It's the fourth Matrix installment with the usual tropes but a love-story that makes sense. At Gateway, other theaters, and HBO Max.
The Matrix Resurrections
“No one can be told what the Matrix is. You have to see it for yourself.” Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne)
Although I am not the best person to ask about what happened in the three previous installments of The Matrix, the new high-concept thriller The Matrix Resurrections makes some sense because writer-director Lana Wachowski (helming solo without sister Lilly) and her colleagues have crafted a saner story with a classic romance (well, maybe classic only a bit). The usual slo-mo bullets, shape shifting, and outrageous homage to virtual reality are there but framed around the reunion of Neo (Keanu Reeves) and Trinity/Tiffany (Carrie Anne Moss).
Although the duo is resurrected from their deaths in Revolutions, how the filmmakers justify the two resurrections I’ll leave to sci-fi geeks who eat up this meta-commentary on virtual reality. Because of Neo’s longing to reunite with Trinity, I found myself analyzing how Reeve’s previously wooden responses now seem genuine. It’s because he has such a low-affect anyway, that snooze is transformed into a deeply-felt emotion coming out of a place only love could make surface. Besides, he continues to make black ultra cool.
For those who care at all about the history of cinema, approach Matrix Revolutions as a reboot with new takes on its own concept that itself is unwieldly and at times inscrutable. If you are into this Christopher-Nolan-like mind-puzzle, you’ll delight in the twists and turns that say Lana Wachowski is leaving the previous three installments for new territory. Then again, it’s old hat, love and all that, but it feels good on my head.
“Nothing comforts anxiety like a little nostalgia.” Morpheus (Yahya Abdul-Mateen)
In theaters and HBO Max
The Matrix Resurrections
Director: Lana Wachowski
Screenplay: Wachowski, David Mitchell (Cloud Atlas), Aleksander Hemon (Love Island)
Cast: Keanu Reeves (John Wick), Carrie Anne Moss
Run Time: 2h 28m
Rating: R
John DeSando, a Los Angeles Press Club first-place winner for National Entertainment Journalism, hosts WCBE’s It’s Movie Time and co-hosts Cinema Classics. Contact him at JohnDeSando62@gmail.com
