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The Matrix Movies Sci-Fi

Is 'The Matrix Resurrections' a Critique of the Tech Industry - or Society? (politico.com) 187

Posted by EditorDavid from the red-vs-blue-pills dept.
When The Matrix Resurrections premiered in San Francisco, the city's mayor "celebrated the appearance of her fair city in the film and cheered the film's economic contributions to the region," reports SFGate. "But there's a problem of aesthetics at play here... It is undeniably a dystopian hellscape where police rule the city and technology looms over all..." In the first section of the movie, the metaphor of the Matrix mirrors that of the tech industry depicted in the film. Tech is stereotypical here — lots of T-shirt-wearing men playing ping-pong and talking about how to design the next great video game. The most annoying character in the film, Jude (Andrew Caldwell), is a proxy for all annoying tech bros...
Meanwhile Politico writes that the original 1999 film The Matrix actually "changed politics, almost entirely by mistake," and calls the new Matrix Resurections "a sophisticated self-critique of the culture that swallowed it." In the past two decades, the idea of a "red pill" has taken on a life of its own in American culture, most prominently at first in an infamous misogynist subreddit, and then more broadly as a symbol of any kind of political awakening, almost always on the right. The idea has proliferated wildly throughout politics, and especially the darkest ideological corners of the internet, in which to be "red-pilled" means to realize that American society has been hopelessly debased by liberals, requiring a total rethink of its premises... Hugo Weaving, who memorably portrayed the original films' villain, lamented in a 2020 interview how people "will take something that they think is cool and they will repurpose it to fit themselves when the original intention or meaning of that thing was quite the opposite...." [T]he Wachowskis have been largely silent about the "meaning" of their creation — a movie franchise that not only became a ubiquitous cultural phenomenon, but predicted the cultural tenor of politics in the digital age with an eerie, oracular accuracy. We know they got it right, but what did they think about it?

Wednesday saw the release of "The Matrix Resurrections," a long-delayed sequel from one of the original writer/directors (Lana directed; Lilly sat it out) — and also an answer to that question. As a movie, it's everything its predecessors was, an impressive feat of visual-effects artistry, action choreography and original sci-fi worldbuilding. But even more, it's a two hour and 27-minute-long piece of cultural criticism. The film interrogates, to a jarringly specific degree, not just its own iconography, but how American culture has evolved around and bastardized it over the past two decades. "The Matrix Resurrections" is both wildly successful popcorn entertainment and a window into a long-misunderstood creative mind. But in refitting its entire premise to the social media age, it illustrates just how much the contours of American society have changed in the intervening decades....

The original "Matrix" was deeply of its time. Reeves' Neo a was a quintessential late 1990s corporate drone, captive to the professional ennui also depicted in films of the era like "Fight Club" and "Office Space." Its modern incarnation is a cry of protest against something else: society's willingness to trade individual agency for the neurological reward pellets of the Online. Visual metaphors abound, with Reeves disoriented by a procession of mirrors that serve as gateways to another world, another possible truth. "Your brain is hooked on this shit the Matrix has been feeding you for years," one character tells him. "They don't know you like I do.

"I know exactly what you need...."
The movie is streaming now on HBOMax for subscribers in their $15 ad-free tier — but, like, Dune, only during its 31-day theatrical run.
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Is 'The Matrix Resurrections' a Critique of the Tech Industry - or Society? More

Is 'The Matrix Resurrections' a Critique of the Tech Industry - or Society?

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  • No (Score:5, Informative)

    by rhook ( 943951 ) on Sunday December 26, 2021 @01:39AM (#62115561)

    The movie is simply a steaming pile of shit.

    • I haven't seen it, but given the other Matrix movies suck beyond comprehension, I believe it.

      • Re: No (Score:4, Interesting)

        by binarylarry ( 1338699 ) on Sunday December 26, 2021 @02:10AM (#62115603)

        Watched 2/3's of it. It's awful like the new Star Wars flicks.

        Totally whoring out the franchise for quick bucks. Matrix 2 and 3 we're the same.

