplainable. [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Jun 17, 2022

There's no denying the aspiration to create a story that revels in both provocative themes and thrilling large-scale entertainment.

Full Review | Original Score: 6/10 | Jun 5, 2022

The Matrix Resurrections evolves the original trilogy's anti-capitalist metaphor and places it front and center for all to see, ensuring that no one can look away from it's message that only community and resistance can save the day.

Full Review | May 30, 2022

A tetralogy was not achieved. The Trilogy remains intact.

Full Review | May 12, 2022

The Matrix Resurrections is the biggest, gayest, and campiest tentpole movie in years! It has action, it has gays, it has leather, it has latex, and its all done with its over-the-top tongue fully in cheek!

Full Review | Original Score: A+ | Apr 4, 2022

Rename this film to: Why Lana didn't want make a sequel but didn't want anyone else to do it for fear the original trans allegory would be completely erased from the legacy of the Matrix franchise and it turned into a cis male bullet time p0rno.

Full Review | Original Score: F | Apr 4, 2022

The Matrix Resurrections is one of the most ambitious and self-referential blockbusters you're likely to see, but it isn't anywhere near as clever as it thinks it is.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Mar 28, 2022

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The 25th Anniversary of ‘The Matrix’: Liberation and Co-optation

A quarter century after its release, the film is not just an inspiration. it’s also a cautionary tale about how even the most liberatory dreams can be adopted by the mainstream—and the opposition..

On the 25th anniversary of The Matrix , the movie remains a cultural touchstone. Its mix of gravity-defying, phenomenal CGI enhanced stunts, martial arts choreography, awesome sunglasses, and Philip K. Dick-esque paranoia set a new standard for cool badass action movie myth-making. 

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If you peel back the layers, though, there’s a bleaker, darker truth under all the shiny success. After a quarter century, the film is not just an inspiration. It’s also a cautionary tale about how mainstream expectations and demands have a way of fitting even the most liberatory dream into a familiar, oppressive matrix. 

As even casual pop-culture fans know, The Matrix (which was released on March 31st, 1999)  is set in a far future in which AI has gained sentience and conquered humanity. People are stored in vats where the machines feed off their bioelectricity. To keep humans dormant, their consciousness is inserted into a simulation of life on earth circa 1999. 

Only a few rebels, led by Morpheus ( LAurence Fishburne ), resist, occasionally entering the Matrix to find others for their cause. Their latest recruit is Neo ( Keanu Reeves ). Morpheus believes Neo may be the One prophesied to free them from the machines.

The film espouses a generalized rebuke to sterile conformity and authoritarian rule, personified by the malevolent Agent Smith (Hugo Weaving.) The rebels hope for a “world without rules or controls, without borders and boundaries.” They want, like Neo, to toss off their desk jobs, don a lot of leather, and gain the power to run up walls and keep their own hours.

If you’re willing to read the film’s buried codes, though, there’s a good bit more going on here than just generalized anarcho-libertarian-chic. Directors Lana and Lilly Wachowski had not come out as trans when the film was released. But Lilly has since acknowledged that their movie is in many ways allegories of trans experience, trans oppression, and trans liberation. 

Neo has felt his whole life that he has a “splinter in [his] mind”—that something is not right with the world. And sure enough, he learns that he is not who he thinks he is, and that he is out of place in his own body and society.  Morpheus gives Neo the choice to take a blue pill, which will return him to “normal” life, or a “red pill,” which will allow him to live authentically, even if that authentic life means he will be targeted by the forces of reaction.

Like many trans people, Neo chooses the medical intervention that will allow him to be a true self, despite the dangers and difficulties. The only person who continues to call Neo by his old name, “Mr. Anderson,” is Agent Smith, who wants to insert Neo back into the Matrix of cisheteronormativity, which is also death.

The movie, then, is, directly and intentionally about the homophobic repression of queer people. The Matrix is not just generalized conformity; it’s the closet in particular. In the original script, one character, Switch (Belinda McClory), was supposed to be played by two people—a man in the Matrix and a woman in the real world. But, according to Lilly Wachowski, “the corporate world wasn’t ready for it.” The Wachowskis were not openly trans at the time, and their film wasn’t allowed to be either.

