Peter Bradshaw
After the flop that was Johnny Mnemonic, the idea of casting Keanu Reeves in another virtual reality thriller must have taken a lot of nerve. Either that or they really wanted Ben Affleck but Ben wasn’t available. In any case, I must admit that if I had been offered a chance a year ago to invest in The Matrix starring Keanu Reeves, I would have said no thanks, I’ve already made plans to put all my money in a box and throw it over a cliff.
Boy, would I have been wrong. Because The Matrix is a wonderfully enjoyable pulp classic – an unalloyed pleasure from first to last, crammed with hi-tech, high-camp action sequences and spiffy effects. And it achieves what I never dreamt was possible – it makes us fall in love with Reeves all over again.
>From the first close-up on that boyish, angular face, with the hairline dipping into a little asymmetric V over the enigmatic features, we know this is going to be something very super from Reeves. “Not too bright, huh?” is an impertinent observation from one of the characters on Reeves’s intellectual underperformance. Well, maybe not. But a bit of pert, ingenuous cluelessness is surely what we want in our cyber-action heroes.
Reeves plays a computer hacker called Neo (a name that deserves an academy award itself.) who is contacted by a cyber-warrior from “The Matrix”, an occult alternative reality accessible only to those enlightened in the way of artificial intelligence.
It is the big, bald Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne) who reveals the terrifying reality about The Matrix: namely, that our waking lives are a gigantic, baroque dream implanted in our minds by a race of machine monsters , that our bodies are being bred in darkness on intergalactic factory farms, that we are kept docile with a virtual reality illusion of a rich, busy existence.
How can I describe the expression on Reeves’s face on hearing this terrifying news?
It is the same as the expression on anyone else’s face on opening a higher than expected gas bill. But it is precisely this impassivity, this tough, stoic alertness which inspires extravagant adoration not merely from all of us in the auditorium, but also from Morpheus, Trinity and the rest of the resistance, who think of him as the “Chosen One” who will lead the insurrection against The Matrix.
The fight scenes in this film are a complete joy. Reeves gains expertise in various Oriental techniques via implanted software – a mini-disc is clunked into the back of his neck, he turns around and breathes wonderingly: “I know Kung Fu …” I say, Keanu, do you really? Yes indeed, and pale, wussy Reeves gets fight scenes that are stylish, exhilarating and beautifully designed.
Movies about virtual reality, or those ostentatiously sporting virtual reality effects, usually tend to be bad; they rely on a lot of sub-William Gibson babble, no- brainer stuff – artificial intelligence for the naturally unintelligent. Moreover they fail to understand that a good movie should itself be a form of virtual reality, and that a second level of techno-fantasy added in this medium looks tinny, tacky and surplus to requirements.
But The Matrix winningly surmounts these obstacles; it unselfconsciously creates its own weird, deadpan universe, its visual effects are worn lightly, and Andy and Larry Wachowski, who wrote and directed it, appreciate that there has to be a lot of sweaty action on the level of actual reality.
The producer is Joel Silver, the veteran Hollywood action maestro, who can count The Matrix as another triumph. (Spago should have a house band play Hail to the Chief when he makes an entrance.)