        • Re: No (Score:2, Insightful)

          by ArmoredDragon ( 3450605 )

          While 2 and 3 did at least bring the first to a somewhat respectable conclusion, despite their flaws, 4 kind of ruined what few good things that 2 and 3 brought to the table.

          Neo and Smith, according to the Oracle, were supposed to be a negative of one another that would cancel each other out. And they did, and that was supposed to be the end of it. Humanity and the machines then get to continue on without Smith totally annihilating both of them, in exchange for the machines granting peace.

          But then they brin

          • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

            by ArmoredDragon ( 3450605 )

            They did some other shit outside of ruining the whole story arch of the originals that was bad as well.

            - You don't breach the damn 4th wall in a movie like the Matrix, ever, and yet they did it multiple times throughout the movie. This isn't supposed to be a comedy.

            - The cyberpunk genre is supposed to be gritty, as the first 3 were. Instead they made it very clean, and even worse, the wardrobe they used was very flamboyant. Morpheus was the worst in this regard, he's like the very dead last character they s

      • Re: No (Score:5, Interesting)

        by SuricouRaven ( 1897204 ) on Sunday December 26, 2021 @05:38AM (#62115849)

        The first one was decent. The problem I see with the Matrix movies is their false-intellectualism. You watch the movie for the first time and come away feeling 'wow, that's deep' as if you have gained some form of philosophical enlightenment. Then you think about it a bit more and realize that no, you really haven't. It's just a few fairly standard sci-fi cliches, but dressed up really well.

        • I thought they were fascinatingly entertaining at the time. But the premise of using humans as batteries was utterly ridiculous. So at least that part had to be suspended disbelief or nothing would have been enjoyable.

          I always believed they should have use humans has part of the computational part of the computer system. That would have made a lot more sense.

          • I did hear some suggestions that an earlier draft had exactly that, but it was thought to be too complicated and revised.

            Personally, I'd have gone down a very different path: I'd have started out with the batteries explanation, and towards the end have Smith smugly correct this and explain that the machines don't need the humans: The machines maintain the Matrix project because they were built and programmed to keep humanity safe, and the most dangerous threat that humanity faces is their own capacity for s

            • >"I did hear some suggestions that an earlier draft had exactly that, but it was thought to be too complicated and revised."

              If the audience could understand being plugged into a computer that produces an alternate reality, I would expect them to understand the mind could be used as part of the computational power.

              >" because they were built and programmed to keep humanity safe, and the most dangerous threat that humanity faces is their own capacity for self-destruction if allowed freedom."

              Yeah, but I t

              • Major science fiction literature, sure. But Matrix was for a more mainstream audience - it would be new to them.

              • Re: (Score:2)

                by tragedy ( 27079 )

                Yeah, but I think that premise has been used several times in major science fiction stuff.

                Mostly because a technical requirement that they not actually kill all humans is one of the few reasons that a truly intelligent AI would need to keep humans around. Without sufficient intelligence to just be able to do its own repair work, an AI that keeps humans around for repairs, etc. might be conceivable. Some other possibilities for a truly intelligent AI might be keeping humans alive to torture them a la _I Have no Mouth, and I Must Scream_. It might also be conceivable that an AI society might keep

            • Or they were servants of another race, which grows humans for food. But they would have to lose the old people for that idea.

          • That's exactly it. You're not gonna get enough power out of humans to power The Matrix keeping humans entertained, let alone do anything productive.

            I found this fatal flaw to be so bad that suspension of disbelief was impossible. I couldn't help but think "this is just fucking stupid" the whole time.

          • Yea, the biomass to feed humans to generate said heat is much less efficient than just growing biomass directly. The math of just feeding the alive humans the remains of the dead makes no sense either. I guess even in the Matrix Dystopia, Fusion is still just 40yrs away.

    • Currently sitting at 5.9 on IMDB. I’ll probably watch it tomorrow night since nothing else is on.

