The MatrixThe Matrix (1999) was a true end-of-the-millennium movie, a statement of the American Zeitgeist, and a prognosis for the future of big-budget Hollywood filmmaking. Starring Keanu Reeves as Neo, a computer programmer transformed into a messianic freedom fighter, The Matrix blends science fiction with conspiracy thriller conventions and outlandish martial arts created with groundbreaking digital techniques. A box-office triumph, the film was no populist confection: its blatant allusions to highbrow contemporary philosophy added to its appeal as a mystery to be decoded. Joshua Clover undertakes the task of decoding the film. Examining The Matrix's digital effects and how they were achieved, he shows how the film represents a melding of cinema and video games (the greatest commercial threat to have faced Hollywood since the advent of television) and achieves a hybrid kind of immersive entertainment. He also unpacks the movie's references to philosophy, showing how The Matrix ultimately expresses the crisis American culture faced at the end of the 1990s. |
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Page 17
... kick over her own shoulder . From first blow to last , the fight is 20 seconds long , a mere three of which are given over ... kicks just keep getting harder to find . Thus the brilliance of the scene : while neither element is strictly ...
... kick over her own shoulder . From first blow to last , the fight is 20 seconds long , a mere three of which are given over ... kicks just keep getting harder to find . Thus the brilliance of the scene : while neither element is strictly ...
Page 18
... kicks to the visible dodging of bullets . 12 Moreover , the plot designs to render such moments as not being amazing absurdities ; we are not asked to suspend our disbelief so much as to understand the terms by which these episodes are ...
... kicks to the visible dodging of bullets . 12 Moreover , the plot designs to render such moments as not being amazing absurdities ; we are not asked to suspend our disbelief so much as to understand the terms by which these episodes are ...
Page 80
... kicks , again recapitulates the beating of Rodney King . The movie , that is , has room for other nightmares . But they do not career toward the riotous apocalypse threatened by Strange Days ' millennium . The movie refuses to leap into ...
... kicks , again recapitulates the beating of Rodney King . The movie , that is , has room for other nightmares . But they do not career toward the riotous apocalypse threatened by Strange Days ' millennium . The movie refuses to leap into ...
Contents
Edge of the Construct | 6 |
Bad Digital | 29 |
Good Spectacle | 42 |
Copyright | |
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2nd Unit Agent Smith allegory Andrew Animator appearance Artists Assistant audience Baudrillard Bill Pope Blade Runner boom bullet camera Carrie-Anne Moss cast cinematic Co-ordinator concepts consciousness Construct films corporate cubicle Cypher Dark City David desert designed Disneyland economy Edge exactly false fantasy fighting film's Fiona gamer hero Hollywood human ideology immersion irreality Johnny Mnemonic Keanu Reeves kicks kung fu labour Laurence Fishburne lives look machine Matrix mediated metafilmic Michael mirrorshades Morpheus Morpheus's movie movie's narrative Neo's Neuromancer nightmare nostalgia offers Paul perhaps Philosophy pop culture Production question realise reality rebel Reeves's scene sci-fi screen seems sequence simulation Slavoj Žižek social Special Effects spectacle story Strange Days Supervisor tech television theatre things Thirteenth Floor Thomas Anderson Trinity Truman Show underclass videogame viewer Visual Effects Wachowski Brothers Warner Bros window Žižek