Matrix: Reloaded, Revolutions and Animatrix (WARNING: Revolutions Spoilers)

Note: the following post gushes about some of the music. If you do not care about the music or this movie in general, pay no mind.

Holy. God. I've gotten hold of the entire Matrix Reloaded score/soundtrack online (from a private server) and while I've only heard two tracks (Mona Lisa and Main Title), if you have any love for movie scores or Matrix music in general, or if you're dying to hear the new music, you are going to be kicked in the ass. The rest of the music could suck as far as I know, but so far it's doing the opposite. Just thought I'd chime in with impressions from the score I've heard so far.

Mona Lisa is heavy on techno, but like in the first movie, there's a blend of orchestra as well. It starts off with a build up of sorts, very low and creepy "thuds." You hear one of the motifs from the first movie (when Trinity jumps across the rooftops in the intro) and it leads back into the creepy, foreboding buildup. Then, it goes absolutely haywire later. Very intense. The blend of techno and orchestra is blissful. I have no idea how this music will fit in the movie, but whatever scene gets it is lucky. There is a nice injection of bass, and the chorus, when it IS there, is pretty strong. Nice action piece. Put a smile on my face. Oh not to mention, it goes on for 10 minutes. Which is good.

Main Title is, as you'd expect, VERY similar to the way the first film started. Same motifs and such. Not much to say here, but it's good for what it is. If you've heard the music during the intro in the first movie, you've basically heard this. This is a nice compliment to that. A rather short track at 1 minute and 30 seconds.

Burly Brawl is very techno as expected, and also combines orchestra. This one is definitely is more "get down to the point." And okay, there's some nice choir at around 1:20 (I'm typing this as I listen). It was mellow between around 1:30 to 1:54, and now we're back into the heavy techno/drum thuds. A pure percussion run at 2:42 to 2:50, though a few more instruments came in before that. Okay, more choir and original Matrix motifs abound at 3:06 to 3:23. Fast again, not concentrating on any motifs, just being brash. Okay, at 4:01 it just went berkserk. Very nice. It's really hard to describe this music, but it's really hardcore, and has serious drums. In the last minute, there are more original film motifs, insane trumpet runs, and then it dies down into almost nothing.

The Matrix Reloaded Suite is like 25MBs and I'm on dial-up, so more impressions tomorrow. I'm loving this music.

 

I had a party at my house last Friday, alot of people watched the final trailer and every single one left saying this movie will be great and I agree. I will be buying the score and as for the soundtrack I've only listened to Dave Matthews remix of "When the World Ends" But from what I've seen of the track listing it looks to be good. I only wish in the score from the first movie they would've made the Agent music a longer track(music played when Neo fought Smith at the end etc..)

 

I'm also a bit skeptical about Reloaded. I love the first film and think it's one of the most intelligent blockbusters ever made but all I know about the sequel so far deals with action. Every bloddy article about the film foes into great detail about the highway chase and the fight against the 100 Smiths. All the actors talk about is the martial arts training. The only plot I know so far is that

SPOILER

Morpheus and Trinity find the Keymaker and try to escape with him

END SPOILER

but that's surely not enough plot for a 140 minute film? All the trailers show is action. And while it's true that most trailers focus on the action they nevertheless always give you an idea of the story. The Reloaded trailers tell me nothing about the story of the film.

My concerns:

- Neo Superman. In Reloaded we will see a totally different Neo. While the first film had at its heart a seemingly ordinary guy who slowly discovers his powers until he achieves this at the film's end the sequel has Neo as an all-out unstoppable Superman. From the point of view of drama this is less satisfying as nothing is more boring than a hero who cannot really be harmed. That's why I dislike the Superman comics - a hero who's invulnerable to practically everything and can also fly is the antithesis of good drama. I hope the Wachowskis come up with something to make Neo more vulnerable and interesting.

- action multiplied. From the looks of it Reloaded falls into the "sequel trap". Meaning: in a sequel you have to show the same things as the original but make them bigger. If the original had a chase against 2 cars the sequel has to have a chase against 200 cars. That's how most Hollywood sequels work. The Matrix had a brilliant fight between Neo and Agent Smith. Now the sequel has Neo fighting 100 Agent Smiths. That doesn't sound right. To a certain extent Lucas makes the same mistakes with his Star Wars films. Every film that gets released has to feature more climactic battles than the previous film (counting TPM and ATC as films 4 and 5). Fighting 100 people might be visually impressive but whether it contains the same emotional impact and dramatic simplicity of a mano-a-mano is doubtful.