Many trans people in 1999 and since have caught the references to trans experience. But thanks in part to mainstream intervention, trans characters aren’t present in the film, and that means that non-trans people have been able to ignore the film’s politics and paste on their own. The references to oppression have been generalized, and by some fans even inverted.

In his 2021 book Reverse Colonization : Science Fiction, Imperial Fantasy, and Alt-victimhood , scholar David M. Higgins argues that stories like The Matrix are ripe for appropriation by some of the worst people in the world. As Higgins says, The Matrix offers “fantasies that invite audiences to identify with prisoners struggling to achieve liberation in the face of vast systems of manipulation and control.” Since the fantasy isn’t tied tightly to the marginalized experience of any oppressed people, it can be picked up by anyone. Agent Smith can be a part of whatever conspiracy theory you’d like.

In the case of The Matrix , that has meant that the story has been adopted and repurposed by far right misogynists. The Men’s Rights Movement has embraced the phrase “take the red pill.” 

As in the film, for MRAs taking the red pill means confronting and understanding the real world, and the real power structures undergirding the world. In this case, the misogynists believe that evil feminists are the oppressors, and men (especially white men) are unfairly controlled and discriminated against. The Matrix ’s storyline is no longer about the way that prejudice poisons the lives of trans and queer people. Instead it’s a paranoid fantasy about the oppression of straight men.

Without doubt the Wachowskis are horrified at far right misuse of their work. When reactionaries Elon Musk and Ivanka Trump joked about taking the “red pill” on Twitter, Lilly Wachowski showed up in their mentions to say, succinctly, “ Fuck both of you .”

If the Wachowskis had been allowed to include positive images of trans women in the film, or if they’d been able to make their allegory more pointed and clear, it’s likely that MRAs and Elon Musk would not be attracted to the film. The right has not embraced Get Out , as just one example. 

Jordan Peele’s success suggests that Hollywood is changing in some respects. But in 1999, and still, for big budget blockbusters, the movie industry prefers to downplay content about marginalized people. The powers that be want something less specific and (supposedly) more assimilable by the mainstream. Last year’s Guardians of the Galaxy 3 , as just one example, could (like the Matrix ) be read as a queer allegory , but (like the Matrix ) it was careful not to include actual queer characters.

This doesn’t mean that The Matrix is actually a right-wing film, or that the MRAs are right to view it as such. But it does show how the real-life Matrix that is Hollywood adjusts its program to make sure its viewers’ dreams don’t get too revolutionary or too emancipatory. Even for The Matrix , there were still rules and controls, still boundaries that the Wachowskis weren’t allowed to cross. Someday—maybe before another 25 years pass—we’ll have a trans hero at the center of an action blockbuster. But Agent Smith, and his studio bosses, will fight it every step of the way.

• SEE ALSO : Surprises and Snubs from the 2024 Oscar Nominations

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Screen Rant

Is on the line worth watching breaking down the mel gibson movie's reviews & rotten tomatoes scores.

The 2022 thriller, On The Line, is trending on Netflix. Based on reviews, here's a breakdown of whether the Mel Gibson-led thriller is worth watching.

• On The Line found new life on Netflix, but its predictable plot and poor acting make it a skip for many viewers.
• Mel Gibson shines in this thriller, but the movie's unrealistic twists and lack of tension disappoint audiences and critics alike.
• Despite its absurdity, On The Line caters to fans of twisty thrillers and Mel Gibson's nostalgic performances.

Spoiler Warning: This article contains spoilers for On The Line.

Although not as popular as some of Mel Gibson 's more notable work, 2022's On The Line has found new life on Netflix, which brings into question whether the movie is truly worth a watch . On the Line sees Gibson as Elvis, a popular radio host who, after receiving a threatening call from an unknown caller, has to race against the clock to save his wife and daughter. Although some of Gibson's action movies have found renewed success on Netflix , it's to be expected given his status as one of the industry's most beloved action stars.