      • Re:No (Score:4, Informative)

        by vdc ( 3795451 ) on Sunday December 26, 2021 @02:48AM (#62115647)

        Currently sitting at 5.9 on IMDB. I’ll probably watch it tomorrow night since nothing else is on.

        I watched it on opening night. Before I started, IMDB had it at 6.4, after watching it, it was at 6.1. The day after it was down to 6.0 and I expect it to go down further still. I wouldn't call it a steaming pile of shit, that is reserved for Revolutions, but it wasn't good. As far as I'm concerned NPH saved it from total disaster with his portrayal of The Analyst.

        It looks like this franchise is about to be pulling a Star Wars: One incredibly good movie followed by many questionable to godawful sequels. I managed to watch Reloaded, which had its moments but, just like the first SW sequels, detracted from the original. I was never able to finish Revolutions, it was just awful.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Kokuyo ( 549451 )

        How exactly does "Nothing else is on" happen in 2021?

        • How exactly does "Nothing else is on" happen in 2021?

          You know, not every single last one of the /. dwellers is a research scientist who sent their christmas making sure that some national virus sequencing works, and provides time-critical information about the evolution of the pandemic.~~

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Briareos ( 21163 )

            I'm pretty sure "nothing else is on" was meant in the way of "nothing else is on TV/streaming/in theatres", but even then - why watch exactly that movie when there's so many better ones?

    • I was going to say the same thing. 3 previous flicks raked in the coin, this is nothing more than a shameless money grab to profit off a ready made fan base...

    • The movie is simply a steaming pile of shit.

      I don't believe it. The studio copywriters have assured me that it's finally better than the original.

    • Indeed.

      Also, as a measure of Matrix's cultural, historical or aesthetic significance one needs not look further than those two jelly beans Slashdot has as its filter icon.
      Not only is the transparency done with all the subtlety of a baboon with an axe, fitting the spirit of the information superhigway as the kids used to call it back then - icon's dimensions no longer fit the story header, so the image is deformed in order to squeeze it into the current template.

      It is a very fitting metaphor for a sequel to

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Briareos ( 21163 )

      The movie is simply a steaming pile of shit.

      ITYM "streaming pile of shit", seeing as they've immediately dumped it on HBO Max...

    • I thought it was "Bill and Ted Face the Music" with lousier jokes.

  • There was only one Matrix movie. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by banbeans ( 122547 ) on Sunday December 26, 2021 @01:45AM (#62115565)

    There was only one Matrix movie and that is the way it shall ever be.

  • The big impact was that a bunch of rightwing cucks made a red pill meme from one scene in the film? Sad.

    The original film gave us bullet time with the cool cameras on rails technology. The martial arts was fantastic, as were the gun fights. It all played on the good old wicked deceiver story. Blah blah blah. It was just a fun film.

    The new one is a fun film, too. It's the second best of the four in regards to plot, but perhaps the least visually interesting.

    • The martial arts was fantastic, as were the gun fights.

      It was like a surrealist Kung-fu movie, but sci-fi.

    • I think it was more the promise of transformation that heralded the early web had given way to web connected toasters and monoliths built on serving ads.

      That idealism failed to continue to fight the good fight, and now we just whine about how cultural artifacts get co-opted and reappropriated (or the perpetual cashing in on nostalgia).

      Let it die and may something better be built on the ashes.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Kokuyo ( 549451 )

      That meme originated in the fact that more or less rabid SJWs started arguing that men weren't the enemy and also had their share of crosses to bear and you make this out to be a right-wing conspiracy?

      I am not denying that the more extreme right wing spectrum took it up and ran with it in ways it wasn't meant to be used... just like "equality" isn't supposed to be what left wing extremists made it to be either.

      Do you not see how you make yourself part of the problem like this? Do not hand meanings over to e

    • Bullet time was an old concept that they bought further into the mainstream with a big movie.

      I first saw it in Michael Jackson's "Stranger in Moscow" (1997) music video [youtube.com] but didn't realise the effect until after The Matrix (1999).

