Movie Reviews

On the one hand, The Matrix Revolutions is a little bit disappointing in that it doesn't really bring any new ideas to the table. There's none of the cool philosphical ponderings of the first film, and none of the jarring twists and turns of Reloaded. On the other hand though, Revolutions offers up about as satisfying a conclusion to the trilogy as I could've expected.

I was happy to find that the Wachowski brothers didn't resort to some kind of lame "Matrix-within-the-Matrix" setup to resolve the big questions raised at the end of Reloaded -- though I admit to not entirely understanding all of what happened in the film; I think seeing it a second time would probably clarify a number of things (just like the first two films). And while there weren't too many original ideas here, there were at least a couple of really amazing action set-pieces: the first is the seige on Zion by the machines, a truly epic and awesome battle scene unlike anything I've ever seen before. The second is a 'final showdown' between Neo and one of my all-time favourite really cool bad-guys, Agent Smith (the circumstances leading up this final confrontation are actually some of the more interesting parts of the film's plot). We also get a good look at the machine-world on the earth's surface, which was really neat.

With all of the pretty darn cool stuff in Revolutions, I'm a little surprised by some of the negativity some people have been showing towards it. Sure, the Wachowski brothers' idea-well seems to have dried up slightly, and there's a slighlt amount of cheese injected into some of the dialogue, and a certain death-scene drags on about a minute too long. I agree that the film has its flaws. But it is a solid, well-made, and very exciting action film that winds down quite nicely what had been established in the first two films. I have to wonder what more anyone could've wanted out of Revolutions. I thought it delivered very well on all points.