Movie Review: The Matrix Ⅳ - The Recursive Matrification

I remember being blown away by the original Matrix. I was an impressionable teenager and it absolutely melted my mind. The story was recycled from a hundred different sci-fi tropes that I was already familiar with - but the direction and effects were outstanding.

Nowadays, of course, CGI is par for the course. Literally any film-maker with a laptop can churn out effects a hundred times better than the original movie. So directors have to rely on story if they want to make an impact.

I honestly couldn't tell you anything about the Matrix Ⅱ and Ⅲ. I know I saw Ⅲ in an Las Vegas IMAX. And I'm pretty sure there were explosions and Kung-Fu. But they are the ultimate example of regression to the mean. That is, the average movie has an average review score. So a hit is likely to be followed by a miss.

Does Ⅳ send us back to dizzying heights of philosophy and intrigue? Almost! The first quarter of the movie is, in my opinion, excellent. It is a beautiful study in coping with mental illness. It is a metanarrative about the nature of sequels. If you've seen Scream Ⅳ, it's like the opening to that - but better in every way. It is smart, funny, dark and dangerous, with enough little flickers of something to make you want to rewatch it.

It fully loads up the "'member-berries" by literally projecting scenes from the first few movies onto a wall in the background. It is an audacious move - and works brilliantly. There are a few neat directorial twists - although nothing on the scale of TENET.

The exposition-laden middle didn't really float my boat. I know people make fun of "somehow Palpatine returned" - but at least that skipped us through interminable discussions full of technobabble.

It builds to a satisfying end though. Sure, the fights aren't particularly groundbreaking. And, yeah, there are no iconic lines. And, OK, if I'm being nit-picky, it just didn't make me feel like I was a teenaged boy who wanted to rebel against the system. But I guess that's not the movie's fault!

Personally, I'd have liked a more ambiguous movie. Is Thomas Anderson trapped - or is he delusional? Are the goodies helping him - or are they self-serving? Is Trinity obsessed with him - or is he just a stalker?

But, you know what? There were lots of fun kicking-and-punching scenes, scenery-chewing baddies, and guns. Lots of guns.