Despite Gibson's age, he's still starring in action thrillers, as demonstrated by movies like, On The Line and the upcoming Lethal Weapon 5 . Although On The Line is decidedly different from the actor's usual work, it features Gibson in what is easily one of the more fun, albeit inconsistent, performances of his career. Additionally, On The Line sees Gibson starring alongside many fresh faces, which effectively speaks volumes to his star power in the modern filmmaking climate. Nevertheless, from plot twists to Rotten Tomatoes scores, On The Line 's recent popularity has been brought into question .

The 10 Best Mel Gibson Movies Of All Time, According To IMDb

Discussions of self harm are included in this article.

On The Line Has A 21% Score From Critics On Rotten Tomatoes

The movie's rotten tomatoes audience score is 32%..

On The Line 's reception among audiences and critics boils down to a predictable thriller marred by an unrealistic plot and poor acting performances from the majority of its cast. Save for Gibson, the consensus regarding On The Line is that the movie doesn't really offer anything worthy of viewers' time . While Gibson delivers a performance that is entertaining, it's overshadowed by a plot that feels dated in addition to lacking any genuine thrills beyond its initial moments. On The Line 's first act is arguably its best, as the tension is palpable and engaging at that point.

The confusing plot twists and underwhelming ending are also among some of On The Line 's most contentious elements.

However, once the supporting characters have more screen time, the movie quickly devolves into a not-so-subtle commentary on social media and its negative impact on the personal lives of respected celebrities and otherwise influential personalities. From puns and one-liners to Gibson's over-the-top delivery of some of Elvis's jokes, On The Line shifts from an enthralling thriller to a B-movie horror movie without any of the self-awareness necessary to make it work . The confusing plot twists and underwhelming ending are also among some of On The Line 's most contentious elements.

On The Line's Reviews Criticize Its Lack Of Tension, Plot Twists & Ending

The final plot twist didn't stick the landing with critics & audiences..

Elvis falls deeper into a cat and mouse game of death with a deranged caller named Gary, but it loses its tension by juxtaposing the thrills with one too many plot twists and bad jokes that, despite their prevalence, never really land. As seen earlier on, Elvis enjoys pranking his employees, and after a particularly harsh prank was played on Lauren, his former switchboard operator, she commits suicide. Unbeknownst to Elvis, Lauren was friends with Gary, and despite never being properly established beforehand, her death causes him to break into Elvis's house, where he threatens to kill his family.

After Gary forces Elvis to jump off a building to ensure his family's safety, Elvis fakes his death, but Gary reveals he knows Elvis faked it as he secretly had a drone circling the building. After then being forced to put an explosive vest on one of his interns, Dylan, for his trickery, Elvis and viewers witness Gary drop the detonator, but Dylan doesn't explode. As it turns out, the entire tense situation was one big prank that Elvis's crew orchestrated to get revenge for the years he pranked them. Despite its absurdity, On The Line still has an audience .

On The Line Is Worth Watching For Fans Of Mel Gibson Movies & Twisty Thrillers

The mel gibson thriller has plenty of plot twists in store..

Audiences familiar with Gibson's body of work will likely appreciate On The Line more than anyone else since , despite the movie's ridiculous plot, On The Line still features an inspired performance from Gibson that hearkens back to his '80s and '90s careers, respectively. Additionally, the movie's various plots could work well for people who enjoy them in other movies despite their lack of credibility or plausibility. Unfortunately, the majority of people who've seen it aren't too crazy about its twists, as demonstrated by its overwhelmingly negative feedback.

While Elvis's firing of Dylan is a prank that makes sense, Dylan's true identity as a stuntman named Max who orchestrated what is essentially an act of domestic terrorism and not facing any severe repercussions doesn't. Additionally, the police allowing such a prank to be broadcast live makes even less sense. While there is a moral about not taking people for granted, On The Line features too many twists for it to really work. Mel Gibson's movies are usually realistic , and while On The Line isn't, Gibson's performance and even the more absurd twists might be worth it for some .

10 Movies Like Inception That Will Bend Your Mind

Are we still in a dream.