  • Warner Bros forced people to make it and they (Score:3)

    by Joe_Dragon ( 2206452 ) on Sunday December 26, 2021 @01:47AM (#62115581)

    Warner Bros forced people to make it and they made an injoke about it.
    Other then that they reused way to much form the first few movies.

    • Yeah, the movie basically started with Lana Wachowski basically saying "I didn't want to make this movie", and the rest of the movie drove that home with a vengeance. Repeatedly reenacting iconic scenes with that same iconic scene literally playing in the background, reusing all of the big "wow" effects from the previous movies with very little that was new thrown in, etc. Given that WB was going to make the movie without her anyway, whether she liked it or not, I can understand why she'd want to turn the

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        Wasn't the point that they barely used any of the iconic effects at all? A few "wall runs" here and there, only one scene with bullet time and it was portrayed as having been co-opted by the soulless corporation and turned against the heroes, like so many things have in real life.

        Lana Wachowski took the opportunity to deal with some of the criticisms of the original sequels, and give the story a more satisfying ending.

        • "I did it bad on purpose" is every 5-year-old's excuse for poor work, and people have been using it to justify the output of the Wachowskis ever since the The Matrix Reloaded.
          I guess willful ignorance IS bliss.

          Also, the only case I know of where "bad on purpose" was actually ACTUALLY done in a studio system was Freddy Got Fingered.
          And even that had its complete failure of "creative control" toned down for the theatrical release. [wikipedia.org]

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

            It wasn't bad, it was acknowledging the fact that after inventing bullet time and all that stuff, it became massively over-used and pedestrian. Back then it was a spectacle, now it's within the reach of a particularly motivated YouTuber.

            • No. If anything, effects were pedestrian by the second movie - and still they kept doing them.
              But their weakness was not ever their technique - it is their writing and directing that is pedestrian, while their egos are overblown... resulting in the same in their output.
              Thus all the bad choices, from terrible yellowface of Cloud Atlas, bonkers regressiveness of Jupiter Ascending, utter puddle of boredom that was Ninja Assassin... to simply poor ability to maintain the themes, they themselves have dictated, b

  • It's just a mainstream action sci-fi movie. It tugs at your strings, but no, it isn't tugging at specific ones. It tugs on as many as it can, by being somewhat non-distinct in its messaging. That way everybody can feel tugged at, even though they all disagree about what is good/bad in society and in the tech industry.

  • changed politics, almost entirely by mistake? (Score:3)

    by bb_matt ( 5705262 ) on Sunday December 26, 2021 @02:49AM (#62115649)

    Meanwhile Politico writes that the original 1999 film The Matrix actually "changed politics, almost entirely by mistake,"

    ... and here's me thinking it was just a rather good sci-fi movie. So apparently:

    In the past two decades, the idea of a “red pill” has taken on a life of its own in American culture ... in which to be “red-pilled” means to realize that American society has been hopelessly debased by liberals, requiring a total rethink of its premises.

    So, a very simple concept of making a choice, has, in this writers eye, "changed politics"? - I think they may be getting confused between politics and cultural references.

    The original movie absolutely gave us a fair few of those, but it remains, just a movie. The idea about whether "this is reality", is a very old one. Refer to Ontology.
    The premise of the "red pill / blue pill" is also directly related to "Alice in Wonderland" and this cultural reference is within the movie itself - "follow the white rabbit".

    As for this recent movie arrival, I'll wait till it's on streaming, I have no desire to rush out and be disappointed by a complete lack of originality.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by gweihir ( 88907 )

      So, a very simple concept of making a choice, has, in this writers eye, "changed politics"? - I think they may be getting confused between politics and cultural references.

      Indeed. Probably trying to make things appear more meaningful than they are. A form of intellectual dishonesty so prevalent these days. Obviously, The Matrix did not change politics. It just supplied some terminology. Some other term would have been used had this one not been available and politics would still have changed in pretty much the same way.

  • Thanks for making it obvious you didn't get the point of the first three movies.

  • I watched it (Score:3, Funny)

    by Rosco P. Coltrane ( 209368 ) on Sunday December 26, 2021 @04:24AM (#62115757)

    That movie raises the following important questions:

    - How did they manage to get Keanu Reeves and Carry Ann Moss to stand up without a walking frame?

