cry me a future where the revelations run amok

too tired to go out today, so i decided to stay home and ended up watching matrix revolutions again (for the 3rd time). as an action movie, it is nowhere near as good as reloaded (which i watched last weekend for like the 4th time), but i think it's a very strong film emotion-wise which i think is something that's very very easy to miss the first few times you watch it since it's mixed in with all the special effects and the philosophical undertones.

as a whole, the trilogy itself is really about choices, and how that is an essential human attribute. the main conflict on a philosophical front is thus the clash of free will and control. the machines believe that they can control the humans if they put in place a good enough system (the matrix/the sentinels) but the humans have a decidedly dogged determination to not be controlled. yet, the film plays with the idea that fighting against control might well be a response that can be calculated and manipulated to implement even greater control (thus zion/the one), so are we ever truly free? and neo seems to answer that as long as we have choice, there is always an element of unpredictability and that's what make us human. which i think is all well an good and a rather ambitious idea to grapple with in an action/CGI-fest.

but the most interesting thing that struck me today, watching revolutions rather independently of the trilogy as a whole, is the whole idea of love and how that has come to characterise human relations. ramachandra (the indian guy in the train station) says that love is merely a concept which humans use, which on many levels is true. but the oracle says that she is unable to see past the choices she can't understand, and to a point, neither can neo. the choice in question is love. the architect says in reloaded that part of the function of the one is to feel love for humanity as a whole, something which the machines seem to be able to comprehend, and indeed does not deviate too far from ramachandra's definition of love as a social construct. but neo falls in love with trinity, which is some different altogether and is portrayed as entirely irrational. however, the irrationality of a blind choice allows him to ultimately "defeat" smith, who is unable to see beyond his choice.

but philosophy aside, the raw emotion between neo and trinity is actually very powerful in the last film (albeit expressed with horrible scripting - go listen to the "six hours ago" speech by trinity). when trinity finally dies from having a ridiculously large number of metal spikes driven through her body, the entire scene is actually pretty well done. it's interesting how the beauty of the situation is commented on by both of them, in totally different ways. trinity sees how beautiful the sky is (which represents to some extent neo's gift to her) and neo sees the beauty of the machine world (which is a power ultimately given to him by trinity when she made him the one). it would have been interesting to see how an ending which kept trinity alive would have worked out, but i think it would be much worse since neo's death is important for other plot/philosophical reasons and to leave one of them alive would be worse than having both of them die (except maybe if it also included trinity being pregnant with neo's child - oh the sequel potential!).

but the part i liked most was when trinity says how she has come this far with neo, but she couldn't go further. the idea of love as a journey is something i personally subsribe to and that part of the scene was exceptionally powerful as a result. but there is something universal about the idea which i think drives the plot in a certain way. the fact is that trinity's character is perhaps in many ways more important to the final resolution than that of neo, and the relationship between the two is one of the key constants in a story that is often convulated. in some ways, the entire trilogy can be seen as a really overdone love story, which also happens to hold the fate of humankind in the balance.

i can't seem to come up with some kind of conclusion for what i've written so far, but i suppose i've said what i felt. i still think it's a great movie, and the main reason why it wasn't properly received was that most people couldn't relate to the ending. it's a shame how the quality of the action really sags at the end, though i suppose it was inevitable. i think it's one of those movies that actually could have benefitted from being longer, which would have allowed for greater exposition and thus a more complete ending. but as it is, i think the ending itself is a lot more hopeful and optimistic than most people see it.