Inception is one of the best Christopher Nolan movies and one of the greatest sci-fi film concepts of the century so far. Many fans of Nolan’s work believe that, despite his other critically acclaimed films and recent Oscar for Oppenheimer, Inception is quite possibly his masterpiece. With a stellar cast and an air-tight, intellectual plot, the indelible visual effects are just the cherry on top for this gem of a film. As with most Nolan films, there are many plot twists and turns throughout this one-of-a-kind cinematic experience, which is what fans are likely searching for more of in this list.

As fans continuously debate the true meaning of that final scene, we’re highlighting some other movies like Inception that will keep you guessing no matter how many times you watch.

What do you think happened at the end of Inception?

Shutter Island (2010)

The closest selection to horror on the list, Shutter Island is a psychological thriller from Martin Scorcese that will surprise most viewers. Summoned to a remote island that houses an insane asylum, U.S. Marshall Teddy Daniels (Leonardo DiCaprio) must investigate the disappearance of a patient while attempting to fight off the demons that threaten to trap him in his insanity. Full of impressive performances and a nightmarish script from writer Laeta Kalogridis, Shutter Island is guaranteed to thrill.

Read our review of Shutter Island .

Memento (2000)

Nolan’s Memento is the debut film that sparked his successful film career. Suffering from a rare, untreatable short-term memory loss condition, Leonard (Guy Pearce) attempts to track down his wife's murderer using limited clues and tattoos on his own body. Full of red herrings and a confusingly out-of-order plot, the viewer is placed directly in the shoes of our frustratingly confused protagonist.

Read our review of Memento or check out our list of the best thriller movies of all time.

Get Out (2017)

Jordan Peele’s breakout directorial debut, Get Out is a genre-blending masterpiece built around mind-melding social commentary on race. Invited to a weekend getaway at his girlfriend's family's house, Chris (Daniel Kaluuya) grows suspicious of their overly welcoming nature. By maintaining an air of mystery and subversion throughout its skillfully crafted narrative, Peele’s Get Out has been compared to the works of master filmmakers such as Hitchcock, Carpenter, and Kubrick.

Read our review of Get Out .

Source Code (2011)

Successfully blending elements of sci-fi, thriller, action, and romance, Source Code comes out of left field to deliver an unexpectedly sensational film. Using state-of-the-art military technology in a top-secret operation to find the source of an explosion, helicopter pilot Colter Stevens (Jake Gyllenhaal) is pushed into the mind of the recently deceased Sean Fentress, who died in a terrorist-attacked commuter train. Highlighted by Gyllenhaal’s charm and some fine directing from Duncan Jones, there are a whole lot of great mind-bending moments to experience in this film with great acting to bring them home.

Read our review of Source Code .

The Matrix (1999)

One of the most culturally impactful and mind-blowing sci-fi movies of all time, The Matrix introduced a scarily convincing concept that has stuck around ever since. After receiving clues and fish hooks from an unidentified source promising a “truth,” Neo ( Keanu Reeves ) discovers he is living in a nightmare simulation crafted by artificial intelligence. Intertwining incredible kung-fu fighting scenes with gunfights, car chases, and stellar performances, it’s hard not to think of this sci-fi classic whenever one’s in the mood for something equal parts thought-provoking and entertaining.

See our guide to every Matrix movie ever made .

The Prestige (2006)

Based on the novel by Christopher Priest , The Prestige is a gritty period piece that brings a new edge to magicians in the Edwardian Era. Two rival magicians, set at odds by a previous partnership gone awry, compete to achieve the greatest illusion of all: teleportation. Brilliantly acted by Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman (and directed by Christopher Nolan), both characters fight for their careers as they obsessively construct their illusions, sacrificing humanity and decency in the name of showmanship.

Read our review of The Prestige .

Donnie Darko (2001)

Another psychological thriller edging on horror that sent fans on an all-out debate for meaning, Donnie Darko is an original, visceral experience that is meant to pique interest and instill discomfort. After narrowly avoiding a freak accident at his family home, Donnie Darko (Jake Gyllenhaal) continues having night terrors and hallucinating a man in a rabbit suit telling him to cause havoc in his Stepford Wives suburbia. Featuring some incredibly effective sound mixing, an awesome soundtrack, a stellar performance from Gyllenhaal, and an intelligently crafted narrative, Donnie Darko fits all the pieces together for a timeless sci-fi drama.