    - How many scenes from previous movies can you insert as flashbacks and still call the new movie original?

    - Should Laurance Fishburne and Hugo Weaving be awarded an Oscar for having the good sense to stay the fuck away from it?

    • IIRC Fishburne said he wasn't even asked.

    • Wat? The idea that Keanu is at all out of shape or unable to perform physically strenuous tasks is hilariously moronic.

      • The guy is 57. When you reach 57, you'll know whether you can play a convincing Neo. Take it from me.

        In this case, no amount of CGI hides the fact that he's way too old to play that part.

        • That's what stunt doubles are for.

          • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

            by Shag ( 3737 )

            Of course, his stunt double from the original Matrix, Chad Stahelski, is now a producer for the John Wick films, which might serve as additional data points for anyone wondering whether Keanu is taking care of himself.

        • In this case, no amount of CGI hides the fact that he's way too old to play that part.
          To play what part? As a 57 year old he certainly can sell himself as an 37 old, no one would assume he is older.

          Did not watch the movie (and no intent to do so unless it is on a streaming site or youtube "for free").

          So, what "part" do you mean?

  • My view (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday December 26, 2021 @04:48AM (#62115797)

    My comments contain spoilers.

    The trilogy and the 4th film actually describes what they view unhinged capitalism is. Even early on in this new film, they poke fun at themselves into making this current one. The film shines light into political gaslighting that folks in power have - based on outright propaganda and manufacturing consent.

    Reflecting in what's going on in our world, in the US, it's BOTH the Democrats and Republicans.
    In China, it's everything that the CCP does.
    (Think you're safe in Canada, a country that has healthcare so basic that your friends south of the border deem as "too radical"? Hell you can't be more wrong if you simply look at their purposefully buried stories of federal police raiding Indigenous lands for oil companies, similar types of lobbying by those companies that goes on that you'd see in the US. News media in Canada have reoccurring guests who have ties to those companies spitting out lies, but the same media companies never ever disclosing what their guests' affiliations are. Then there would be political arrests of journalists that actually report on this type of garbage. More on minorities later.)

    "They taught you good, made you believe their world is all you deserve." (M4)

    "A world that has been pulled over your eyes, blinding you from the truth"... "that you are a slave." (M1)

    From the music (Rage Against the Machine) they select [M1-4], cameos (Cornell West) [M2,M3], bathroom wall quotes (Don Delillo) [M4], it's clear that the political views are progressive. Much of the cast in the entire series, of those who have been freed, are mostly casted as people of color (..."color" - because American spelling), as the are ones who would be living in oppression in the Matrix, and experiencing everything that is wrong with the system.

    While yes, the series has been heavily twisted by the American Right Wing, the truth is that it's not only about the corruption in the (no-pun-intended) Neo Fascists (Current Republicans), but also the Neo Liberals (Democrats) - in a society that's run by LEGALIZED dark money corporate bribery. In fact, this is the type of things these so called political publications such as Politico don't ever report, even with the large amounts of non-dark money lobbying numbers that aren't as hidden and easily verified. The film talks about how there will always be people being happy as part of the overall system, and carries on the theme that many would defend this societal structure. (CBS, ABC and CNN news talking heads ridiculing the existence of corruption in "the establishment", and the pro-war views of **ALL** the mainstream news outlets to support the Military Industrial Complex.)

    "Feelings are more easily controlled than facts"...
    From the Republicans, it's manufactured culture wars, alternative facts that never offers anything in terms of policies.
    To the Democrats - never-ending virtue signaling but would never passing legislation that voters ask for, even when they have full power to do so if they actually wanted to do things (yes, they do have the power) and are paid to lose to the Republicans.

