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the fourth entry in the matrix series is finally out in cinemas and on hbo max costing in a region
of 190 million dollars and directed this time by lana wachowski and not with her sister
who also had no involvement with the script so far it's not performing well at the box office
especially compared to spider-man no way home which is doing huge numbers
the early reviews for resurrections were very mixed with most leaning on the negative
the common complaint was why was this film made with some critics saying there appears to
be no creative life left in the series the times newspaper gave it one star out of five calling it
another truly horrible sequel some haven't been as harsh and warmly welcomed its return
and praised its love story that is the core of this new sequel the magic films are fully
ingrained in pop culture thanks to its themes of us being in a fake world controlled by computers
and doubting her own existence his use of visual effects with the bullet time and extensive fight
scenes inspired by hong kong cinema have kept them fondly remembered but in this post-matrix
world one could ask what else was there to say and add further to this franchise the trilogy
was neatly tied up with neo sacrificing himself to save everyone in the real world
so how has neo returned this review will contain spoilers so please come back once you've seen the
film if you don't wish to know more about its plot with this new matrix film thomas anderson is now
a successful video game developer and created the matrix video games based on dreams from his
faint memories of being neo anderson is haunted by these dreams and keeps encountering tiffany
a married mother who reminds him of trinity in an amusing cameo she's married to chad zachowski
keano's stunt double from the original trilogy and director of the john wick films
anderson has a therapist who helps him with his mental issues and his therapist prescribes him
blue pills to keep his sanity in check however anderson's constant flashbacks encourage him to
discontinue his medication a team in the real world headed by bugs is retracing 20 steps from
the first film and discovers neo's old flat and finds the game running trinity's old code
that discovered neo within the matrix before the agents found her box finds an
agent behaving strangely discovering he has a program embodying morpheus and helps free him
bugs and her crew discover neo is still alive in the real world despite his apparent death at
the end of the war 60 years earlier bugs enters the matrix to join morpheus and free anderson
learning that smith who runs the games company is really agent smith who has been keeping a
close eye on anderson bugs and morpheus convinced thomas anderson he is living inside the matrix
and he agrees to be freed in hopes he will once again be with trinity
i think like many of us we never expected to see a fourth entry in the series and once announced
fans were asking why the bachowskis had said no for so long to any follow-up despite being asked
on a yearly basis by warner brothers so here we are with neo and trinity back on the big screen
there was oddly not much hype for this film the trailers seemed delayed and not much had come
out on its production some rumors suggested lana wachowski was going to can the movie
when the production was halted due to kovid and had to be persuaded to continue which isn't a
good sign once finished the early reviews weren't looking overly enthusiastic but then again the
matrix 2 and 3 didn't get the glowing feedback the first film received back in 1999 and the
rest of the wachowski films outside of the matrix trilogy haven't fared well with the critics and at
the box office despite them producing some very interesting movies over the years so i went into
this film with my expectations low because the marketing hadn't really done a good job of getting
me excited so does resurrections live up to the first film or see more on par with the sequels
well it's nowhere near as good as the first film that is a tough act to follow but i do think it
has more of an emotional angle to it that made its story more compelling in some aspects to reloaded
and revolutions it is however the weakest out of the franchise when it comes to action
and its scope it does really feel like a small movie despite costing in a region of nearly 200
million dollars it looks like it cost a lot less the matrix and its sequels are fondly remembered
for their elaborate action sequences and extensive visual effects that were just jaw-dropping at the
time the sequels really tried to ramp up the action even further despite those films not
really meeting many people's expectations with its story there is no denying they delivered on
the spectacle resurrections fails to match their previous efforts on all levels the film deploys
flashbacks to the original trilogy and in those quick clips everything looks pretty epic then
it cuts back to part 4 which honestly looks a bit like a netflix movie in places shot with a lot of
close-ups quick edits and fights taking place in a lot of bland locations that are small in scale
nothing blew me away there were some nice visual effects sequences of the real world and seeing the