Read our review of Donnie Darko .

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is a conceptual twister and cinematic masterpiece in which genre, narrative, and the very concept of memory are challenged. Joel (Jim Carrey) is on a train for his usual commute when he meets Clementine (Kate Winslet), a quirky, overtly forward individual, who makes outrageous statements that smite our protagonist’s heart. When their relationship gets nasty, they individually seek out the help of an experimental memory-removal clinic that reminds them exactly why they belong together.

Read our review of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind .

Fight Club (1999)

Based on Chuck Palahniuk’s novel of the same name, Fight Club centers around young and dejected men who decide the best way to solve their problems is to fight in basements and reject society's standards. The movie has some great writing and an awesome twist that recontextualizes all that came before it. Wit unforgetable performances from Edward Norton and Brad Pitt, it's a must see for any fan of psychological thrillers.

The Butterfly Effect (2004)

Led valiantly by its intriguing concept, The Butterfly Effect is a thriller that successfully goes for shock value. After Evan Treborn (Ashton Kutcher) is affected by his first blackout in years, he discovers he can consciously travel to his past blackouts as a child and change the future. Beyond the compelling idea, The Butterfly Event features disturbing, unpredictable events that make this film unforgettable.

Read our review of The Butterfly Effect .

Connor Sheppard is an Oregon-grown culture writer for IGN with previous work on The Manual. Intrigued from a young age by pop culture and movies, he has developed into an experienced critic and consumer of all things media. From his time earning a bachelor's degree in digital communications at Oregon State University, he found a love for writing and appreciating specific actors and directors in the many films he watches.

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The American Society Of Magical Negroes review: A movie that's afraid of itself

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Although The Matrix came out two years before Spike Lee famously coined the term “magical, mystical Negro” in 2001, it successfully inverted the potential fulfillment of that trope. Morpheus was undoubtedly a self-sacrificing guide to Neo. but it was Morpheus’ confidence, the weight of respect his character’s presence inspired throughout the film’s world. Kobi Libii’s debut feature, The American Society Of Magical Negroes, attempts a different approach to subverting the trope, by conceptually centering his film around a whole secret society dedicated to using magic exclusively to help white people.

The title, at first glance, evokes the image of an anachronistic period piece, featuring Black wizards and witches on a mission to save the world. But we live in a post-Get Out world and, now, a post-American Fiction world, where genre films by talented Black artists are given Academy Awards when those films are also smart commentaries on modern hypocrisies of race in America. Libii’s film is instead part anachronistic fantasy, part sketch-worthy satire, part romantic comedy, and part purgation of Libii’s own frustrations with race. Unfortunately, a fatal lack of consequence for the film’s world or characters prevents it from ever deepening its initial premise, or unifying the sum of its disparate parts.

The American Society Of Magical Negroes

The American Society Of Magical Negroes is the story of Aren, played by Justice Smith, who gives the character a similar timidity that he also gave the severely underconfident Simon the Sorcerer in last year’s surprisingly fun and heartfelt Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves. Aren is a broke visual artist whose backbone has a comparable strength to the brightly colorful yarn sculptures with which he hopes to make his artistic mark. The film opens with him side-stepping, tip-toeing, and apologizing his way through a gallery crowded with wealthy potential sponsors.

The unconscious automation of Aren’s behavior, a young Black man naturally elevating the comfort of the surrounding white people over his own, attracts the attention of Magical Negro Roger (David Alan Grier, on a kind of charming autopilot). Roger takes Aren under his wing, inducts him into the titular society, and sends him undercover to monitor his first client, Jason (a believably insecure Drew Tarver), an upstart white male web designer who works at a tech company called Meetbox. Aren soon discovers that Lizzie (an underutilized An-Li Bogan), the charming girl he had a meet-cute moment with in a coffee shop, not only works at Meetbox, but is Jason’s “work wife.” When Aren inadvertently convinces Jason to pursue her romantically he has to decide whether it’s more important to manage white discomfort or give voice to his own.