- I really hope the Wachowskis will not produce any shock twists along the lines of "The Matrix is the real world" or "The real world is actually also a Matrix, the REAL real world is totally different" or "Morpheus,Trinity, The Oracle or whoever turns out to be a traitor". Nothing would be worse than that because it would retrospectively damage the first film.

If anybody can pull it off it's the Wachowskis and I hope my reservations turn out to be wrong. I'm just not convinced yet that Reloaded is a great film. The impression in my head right now of the film is "Action flick with no plot", the total opposite of the first film (which has surprisingly little action, I think somebody counted 12 minutes for all the film's action scenes)

 

FIRST REVIEW!!!

best.review.ever

warning spoilers.

 

I don't trust reviewers who can't speak English coherently. Sorry, but that's not best.review.ever. It's more like demented.fanboy.ravings.masquerading.as.review.

EDIT: I also don't trust a reviewer who starts: "I still don?t get the plot of the first one. . ." It's not a terribly complicated plot. . .

 

well it's probably a fake review, but it did make me laugh.

 

Guess who is downloading the Animatrix DVD right now? Yup, that's right. Me.

 

to be honest, the AICN review leaves me with the impression that the reviewer is much smarter than he presents himself. If you want to be noticed on the internet you have to be different. My impression is that he purposely writes like an idiot to gain attention.

However the review is totally pointless as it tells us absolutely nothing

 

it does get you hyped up though, doesn't it!

And yes, without a doubt, Reloaded will wipe the floow with X2.

 

Uhm, why do people have to write out well thought out reviews of movies when they just want to share their opinion? Lord, if that were the case, I'd NEVER share my opinions on a film. I'm sure that guy didn't even try to write it as an extremely literate review (obviously).

 

Seen the movie, here's all the good stuff:



SPOILERS: highlight to read.



It opens with Trinity attacking a yet unknown location. All of a sudden, she jumps off the building (this is shown is the trailer) and is being pursued by an Agent. She gets shot. Neo wakes up and realizes it was a dream. He gets out of bed (Trinity is with him) and goes into the other room. They try to talk but he says nothing. Cut to next scene of Morpheous and other captains talking inside the Matrix. Interestingly, we learn that Morpheous is not really a big shot leader but rather just another peon in the world of Zion/Matrix who does not have the support of his fellow captains. There is a knock at the door. It is Agent Smith with something for Neo. It is his ear piece since he is no longer a part of the matrix but rather a lose program.

Agent Smith pulls up in a black Audi A8 (didn't see the rims so it might have been an S8--I'm an Audi nut =). Anyway, Agent Smith comes to the door and knocks on it hard. It is one of those metal doors with a sliding eye piece. The eye piece opens and then one of the two people (don't know exactly who they are, but they are freed people) and they get the envelope from Agent Smith. They call Neo up and give him the envelope which has the earpiece in it. The next knock from the door ha everyone assuming its Agent Smith, but its not. Its the other Agent (can't remember the name, either Thompson or Johnson) who are on the other side. Neo tells the others to scram and the fight starts. Apparently the Agents (2 or more, can't remember now) block Neo's bunch and Neo says "upgraded units". Fight continues. No idea where Agent Smith went. Fight scene ensues with real Agents who have found the location.

There is an arugment and the ship pulls into Zion. Machines are boring down we learn. Learn the commanders woman used to be morpheous woman who is a captain.

Morpheous speaks to people. Big party/orgy scene. Trinity and Neo have sex. Afterwards, the counselor talks to Neo.

Cut to scene of the glowing asian guy protecting the Oracle. They have a fight scene on the table. The asian guy is another one of these lose programs in the matrix.

Oracle talks to Neo about choices (more specifically about his choice to possibly let Trinity die--you should recall the first scene in the movie) and tells him about the Keymaker and "the source".

She leaves. Agents come. Agent Smith multiplies and a huge playground fight starts (shown in trailer). Agent smith is replicating himself somehow but putting his hand inside any person in the matrix and taking them over. He tries with Neo, but can't do it. Neo then leaves but flying (superman style) after the fight.