machines up to their usual tricks of harvesting people for power but again it's stuff we've seen
before we get to see keanu use his martial arts skills but not for long we get a couple of nice
long takes with him using kung fu but for the most part he uses his new force power technique to push
people away or use as a shield to avoid any more close combat not super exciting to watch and felt
like a cheap alternative to avoid keanu taking part in long fights i don't blame him to be honest
as he's not in his 30s anymore and not athletic enough to take part in all the extensive wire work
so when it comes to the return of neo i felt the idea behind his return was quite interesting
having him be a video game creator and with him losing his ability to distinguish what is real
is played out effectively as he tries to make sense of it all to his psychiatrist at first
i did think this new twist seemed to undermine the original but as this is not real and only a
narrative to keep him operating in the matrix it felt like a clever twist to keep it unpredictable
but it was a bit cheesy as it gives the other fellow coders ideas to play up the noteworthy
moments of the matrix and joke about bullet time for example they even play on the keanu reeves
memes we see scattered around the internet within eating by himself it's all very meta the tone of
the movie is a little more comical the original trilogy played things very seriously humor was
rarely used some could say they were a bit up themselves and bordering on being pretentious
number four tries to lighten things up even with its photography with little use of the green
filter the previous films pushed this makes use of a more colourful image with a comic book style
presentation there are some scenes that do look great but it still felt like a step back for me
the original trilogy was like an anime turned into live action this one doesn't have that vibe
anymore so it feels instantly disconnected with its changes in lighting and production design of
course we have a change of cast for morpheus and agent smith that make references to the changes
of skins and bots etc using typical video game terms they are both great actors but the film
was missing hugo weaving and lawrence fishburne sadly the great composer don davis doesn't return
but the new composers who worked on cloud atlas do make use of his themes and keep the music in style
with the original trilogy but nothing really stood out to me to make me want to rush out and buy the
soundtrack there was a moment in the film which i quite enjoyed was seeing neo fight agent smith 2.0
a great adrenaline pumping track that works well but not much else stood out as memorable
it's not a bad score by any means but just didn't have the punch of don davis previous work
i didn't walk out this film annoyed or confused by its story but just with the thought of this
didn't really need to be made it wasn't something people were screaming out for other than warner
brothers who saw more money to be made and the film plays on that idea and makes fun of the
studio in the script which made me chuckle in some ways it could be compared to gremlins too
joe dante didn't want to make a sequel but was persuaded by warner brothers who gave him a lot of
creative freedom and the film ends up making fun of the original film and goes a bit meta very much
like resurrections which takes it even further you could even say it feels like back to the future
part 2 in places for the first act and comparisons can be drawn to wes craven's new nightmare
if you enjoyed the matrix trilogy i'm sure you will probably give this a go but if you hated
the sequels then i would suggest avoiding this as i'm guessing it would annoy you even more
it is a strange viewing experience to give the wachowskis credit the sequels to the matrix won
by the numbers and predictable no one knew what to expect but probably had no idea where they
would go with it but again they failed to meet what people desired but what did the fans want
it's hard to know as sequels can oftentimes never match your own ideas unwants for a follow-up
it's a tough challenge there is some interesting ideas in this sequel but not enough to warrant a
two-hour plus run time it does have a saggy middle act and it felt like it was dragging in areas you
never got a sense of any suspense either the first one and even the sequels had moments with
the agents closing in and there was no escape resurrections felt like they were going through
the motions i was just hoping for this film to really do something new with the action genre
and it never gets there but i don't think that was lana's goal it's a love story at heart and
for the most part that angle works there was a great scene with keanu and kerry just
sitting there talking about their past it works a treat and is one of the best moments in the film
in a few years time or perhaps in a decade people will say this movie was
doing something really smart and interesting or it may just be labelled as a sequel that should
have never been made and best forgotten only time will tell but for now i'm unsure maybe
on repeated viewing i will warm to it more and appreciate what lana wachowski was trying to do