In the world of Magical Negroes, white discomfort is the metric by which everything else is measured. Roger insists that the society’s entire raison d’être is the monitoring of white discomfort, visualized by little floating barometers that gauge “white tears.” If that meter falls too deep into the red the Magical Negroes are sent on missions to utilize teleportation and conjuring spells, shifting the world around discomfited white clients until they’re comfortable again, thus saving the world one pacified white police officer at a time.

Joining the society starts to give Aren the language to describe the all-consuming self-doubt and hyper-awareness he’s always felt. In one of the film’s more successful scenes, Aren is challenged by Roger to unapologetically approach a crowd waiting to enter a club. When he finally takes the leap his immediate surroundings fade to black and we go close on Aren as he hyper-focuses on the immediate reactions of fear and uncertainty on the white patrons’ faces. He did nothing to warrant those reactions beyond being Black and slightly self-assured. It’s the closest we get to a feeling of resonance and consequence in a satire that is too cautious for its own good.

Aren is a shockingly incurious protagonist. Besides Roger, Aren never has any meaningful conversations with the various members of the society, and never tries to. The members all flit about in the background of classrooms and hallways tinged with mystically warm light, littered with wand boxes, thick, leather-bound books, and magical smoke of a Hogwarts-lite aesthetic. What we do learn about the rules and function of the society itself is broken up into lightly humorous lectures in which the aforementioned magic smoke projects former members establishing the “fundamentals” of being a Magical Negro. These projected vignettes poke fun at the trope via characters who quote their wise grandmothers and use thinly veiled innuendoes alluding to the dysfunctional manhoods of their white male protagonists. The lecturer, played with dry humor and majesty by Aisha Hinds, never talks to, acknowledges, or even notices Aren at all. Same goes for the classroom of Aren’s fellow novitiates. It’s disappointing that, outside of Roger and dramatic society president Dede (Nicole Byer), the film’s roster of talented Black actors rarely have the chance to meaningfully impact the story itself.

The majority of the film actually takes place in the sterile Silicon Beach-set Meetbox campus, where Aren fluffs up Jason’s ego and gradually bonds with Lizzie over their mutual attraction, as well as their shared frustration at having to prove themselves to white gatekeepers. The main tension of these scenes is that Aren is instructed by the League to give up his romantic pursuit of Lizzie as soon as Jason is interested in her, even as Aren and Lizzie become more attracted to each other. There’s genuine chemistry between Smith and Bogan that makes their scenes fun to watch, but the potential drama of the love triangle is completely undercut by the fact that it’s never believable for a second that Lizzie would consider Jason as a romantic prospect. One-sided conversations where Aren unsuccessfully tries to make Jason aware that his whiteness affords him the luxuries of confidence and assumed success muddles the focus of the Meetbox scenes even further, critiquing corporate culture on a level that is articulated but never felt.

Part of the problem is that the film never deepens beyond its initial assumption that white discomfort is what fostered the presence of Magical Negroes, both historically and within the mythology of the film itself. It’s not just white discomfort but racism that engenders the deep feelings of existential fear and diminishing self-esteem in Black people. When I suspect I’m making white people uncomfortable I fear for my life and my livelihood. I fear for my ability to survive because those moments make me distinctly aware of a social and economic system that benefits from the exploitation and control of its Black citizens. For all Roger’s talk about how their work is saving Black people, we’re never shown an example of how unsafe their world could be without them. No character is ever truly endangered, or made to confront the consequences of racism. And in a media landscape where as far back as The Boondocks and as recently as Atlanta and Sorry To Bother You, Black creators have found ways to hilariously satirize American racism without shying away from the potentially harsh and fatal consequences, the relative shallowness of this film just isn’t enough.

As Morpheus says in The Matrix, “There’s a difference between knowing the path, and walking the path.” The American Society Of Magical Negroes is a film with a lot on its mind, but the execution as a work of cinematic drama feels disjointed and unchallenged. It’s ironic, and unfortunate, that a film presumably about the significance of discomfort feels so afraid to mine the depths of its own idea, or make anyone watching feel truly uncomfortable.

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