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     THE MATRIX                               (rating:6 out of 10)

     The trailers looked amazing. Edits of men jumping between skyscrapers, men dodging bullets in slow-motion,faces morphing into one another. Keanu Reeves looking his boyish, clueless best. Laurence Fishburne claiming affectedly: "Unfortunately, no one can be told what the matrix is." And the puzzling question: What is the Matrix? I wandered what it was myself up to the very day I saw the film. Now I know--the answer is not as ecstatic as you may have thought: THE MATRIX is a good flick to watch and kill a couple of hours; hollow but a good flick nonetheless.

     Keanu Reeves plays Thomas, an otherwise forgettable face in the crowd who works at a mega software-developer corporation. At night though, he's Neo, a renegade hacker making a name for himself surfing the complex, secret waves of cyperspace. Neo is a man with a nagging question in mind (guess which one it is?) who is also very wanted: first, by a gang of hackers led by the ultra-secretive, cyber-Zen-master Morpheus (enter Laurence Fishburne), secondly, by a trio of square-jawed FBI-type agents, led by some dude whose name escapes me at this time. Not remembering key character names is a sign, for me, that the movie didn't do a good job storywise. Neo is introduced to the Matrix by Morpheus and is revealed a conspiracy of mind- blowing proportions as well as philosophical connotations. Along the way, there are visual sequences comparable to a shot of adrenaline to the heart, martial art fights and lots of talk about Neo being "The One."

     So if all that sounded   cool, how come i came out of this movie with a hollow feeling? The Wachowski brothers, who previously wrote and directed the excellent lesbian crime thriller BOUND, are responsible for MATRIX, and I gotta hand it to them: this film is a radical change of subject matter. It's also obviously a very expensive, effects-heavy film and produced by V-I-Producer Joel SIlver (LETHAL WEAPON series). But it suffers from a sophomore mistake: Too much ambition. The hollow feeling I perceived comes from several sources. Keanu Reeves can't act--I've always held this opinion, though many disagree (mostly hormone influenced females). He doesn't act in this film either--he reacts, playing the typical action hero role. The atmosphere, customes and soundtrack are another matter. They are seemingly flawless, yet they're overstressed, making THE MATRIX into an exercise in Style. Ohh, look at Trinity (Carrie- Anne Moss), Neo's love interest, all doned in black tight vynil and perfect crop haistyle. Uhh, look at Laurence Fishburne put on his sunglasses held up just by the bridge of his nose. Ahh, look at Keanu, walking on walls on full-length black leather jackets and hyper-cool sunglasses. Giorgo Armani be proud.

     By far the core cause of this film's hollowness is that its sci-fi premise isn't entirely thought out or fully carried out. The provocative question about the nature of reality is asked: Is reality the experiences of our bodies interacting with the material, hands touching matter, eyes seeing sights, tongues tasting tastes, or is reality the self-closed creation within the mind, the plays of imagination and thought? The movie doesn't answer nor consider the question in a satisfactory manner. STAR WARS was a great sci-fi film not because of its sci-fi issues (many will argue it's not a sci-film at all), but because of its classic storytelling. THE MATRIX doesn't come to realizing good storytelling, and since its sci-fi core is weak, the film turns out hollow and somewhat forgettable. I'm not calling for some boring sci-fi movie, all issues and no action--but just for a film that combines the sci-fi with well paced storytelling. (For example, BLADE RUNNER.) this movie could have used more humor as well. It could have benedited from a less pretentious tone. All that bullshit about Keanu being the One got on my nerves.

     Now you know what the Matrix is. I'm still waiting for that cyberpunk sci-fi classing to come along. In the meantime, if you like eye candy...

                                                              Armando V.

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