The Royal Hotel (4½ Stars)

Last week I wanted to see this film, but I changed my mind at the last moment because it was too cold. Have I toughened up now? Not really. Last week the weather was -5C, and today it's +9C. Would I have gone to the cinema if it had still been as cold? I'd like to say Yes, but I'd rather be honest and say that I don't know.

What I can say with certainty is that I'm glad I went today. The film is amazing. Don't believe people who say that Australian films suck. "The Royal Hotel" is a film worth seeing in any weather.

Two young girls, Hanna and Liv, are on holiday in Australia. They're Americans, but they pretend to be Canadian because Canadians are more popular. Is that true? When they arrive they're in a mess, because Hanna's credit card doesn't work and Liv has only brought a small amount of cash. Rather than cut their holiday short, they look for a job to pay their way. They're sent to a bar in a remote mining town in the Australian outback. The bar's name, "Royal Hotel", is bizarrely ironic. The men in the town are uncouth and sexist. The girls have to fight off unwanted advances every day.

The film doesn't have much of a plot. It just meanders from one mishap to the next. Normally that would be bad, but in this case it suits the film. The girls wake up every day, not knowing what will happen next. Hanna manages to keep the men out of her bed, but Liv is different. Liv discovers that if she's drunk enough the men are pleasant. Liv thinks the men are harmless idiots, whereas Hanna thinks that some of them are dangerous. Which one is right?

Wikipedia states that the film is inspired by true events, but the page's author fails to say what events he's talking about. Not every Wikipedia page lives up to the same standard. True or not, the film is staggering. Very few people went to see it. Including myself, only eight of the 220 seats were occupied. Someone should drag people away from Netflix and into the cinema. It wasn't too cold today, so they have no excuse.

The Matrix Resurrections (4 Stars)

I feel reluctant to write anything about this film. It's not that I have writer's block (as often happens), I have lots of things I could write, I just don't want to.

The second half of the film is quite good, with spectacular special effects. The first half is like a parody of the first Matrix film.

The premise is that the machines and humanity have now made peace, but the Matrix is still necessary to power the machines. Neo and Trinity both died in the third film, but the machines have magically brought them back to life. As Thomas Anderson, Neo is a software designer and has created a virtual reality computer game based on his memories of the Matrix, so it's now possible for people in the Matrix to enter a Matrix inside a Matrix. That's actually a good idea, but it's not presented well. A director like Christopher Nolan would have done it much better.

"The Matrix Resurrections" is a film I'd like to forget. It shouldn't have been made. Even if the film's second half had a lot of Wow effects, it's an unnecessary film.

Please, please, please don't make a fifth film.

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The Matrix Revolutions (5 Stars)

Today I watched the second and third Matrix films back to back, with only a small break for a Pinkelpause.

As far as I'm concerned, this is the end of the series of Matrix films. The first film was a masterpiece in its own right and didn't necessarily need a sequel, but I admit that it left some questions unanswered. The second and third films (which can be considered a single film in two parts) answer these questions, and they're a definitive end of the series. "The Matrix Resurrections" is an afterthought, a totally unnecessary sequel.

I realised today that all the sequels have names that begin with the letters RE: "Reloaded", "Revolutions" and "Resurrections". So if they make a fifth film, what will they call it? "The Matrix Retarded"?

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The Matrix Reloaded (5 Stars)

Today I decided to watch the second and third films in the Matrix trilogy back to back. That's the best way to enjoy them. They deserve to be watched together as if they were a single film.

My heart bleeds for Morpheus. He's spent all his life following the prophecies of the Oracle, and now he finds out that she's working for the machines. The machines want to give men hope in order to keep them subjugated.

The Merovingian tells us that the French language is so beautiful that even the curses sound beautiful. He gives an example that's so shocking that it's omitted in the film's French subtitles. Was the studio ashamed to write what he said? His exact words are 

"Nom de dieu de putain de bordel de merde de saloperie de connard d'enculé de ta mère".

When searching online, I found several attempts at translating the curse into words that would be used in English, words like "goddamnit" and "motherfucker". These translations are inappropriate, because the whole point is to show that the French language has a curse which English doesn't have. This can only be expressed in the literal translation:

"Name of God of the whore of the brothel of shit of trash of the anus of the sodomiser of your mother".

Supposedly these words were ad-libbed by Lambert Wilson, the French actor who played the Merovingian, and the Wachowski Brothers liked the curse so much that they insisted on putting it in the film.

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The Matrix (5 Stars)

Many people say that "The Matrix" is the best film ever made. I don't rate it quite that highly, but it's still in fifth place in my top films list, a very high position.

What do people like about it so much? Maybe it's better to ask what I like about it so much. It has dazzling kung fu action and breath-taking shootouts. It has delicious sci-fi imagery. It's laced with philosophical statements that question our reality. Then there's the heavy metal soundtrack that numbs our senses. And it's a love story. It's a film like none that went before it or have been made since.

There are probably other things I've forgotten, but I'll leave it at that.

Watching "The Matrix" is a significant happening in people's lives. We can remember where we were when we first saw "The Matrix". I sat at home watching it on television when I was going through one of the worst periods in my life. It offered me two hours of distraction when I needed it most. That was in America. When I moved back to England I taped it, and it was one of the first films I bought on DVD.

The film's dialogue is so deep and meaningful that hundreds of sentences can be picked and quoted. It's worth reading the whole script of the film's screenplay. It's easy to find online if you search. If you copy and paste random passages to your Facebook timeline, your friends will immediately recognise the quotes. "The Matrix" has become part of our culture. Expressions like "the red pill and the blue pill" have become part and parcel of the English language.

