So, The Matrix 4 (The Matrix Resurrections) is on its way (possibly before Christmas?!?) and it seemed like a good time to go back to the past and revisit 1-3.

The Matrix (1): Quite possibly the best movie ever made. I could watch this every day until the end of time and still enjoy it every time. (I watch it at least a few times a year, still.) Kysa and I saw it 18 times in the theater when it came out (a number of those at that old cheap theater on 51st or 52nd [NYC], where people brought like whole meals in with them). It still holds up. The story is fabulous, the filming is fabulous, the… EVERYTHING ABOUT IT IS FABULOUS. Also, Keanu is just such a stunning specimen of humanity. Trinity kicks so much ass in this flick. Cypher is such a perfect (AWFUL) idiot. Morpheus is just the right amount of mysterious and not downtrodden by the horrors of this world. I know the entire plot of this movie like the back of my hand and STILL: the fight scenes are fantastic, some of the drop dead moments (Trinity’s hand on the phone booth as she vanishes while a truck inches away; the moment she sees the homeless man turn on the platform) are still SO satisfying even though I know they’re coming. “YOUR OTHER LEFT!” How hilarious that they even use an old TV trope like that one. Neo’s glee at learning karate. When he HOLDS THE HELICOPTER UP. The gun reveal in the lobby. Tank and Dozer. Gaaahhhhh there’s so much about it I love, I could write an entire book about it.

Matrix 2 (The Matrix Reloaded): Wow, so bad. How is this even made by the same people? The scene where Neo fights like 400 agents = looked SO INCREDIBLY FAKE. It basically seems like suddenly the same people who made brilliant, unbelievably wild fight scenes in the first movie just can’t use technology anymore?!? The sex scene seemed basically gratuitous. The Neo worship and prophecy doesn’t really seem to make sense here. If he’s meant to change things, and he’s here, then… where’s the change? All the spooky illogicalness of the first movie is just sliding down a slippery slope here. I remembered bits and pieces of this movie, but it was so awful, I’m pretty sure I only saw it right when it came out and then never again.

Matrix 3 (The Matrix Revolutions): When you thought Matrix 2 couldn’t get any worse… The whole plot with the Merovingian seems ridiculous both because it makes no sense and because of the ridiculous acting. The ghost twins seem to only use their power sometimes–there’s a whole bunch of times in that highway scene, they could have materialized into another place and ended the entire situation. The explanations by the keymaker and the oracle and the architect and all the other bajillion random people explaining the Matrix to us did not make any sense whatsoever. A lot of the stuff in Zion also makes no sense. The grody bug machines seem to kill off at least 2/3rds of Zion, at least most of its army, and yet the dance sequence at the end could have (probably did!) used the same strip of film as the one at the very beginning–no visible decrease in Zion’s population whatsoever. I remembered almost nothing of this movie and I CAN SEE WHY. It sucked.

So…. fingers crossed for part 4?!?!?!?

Not your typical James Bond movie. Far darker and insidious than those movies have been in the past–despite the evil, rule the world, kill everyone mentalities of the villains, which has always been there. This time it felt more like Bond had joined them in their vendettas, as well as other members of MI-6, and it was pretty unsettling.

Definitely felt like Daniel Craig said “I’m going out and Bond is going down.” I read an interview where he said he had always tried to portray Bond as someone who realized that he deserved consequences also, that he (as Bond) realized that he himself had done some pretty unscrupulous things in the pursuit of annihilating other unscrupulous people.

It felt a bit drawn out to me. I don’t think Bond movies are really known for their editing, and I think they could have lopped off a bit of this one.

I would recommend you watch the last (prior) installment before going to this–I really didn’t remember the girlfriend from that movie very much and she’s a huge part of the plot in this one.

My favorite part was Bond’s wall-less, somewhat modular (unattached rooms?) home in Jamaica. I know the presence of bugs would drive me INSANE to live in a place like that, but man it was really visually stunning.

I did enjoy some things about this movie. There are some hilarious, very typical Wes Anderson, moments. The physical spaces, the way the sets were used, was really cool. There were lovely little performances by a bajlllion different actors.

But ultimately I felt like it was aimed at such a teeny tiny subset of the population: the overlap between 1) Wes Anderson fans and 2) fans of the New Yorker and other magazines of that ilk, (and writers such as E.B. White and others on the long list at the end of the flick) when they used to contain long meandering social interest articles. (Do they still? I feel like maybe the focus of that magazine, among others, has shifted a bit, but what do I know, I don’t read it!)

I did not feel as drawn in to its world as with other W.A. movies, such as The Royal Tenenbaums, The Fantastic Mr. Fox, or Moonrise Kingdom. In a sense, you could argue it’s not quite as twee as those. And it’s not as plot driven, all the set pieces are really their own things.

Dune was a very pretty movie–I mean if you find deserts pretty, heh. The performances were great. It was fun to see Timothy Chalamet and Oscar Isaacs playing someone entirely different after just seeing them in other movies. Other actors did compelling jobs. The costumes were cool, if slightly unexplainable. It definitely had that “this is an epic story, hold your breath and strap in” feeling.

BUT

1. I did feel like if you didn’t know a few things about the plot going in, it might have been hard to follow. The movie basically did no world building to start the viewer off–it just jumped right in. I went with someone who’s read the series and she felt this movie only got about halfway through the first book. Also she was able to explain some background stuff that I think the movie really just pretended viewers didn’t need to know. Sure, sure, keep it mysterious.
2. The sound mix was a mess–the background music was crazy loud and the dialogue was so quiet, it was incredibly difficult to hear what people were saying. I don’t know if that was specific to the theater where I saw it, or if that was just generally true of how they put it together, but the mix was off.

Also, assuming sequels are made, this is going to be one of those series that just burns through actors as they already killed off a lot of the most recognizable ones in this first installment.

Things I liked about this movie in order of liking them the most:

1. Katy.
2. The soundtrack. (Mostly the rap.)
3. Xialing.
4. The floating lanterns scene.
5. Auntie Nan, Mom, and eventually Shawn’s fighting style.
6. The “animals” we’ll call them.
7. The videotape dude on the bus.
8. The grandma at the beginning.
9. The almost complete lack of food scenes (they eat twice in the entire movie?).
10. The archery instructor.

As you can see, this movie was very badly titled since that character is not even in the top 10 reasons to see it. It’s most definitely just as much Katy and Xialing’s movie / story / journey as it is his. So while Marvel is getting maybe a little less racist (I mean, a little, there’s miles yet to go), they’re really not getting any less sexist. (This really goes for all movies, right?)

ETA: I must also point you to this New York Times review and say while it was an enjoyable way to spend two hours with a headache on a Sunday afternoon, this movie did not greatly improve my general thoughts about Marvel movies, superhero movies, cultural appropriation in Hollywood movies, or anything else. Heh.