They go to find the keymaker at the French-wannabe information seller (The Merovingian) who is also a Matrix programmer. See Monica Belluchi as his wife (Persephone). For those who are kinky, The Merovingian programs this piece of cake to cause on of the people in his party to have an orgasmic experience. What is funny is the way they switch to the matrix style screen and up between her legs and show an explosin in that special area. =)

So the Merovingian turned down the request of Morpheous, Neo and Trinity to turn over the keymaker. Persephone was being belittled by her husband (Merovingian) and she seemed agitated. Morpheous, Neo and Trinity get into the elevator to leave. When they get to the ground floor, Persephone is waiting for them. She goes to the bathroom and then the entire kissing passionately scene comes up that I talked about before (Persephone wants Neo to kiss her like he kisses Trinity before she turns over the Keymaker). So She does and they end up in the house with the two staircases where the later fight scene happens and Persephone goes to a back room. The back room has two guys in it (don't know there names). She shoots one with her gun and tells the other to run to her husband to tell him what she has done. They then go and retrieve the keymaker from behind a small door. They find those

 

Wow, how about a non-spoiler analysis? How's the acting/writing/music/story? More importantly, how's that freeway sequence?

 

Well I bought the album today and it was two discs and the second disc had 41 minutes of nothing but movie score on it. I think its cool how they included the regular soundtrack and the score together on two seperate discs with one being enhanced cd. Though I am fighting the urge to read the spoiler above I admit.

 

Mona Lisa Overdrive is such a cool track. I've had it on a continuous loop for days now.

 

GabeC:

How did you see the movie?

 

There have been screenings all over the place.

 

Yeah, but generally you have to be invited to those and stuff, otherwise why would the film even have a release date? Why not let EVERYone see it now, instead of waiting until May 15th?

 

Well... i'm just guessing, cut me some slack.

 

`There have been screenings all over the place.'

That one way to put it.

 

I would just like to say that Don Davis is my new idol. I love the Matrix Reloaded music! Mona Lisa and the Suite are absolutely brilliant, I can see samples from Mona Lisa being used in clubs already...

 

That one way to put it.

Haha, indeed, now that I think about it.

 

Yeah, Mona Lisa Overdrive is like the coolest blend of orchestra and techno... and it packs some serious bass. I like the Burly Brawl too.

 

Aparently there is a bootleg of the Matrix Reloaded online somewhere. I am downloading everything I can off Kazaa now! Link

 

I'm trying to use WINMX to get at least the first 1/2 hour.

Tell me, on dial up, how long will it take me to get 1.36 billion bytes?

 

How did you see the movie?

I asked (begged) my uncle (who works at Dreamworks) to pull some strings, and get me in to one of the screenings here in NY.
He pulled trough, and got me in to one of the 11 screenings.

How's the acting/writing/music/story?

The acting's great, Fishburn's awesome, for the most part he has the best scenes in the movie (acting wise i mean), but Reeves steals the show at the end.
I wasn't a big fan of Reeves in the first movie, but he made up in this one, there are 3 scenes in particular that he just nailes, and are just a treat to watch.
Moss's good to, the chemistry between her and Reeves is great, either it's just real good acting, or they have a little thing for each other for real. I think the latter.


The writing and the story's crazy, just genious, i blew the first one out of the water for me.
It's a good thing they're showing us Revolutions later this year, becouse when Reloaded ends, all you'll think about is seeing Revolutions. It'd be impossible to wait 3 years for the third one. I didn't think so before, but now i realize it's a genious move to show both movies in the same year.

To be honest, i didn't really pay allot of attention to the music (there was to much going on on screen) but from what i did hear, it sounds great. I remember that the music you get to hear when we get to see Zion for the first time was pretty awesome.


More importantly, how's that freeway sequence?

It's the greatest chase sequence ever!
I seriously doubt anyone will ever make a better one. It's simply amazing, i swear to God, it's insane. Everything's already crazy when it's just Morpheus's taking care of buisiness, but when backup arrives, the **** really hits the fan.
Through the entire movie there were only one or two times where i tough "That looked a little fake." and one of them was during the freeway sequence. But that still doesn't take away that it's the most amazing/groundbraking piece of effects i've ever seen.

I remember people saying that it would equal the Coruscant speeder chase from Attack of the Clones, but in my opinion, it blows it out of the water.


Any more questions?

(btw, excuse my spelling, i'm in a hurry.)