What, exactly, causes somebody to allow Keanu Reeves to act in theirmovie? Did the Wachowski brothers (who also directed "Bound") really sit
down and decide to spend a hundred million dollars making their dream
sci-fi film, then proceed to hire a guy with all the acting range of a
carp?
The movie itself is unapologetic postmodern science fiction, which means
that it rips off every sci-fi source in existence. This is because most
of its target audience doesn't even know the Enterprise had a captain
before Picard. This is lucky for them, because when Morpheus (Laurence
Fishburne) tries to convince Neo (Reeves) that he has the ability to
control his reality, it reminded my nerdy friend of the Star Trek
episode where Kirk and the boys fought at OK Corral and lived through it
because Spock mind-melded with them, convincing them that the bullets
weren't real and that Vulcans are hung like rhinos.
This whole Matrix thing seems a lot like "Dark City" in both story and
theme. In order to convince Neo that he's crucial in their battle to
reveal the Matrix to everybody, Morpheus and Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss)
take him to an Oracle. Constant references to the Oracle reek of the
constant references to The Force in "Star Wars," which means that after
about five minutes you hope the next person to mention the Oracle is
accidentally decapitated by a futuristic meat cleaver. Then there's the
role of love in the end, which was apparently stolen from that Bruce
Willis tour de force, "The Fifth Element."
There's also a ton of John Woo gun fights and Jackie Chan martial
arts-type stuff, except that Reeves looks so stiff in the fight scenes
you wonder if his next gig might be Tomb Raider IV, or maybe
Vice-President of the United States.