The Matrix Revolutions (Widescreen Edition)

Rating:
Summary: Big time eye candy even if it falls short of expectations
Review: I rewatched "The Matrix" before I watched "The Matrix Reloaded" on DVD, so that when I went to the theater and saw "The Matrix Revolutions," I would have a fighting chance of being able to follow along and possibly appreciate the climax. I would not say that the ending was predictable per se, but given the pair of problems afflicting Neo's world (the sentinels are coming to Zion City to kill all the humans while Smith is taking over every being in the Matrix) the solution has the virtue of logic (albeit Hollywood rather than cybernetic). Anyway, I am not all that sure that thinking too much about this film is necessary for enjoying it, although I did take small pleasure in being ahead of Neo a couple of times in the film. I do not thing there really could be any other ending, given the set up, but if you were expecting something spectacularly new and more substance than style in the conclusions of the trilogy, you are going to be disappointed.

"The Matrix Revolutions" comes down to two gigantic battles. The first is the defense of the dock in Zion City when the sentinels break through. What we have at that point is basically the biggest shootout video game you have ever seen. The second is the final showdown between Neo and Smith, which manages to combine the contradictory principles of bigger and better with less is more. While each is going on you are two busy enjoying the spectacle to be overly concerned with what it all means in the end. I mean, sometimes a EMP is a good thing and who cares if kicking a computer virus is really not going to do it much harm?

For me this was the biggest kitchen sink movie I have ever seen. The whole "Matrix" idea got props for being cutting edge, but for the finale I was repeatedly struck by bits and pieces of dozens of other films and had to fight down an urge to yell, "Use the Force, Neo!" But there is a vessell fighting off attackers like "Star Wars," big guns like in "Aliens," millions of attacking creatures like in "Star Ship Troopers," several scenes lifted from World War II movies, Neo fights Smith in a driving rain like the climax of "The Seven Samurai," and dozens of other cinematic references. This is not to say that these references are intentional homages, but neither are they intrusive (cf. "The Rock").

I was also struck by how "The Matrix Revolutions" has the same basic structure as "The Return of the King," the upcoming conclusion of "The Lord of the Rings," in that you have a giant pivotal battle (the Battle of the Pelinor Fields) and then the whole thing comes down to a mano e mano confrontation (Frodo and Gollum). It also occurs to me with both of those movies and "The Matrix Reloaded" earlier this year, actor Hugo Weaving (Smith and Elrond), has the opportunity to be the first actor to ever appear in movies that came out in a single year that could end up earning $1 billion in the United States. At the end of the first week of release of this film he has already broken the $400 million mark.

Rating:
Summary: Terrible is Just a Word...
Review: Terrible is just a word. That is until you watch the Matrix Revolutions. To speed things up here's a list of just a few of the movies shortcoming;

1) Why use humans as Batteries? That's just stupid. Humans give off less energy than they use, you could just burn the food. That bothered me in the first movie, but the movies quality made up for it.

2)Why is #1 important? Because using humans for energy is the reason the Matrix exists in the first place. The Matrix keeps humans pacified. Couldn't they use pigs or give the humans lobotomies, or better yet nuclear power.

3) In Revolutions the Machines make it into Zion (seen in previews). The machines then battle the humans. Couldn't they just drop in a nuke or two. Even some napalm would have done the trick.

4) The goofy robot fighting things the humans use to fight the machines. They don't even have armor to protect the soldiers.

5) Let's not forget the horrible - plot and dialogue, boring and pointless speeches, and the drawn out death scenes.

Rating:
Summary: The critics saw another movie...
Review: I don't understand why some goofs are rushing to pan this film. Is it now cool to hate these movies? That must be the reason. It's not because this film is bad because it was great.

I loved this film: it's philosophy, the cinematography and the great action scenes. I went to see this movie with two other people, when it was over they both agreed that the movie was great and the critics are crazy!

The fight scene at the end was phenomenal, well worth the price of the ticket and the battle for Zion scene was exceptionally good. This film kicked major a$$!!

So why all the bad reviews? Who knows.. The Wachowski brothers have managed to turn The Matrix from a pure action film series into a credible work of science fiction, and I guess that made things too complicated for some people.

Anyway, follow the philosophy of the movie: think for yourself. if you want to go see the movie, then go see it.