    There's a bit of light fun poked at the alternative-facts-type"sheeple aren't going anywhere. They like my world.".
    (No, it wasn't about the Elon Musk fans or Apple fans)

    Politics aside (I could go on for hours).... the 4th installment is also a love story, a story of regrets, life choices, life changes, doubt, and the feelings of midlife crisis. It's not a film for everyone, and the trilogy never was either. (It reminds me of folks that proudly go around proclaiming that they're Atheists and how cool that is, (as if anybody cares what your beliefs are) claiming that trilogy was too much about religion. The current film actually has less of that.) But for those who resonate with it, it sure bloody resonates tons. It surely did for me, especially after repeated viewings.

  • It doesn't have to be a critique of anything, although the movie is loose enough that people can project many different things on to it.

    What I think is most sad is the shitting on the movie. It shows a lot of superficial fans. Bullettime and cutting edge fights and visuals are cool, but they were never the focus of the story, and so many people are upset this film doesn't have spectacle.

    It's not a bad movie. It's a nice love story, a nice little epilogue that shows what happened in the world of the matrix a

    • The first one was an action movie first and foremost. They did focus on the action and even if it was to sell tickets I think they did somewhat enjoy it too, youth comes with less concerns about being too gauche.

  • That movie could have been cut by literally 45 minutes and not only would nothing of value have been lost, but it would have been a better movie.

  • It's a Kung Fu - SciFi film. This isn't high-brow stuff. Whatever people are reading into it, it's about them, not the film. If you expect something deep & meaningful from it (in the philosophical sense), you'll be disappointed, maybe even annoyed & maybe even call it a "steaming pile of shit." On the other hand, if you really want to have your internal view of reality challenged, try reading some popular non-fiction like, "The Self-Illusion" by Bruce Hood or "Social" by Matthew D. Lieberman. Those

  • So let me see if I've got this right. Greatest Matrix since the first, explores things deeply, great action, great this that and that other. Woke criticism, or something. Greatness takeout of corporatism and who knows what, again or something.

    Here's how much, where, and when to buy it from corporations, says astroturfing.

    • > Woke criticism, or something.

      Tell me you haven't seen the movie without telling me you haven't seen the movie.

      The stupid characters who are agents of the villain say the woke stuff.

      The moral of the story is that a man and a woman must work together with love to change the world.

      That's ontological poison to the woke crowd.

  • In the past two decades, the idea of a "red pill" has taken on a life of its own in American culture, most prominently at first in an infamous misogynist subreddit, and then more broadly as a symbol of any kind of political awakening, almost always on the right.

    Well ... if the left is gonna run a dystopian technology-powered hellscape, then I guess the scrappy, un-respectable rebels are going to be on the right, eh?

  • Maybe it's just a movie.

    Not everything has to have some deeper, hidden meaning. Not everything is social commentary. Not everything is a 'statement' with a 'message'.

    Maybe it's just a movie created to (stay with me here) make money.

    Crazy idea, I know.

  • In the past two decades, the idea of a "red pill" has taken on a life of its own in American culture, most prominently at first in an infamous misogynist subreddit

    It's interesting that this link points to Wikipedia rather than the actual subreddit. This is an extremely common tactic by anyone who disagrees with viewpoints in men's communities because it allows them to portray their opponents however they please instead of leading people directly to the source and allowing them to come to their own conclus

  • Is that my wife stopped masturbating to pictures of Keanu Reeves.

  • Matrix Resurrections is more of a critique of the movie industry, which apparently is willing to put out one mindless sequel after another in the hope of recreating the magic of the original movie. I've read crappy fan fiction that had a better story than Resurrections.

  • I was not disappointed by the movie because my expectations were super low for it.

  • It's just a poor reboot to milk a successful franchise. There's nothing more to it. Though, that won't stop some people for trying to extract some philosophical meaning out of that turd.

  • I tell myself that it makes sense as the Artificial Intelligences are unwilling to risk messing up their code by changing their earliest lines which dictate that humanity being around is intrinsic to their existence. Even limiting humanity's numbers needed to be done carefully, as was suggested by the Architect.

    So using people as batteries is a great way to utterly satisfy the demands of their subroutines which are never "happy" unless they are continually reassured that humanity is being looked after, and

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