Merchandise Reloaded
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Since there is a fourth film coming up in The Matrix franchise, a piece I had written back in May 2003 - just after the second film ‘The Matrix Reloaded’ had come out - feels relevant. I explained why the sequel was such a let down by analysing what made the original so good and special.
(Except for a minor editing of an intro para that isn’t directly about the film, everything is exactly as in the original write-up.)
- Munaf Husain
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I don’t like sequels. ‘Reloaded’ confirmed that suspicion.
No film that I can recall except ‘The Godfather II’ and to some extent ‘Indiana Jones’ has given me any reason to hope or expect a worthy sequel. Every other film that was made as a second to a successful first, that I have seen, has turned out to be merely a product rather than a concept.
Without a doubt the original Matrix was a concept, even if a movie concept.
Reloaded is a product, a franchise, a merchandise. An economic necessity rather than a work of originality, unlike its essential predecessor.
When ‘The Matrix’ came out four years back I did not watch the film right when it was released. A colleague and friend, Tom, told me that he had seen the film twice in three days. A far more discerning viewer than the average moviegoer, Tom once defined to me that a good film was one that ‘resonated’ after you saw it.
It was much later, not before at least another year, that I ended up watching it. On Video. I had right away understood what Tom must have meant. This was not just another ‘pop-corn’ blockbuster.
In addition to all its awe striking technical wizardry and its musically choreographed, high-energy cyber-action, Matrix lovers spoke about something beneath and beyond the effects and the thrills. A philosophical depth. A theme that had struck spiritual chords in them. Here was a sci-fi action flick in which people had found some sort of mythic concept that they could immediately relate to. The idea suggested was that of a mentally enslaved humanity. A state in which we are all really programmed beings following a reality that has been pre-planned by forces unseen. Who in this modern age cannot relate to that idea? Why do we toil endlessly? Why do we seem to lack free choice and will? Why do events seem to have only one course of action that we have no choice but to follow? We ask ourselves these questions each day, while we wonder if we are truly free.
The (original) Matrix addressed these questions by using mythological symbols and engrossed audiences with the suggestion that they could liberate their minds if they so wished. That it was all a matter of seeing through appearances and reality was only what one “believed” it to be.
Modern, spiritually hungry, moviegoers — living the daily pattern of jobs, mortgages, and mind-numbing media imagery perpetually beckoning them to buy some more and get further enslaved — understandably found instant resonance with the mythic concepts presented in The Matrix. Not many westerners have religious experiences in the church or the temple these days. Far more are open to receiving a spiritual infusion inside a Cineplex with THX & Dolby Surround.
The Wachowski Brothers had hit upon something quite simple but big. The sci-fi film for today’s cyber-exposed audiences that carried the age-old mythic themes that have engaged our minds and spirits for millennia.
The central character, a young man somehow different than all others around him. The man destined to be the messiah but who does not know it first. Only a revelation of a profound nature makes him aware that he is the One — to lead, to awaken, to save humanity from dark forces that prevent it from seeing the truth. This awareness is also aided by another character who usually has more knowledge and is more sage-like than our hero, but who is not the One himself. He is the one who heralds the arrival of the hero. The prophets of the Old Testaments, Jesus, Mohammed, Buddha and hundreds of similar characters in mythology as well as literature, all have that basic theme in common.
The troubled messianic figure of Neo in ‘The Matrix’ wears black designer sunglasses and a black trench coat in addition to many such elements that were certain to create a stylised cult figure from the word go. But underneath that he has the same traits as all the messianic figures of our ancient past. Whose struggles and adventures somehow satisfy our spiritual underpinnings, even if in the darkness of a movie-theatre and accompanied by popcorn and a Coke.
‘Matrix Reloaded’ seems to have none of the thematic integrity of its predecessor. It just has more of the same that audiences loved in the last one. There’s far more of superbly choreographed action set to cyber-punk music. There’s more mythic characters introduced. There’s more of the pop-philosophical dialogue strewn all throughout. But although it provides all these generously it lacks the simple profundity of the original. Hence, even though it has brought in $92 million in its opening weekend, thereby already earning 78% of what ‘The Matrix’ has earned till date, it will be the original that is more likely to be regarded as a cult classic in the category of ‘Metropolis’, ‘2001 A Space Odyssey’ and ‘Blade Runner’.
In other words, like most sequels ‘The Matrix’ was a concept whereas ‘Reloaded’ is a merchandise.
(First written in May 2003)