Rating:
Summary: The Jury's Still Out...
Review: First up- The Original Matrix is my all time favourite. Second- When I first saw Reloaded, I was disappointed; it took 3-4 viewings to grasp it, then I enjoyed it. Third- I have only seen Revolutions once, I am sure it will take another two viewings at least to fully grasp it all.
Conclusion? I'm not 100% certain! And probably won't be until I have seen it more. The Original Matrix has always been five stars all the way, with the second definately good- But not great three stars.
The Third I think will fall into that good but not great slot. Perhaps it's simply an unfair case of the first film being SO good that they really were on a hiding to nothing with the sequels; the gut feeling maybe they should never have existed really comes to mind here.
To the point though, if you liked Reloaded you will like Revolutions, as it is really the second half of the four hour movie. The SFX are incredible-In this modern Cinema world of Jaw dropping effects it has been a long time since a movie has blown me away like that.
The main problems with it are the drawn out story around the main war; Matrix II & III really could have been pushed into a single movie...And in some places, where the main characters are missing from the action during the big fights, it kind of feels 'Independance Day'-like. Lots of cheesy dialogue and big effects.
Having said that, when it's good it's very good. I like the Philosophy aspect as most Matrix fans do, and I thought the plot was a good, fitting end to the series. I get the feeling a lot of critics have slagged it because (A) Those people like everything explained for them, without ambiguous 'discussion points', and (B) They wanted a Star Wars-ish happy ending with all our Heroes receiving medals on a stage. The Matrix was always too dark a story to do that.
Overall, it's a good movie which was never, EVER going to live up to the hype. But please, dear Brothers...Pay attention to the 'Tomb Raider' video games- Enough is enough, don't destroy the franchise by thrashing it.

Rating:
Summary: Can't see the Matrix for the trees?
Review: In a nutshell, the best way to describe Revolutions is: Matrix 1, inverted! Just think of how and where the action was staged in The Matrix and flip it completely.
Just when you think that you have never seen a sci-fi fight scene this grandiose, the Wachowskis kick it up one very fat notch,(I'm not talking about the end-game sequence here either). There is more psycho-babble, every bit as vague/simple as Reloaded, but if I don't walk away from a sci-fi flick without feeling at least a bit dorky, then I'm just not getting my moneys worth!
Technology is used for no practical purpose, in needlessly dangerous ways, by people who say things to each other in convoluted parables which just makes it harder for Keanu, who is struggling to keep up anyway...and I guarantee you'll love every minute of it.
There are even parts where you just want to yell out to characters to (metaphysically) watch out behind themselves...and they never do. Great fun!
The most cynical criticism has been leveled at the conclusion of the film, but in yet another great sci-fi tradition, the end matters not one over-ripe fig. It's the ride we're along for here folks, and to knock the Matrix for trying too hard is like getting frustrated with a forest because of all the damn trees.
Matrix Revolutions, you'll cry, you'll laugh, (both in all the wrong places),but you'll still be talking about it long after the credits roll.

Rating:
Summary: In the future, only black people will say "ain't."
Review: One thing that stunned me about Revolutions, aside from the fact that it was actually engaging and pretty provocative, were the stereotypical portrayals of so many blacks as people who can't be bothered with grammar. I found it pretty insulting. But, with that out of the way, Revolutions actually provides pretty good entertainment. Perhaps the weakest part of the movie is the dialogue; in fact, it's painfully bad. Here's what the typical exchange sounds like: "I knew you were coming back." "I know." "Did you know I loved you?" "I knew you knew, but I didn't know that you would say that you knew." "I know." It becomes downright impenetrable blather because of the writers' limited English skills. There. Someone needed to say that.

The acting is pretty good, but let's face it. It's hard to act when you're given such mediocre lines. And what happened to Laurence Fishburne? He looks bloated, slow, and hesitant. In fact, he seemed to be hung-over. Thankfully, his presence in the film is quite limited. Then there is the infatuation with leather and vinyl. One might almost suspect a cross-dressing leather fetishist did the custume design, and no one could bring themselves to point out how silly it looks. (I'm sure in a grungy metropolis just outside the hot core of the Earth sweaty leather will be the clothing material of choice. Sure. If not that, PVC vinyl.)

What is good about Revolutions is that actually starts saying something interesting about human nature, and the relationship of our own world to the matrix--pointing out, quite effectively, that our world isn't much more than or different from the matrix. I won't go into much more detail about this thesis, other than to say that it makes for a much more subtle commentary on human relationships and emotions and provides a interesting philosophical bridge between humans and machines. A lot of the movie is difficult to understand, but a least there is meat to chew on--unlike the pointless and silly Matrix Reloaded.

So, there you have it. Not as good as the original (which didn't try to answer its questions and had a much more compelling and engaging premise), but much better than part two.

Rating:
Summary: Matrix Revolutions- In A Clsss By Itselff
Review: Over and Over and Over again I keep seeing(and hearing) negative reviews for this movie and I cannot undertand it at all--There are people who keeps saying that there should not been a RELOADED or most recently a REVOLUTIONS and that it should have stopped with the original movie when if people will remember that THIS MOVIE WAS MEANT AS A TRILOGY!!!!!! The Wachowski Brothers KNEW WHAT THEY WERE DOING!!! (for those who are lost go and pick up a copy of THE MATRIX:REVISITED) What I have found is that most people were disappointed in this movie and RELOADED because they only were interested in THE MATRIX as just another simple action movie when these movies represent so much more
REVOLUTIONS end is as clearly oultlined and lead up to if you refer back to the first film(those fans of the ORIGINAL) Stop refering to these movies as seperate entities and view them as a whole picture(also view THE ANIMATRIX--most of you probably hated that too) and then as Morpheus says "FREE YOUR MIND"
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Rating:
Summary: You already know the answer to that question
Review: It's amazing how very bad this series became. I actually enjoyed Revolutions - I thought they had good fight scenes and the talks with the Merovingian and the architect were quite entertaining. I mean, the architect had one of the most awesome voice I've ever heard from a human -- even if he had just recited random words out of the dictionary, i would have been enthralled. But oh, how the people yakked in that film. I could have done without a few of their overblown speeches (especially that old man counsellor) and the "Neo is Christ" crap.

In Revolutions, people talk less (I think) but they don't actually say anything useful. And the oracle is one of the biggest letdowns in history. Her answer to every question is "You already know the answer to that." I mean, someone said that she told them "I would help him. Or not." Now, that's great advice. I don't care at this point about Link or his girlfriend (who is named "Z." Is it Z for Zelda? Link and Zelda? It's a more probing, thought-provoking question than anything asked in this movie.) There are a lot of pointless characters and the fights are now so very CGI that I can't care at all about what happens. Neo and Smith's fight goes airborne and then they keep knocking each other down and getting back up and flying around and making rain spheres explode and cracking large holes in things for no apparent reason. My dad and I kept laughing at the crappy crappy dialouge ("Love is a word." "I never finished the training program" "No -WE- did it!" "What would you do?" "I'd make shells.") and I can't remember half of it. The movie entirely forgets about the questions it raised in the first and second films, the characters are so flat that I don't give a hoot about a single one of them, and the film started going into the rules of movie violence, where the more prominent the character, the longer they can survive serious injuries. A scalpel wound to the abdomen instantly kills one girl, but being impaled by six or seven dangerous-looking poles (Why would you have that many dangerous poles in your space ship?) fatally wounds someone else, giving the character ample time to spew out some stupid, unprovoking last words. Also, at the beginning of the film, Zion has 20 hours before the sentinels break through, and Morpheus and Niobi don't get there until the fight has been raging for some time. Does it seriously take them 20+ hours to fly to Zion?

Everyone is turned into a cartoon version of themself, especially Smith, who actually has a scene in which he takes off his glasses and cackles maniacally into the camera. In fact, the actor who plays Bane (nice name. I wonder if he was in for some trouble) is a better Smith than Smith. Speaking of which, how does Neo not recognize that speech pattern and the "Hello, Mr. Anderson" for so long? What a doofus. I agree with the oracle from the first movie (and only the first) that he's "not too bright, though." The end was spectacularly bad. Hopefully this movie will fizzle out of my memory and I can pretend that only the first one exists. Ahhh... what a wonderful world that would be.

Rating:
Summary: The Matrix Revolutions is an brilliant finale!
Review: "The Matrix Revolutions" is an brilliant finale to one of the best movie sagas in our and any time. Keanu Reeves, returns, of course, as Neo, The One and possible savior of Zion. Neo is in a coma, which, strangely, doesn't look like a coma because his brain patterns are different than a person in a coma, unfortunately. Laurence Fishburne, is, back as, Morpheus, the man with all the ideas. He believes in Neo, because of what he can do. Carrie-Anne Moss is, of course, back as, Trinity, who would give her life to save Neo. Neo is trapped between the machine world and the real world, unfortunately, by the Merovingian, played again, by Lambert Wilson. The Oracle, this time, played by Mary Alice, replacing the late Gloria Foster, is back, too. As is, Agent Smith, played, with sheer brilliance, by Hugo Weaving, who has never looked better in a performance like this, unfortunately. Niobe, played again, by Jada Pinkett Smith, is back, as well. This is also an appearance by the Architect, played again by, Helmut Bakaitis. The rest of the cast from "The Matrix Reloaded" returns as well, too. This is an brilliant movie with brilliant ideas and thoughts in its brain, a little more than "The Matrix Reloaded". It doesn't have that many fight scenes as its first two processors did, unfortunately, it is brilliant, nonetheless. The score by Don Davis, is a triumph in itself and it is one of the best scores heard this year so far. The directing by The Wachowski Brothers, is superb and dynamic, but it is also brilliant, too. The Costume Design by Kym Barrett is excellent. The Production Design by Owen Patterson is wonderful without compromise. The Cinematography by Bill Pope is superb. The Film Editing by Zach Staenberg is dynamic. The Screenplay, also by, the Wachowski Brothers, is excellent and superb, without compromise. The Visual Effects is brilliant as its first two processors, and it shapes the filmmaking of tomorrow's newest talents as "The Matrix Reloaded" did. Go see this movie now and try to see it again, if possible. It is a visionary achievement that shall be remembered for all time.

Rating:
Summary: Good Final Movie, but needed a little more.
Review: The Matrix Revolutions is a fine final movie, but it needed to have a more human touch and a better ending than it did. Keanu Reeves, Hugo Weaving, and the gang is back but the spectacle is gone, and the ending is must to be desired. Great special effects that do put the first two movies to shame, and the final confrontation between Neo and Agent Smith is a crowd pleasers.

It just needed more that it had to be a satisfying ending.