"The Matrix" was made in 1999. It could have been left as a standalone film, but two sequels were made in 2003. A lot of fans were disappointed with the sequels. I understand their disappointment. The first film was such a pinnacle that it was impossible to live up to it. I personally enjoy the sequels a lot. They answered open questions while asking new ones. There was yet another sequel in 2021 which I've only seen once. I consider the fourth film unnecessary, but I'll be able to say more about it when I see it again.

Needless to say, "The Matrix" is a film worth watching over and over again.

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The Matrix Resurrections (4 Stars)

When this film was announced, 15 years after the third part, I groaned. What's the point? The Matrix trilogy was perfect as it was. Neo forged an alliance with the machines in order to eradicate the virus, Smith. Peace was made. The machines no longer tried to destroy Zion.

That's the question that I took with me into the cinema today. What's the point?

Let me explain it in a few words, without giving away any spoilers.

The film takes place 60 years after "The Matrix Revolutions". The peace treaty between the machines and the free humans has held. However, the Matrix is still necessary to provide the machines with the power they need. Neo died at the end of "Revolutions", but the machines somehow revived him and plugged him back into the Matrix to use him to keep the people in the Matrix contented. They also revived Trinity, though I don't understand why.

That's what the point is. The Matrix (a new version of the Matrix) is continuing without a war in the background.

The film is acceptable, though not up to the standards of the previous films. It's enjoyable, but it's unnecessary. It didn't need to be made. If it had been made at all, it should have been made shortly after the third film, when it was still fresh. Being made now, it looks like the studios are just trying to squeeze the last drops out of a cash cow. Will they succeed? I don't know. A friend of mine who works in the cinema told me that it wasn't performing as well as expected. Today, less than a week after it was released, the theatre was less than a quarter full. In comparison, "Spider-Man No Way Home" is still sold out every night in its second week.

Nobody wants to return to the Matrix.

P.S. Nobody except for me remained in the theatre to see the after-credits scene. Didn't they know about it, or didn't they care?

The Matrix Revolutions (5 Stars)

The critics didn't like this film much. It only has a 35% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. That's all the proof we need that today's film critics are rotten. It's an excellent film that neatly ties up all the loose ends from the first two films. Peace is made between humans and the machines. There's no need for a fourth film.

Most of the people in the film are characters that we know from the previous films, but there are a few new faces.

The Trainman works for the Merovingian, transporting programs into and out of the Matrix.

Rama-Kandra is a program with human traits. He loves his wife and daughter. He believes in Karma. He's very soft spoken, and he makes an effort to explain to Neo that humans and computer programs aren't all that different. He tells Neo that he saw him visit the Merovingian in the last film. If you pay close attention you can see him in the Merovingian's restaurant.

Kamala is Rama-Kandra's wife. Sati is his daughter. It's not obvious where Sati should be sent. In the conversation with Neo it sounds like she'll be sent from the Matrix to the machine world, but later on it seems to be the opposite direction, because she's put in the care of the Oracle.

This is a very good film, whatever the critics say. I hope the fourth film is just as good.

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The Matrix Reloaded (5 Stars)

I intend to watch the new Matrix film this week, either Tuesday or Wednesday, so I'm rewatching the second and third films today. I already watched the first film in September.

Most people say that the sequels aren't as good as the first film. I agree, but I still think they're very good. "The Matrix" could have existed as a standalone film, but the sequels made sense. "Reloaded" (to shorten its title) shows Neo as the reluctant Messiah. Some believe in him, others don't. Many ascribe omnipotence to him and ask him to look over their loved ones. That's a heavy burden for any man to bear.

Nobody is a more dedicated believer than Morpheus. He's spent all his like searching for The One.

The Oracle has prophesied the coming of The One. In "Reloaded" we learn that she's not what Morpheus and everyone else believed. She's not human, she's a computer program, written to give humanity hope. Hope can be something good, but in this case hope is used to keep humanity under control. Hope is intended to manipulate mankind. Hope has manipulated Morpheus. And yet Morpheus still believes. His belief is no longer in the words of the Oracle, it's in the person of Neo himself.

Let's apply that to ourselves. Many people believe in a religion. Let's take Christianity as an example, although it could just as well be any other religion. Imagine that we were able to meet and talk with the people who wrote the Bible, the Evangelists and Paul. Imagine that they told us that Christianity is a fake, and they only invented it to make us better people. How would we react? Would we just close our ears and continue with our belief system?

The Oracle's co-conspirator is the Architect. He's the one who designed the Matrix. First he made it perfect, and then he destroyed it and rewrote it with flaws to make it more realistic to its inhabitants. We find out that the current Matrix in which Neo lives is the sixth iteration. It's Matrix 6.0. The Architect is unable to make it fully acceptable to its inhabitants, so the Oracle adds the element of hope.

Agent Smith returns after seemingly being destroyed in the first film. Do you remember his definition of humanity?

"I'd like to share a revelation I've had during my time here. It came to me when I tried to classify your species. I realized that you're not actually mammals. Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with their surrounding environment, but you humans do not. You move to another area, and you multiply, and you multiply, until every natural resource is consumed. The only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet. You are a plague, and we are the cure".

It's ironic that Agent Smith himself has now become a virus. The other Agents just take over one human body at a time, but Agent Smith takes over body after body, until ultimately he'll be the only person inhabiting the Matrix.

New characters join the film, such as Collin Chou as Seraph. The role was offered to Jet Li, but he turned it down. He said he was afraid that his martial arts moves would be digitised and copied by the studios. I don't understand that. Couldn't his moves be copied in other ways?

Other new arrivals are the Merovingian and his wife Persephone. This adds a new flavour to the mythology of the Matrix franchise. The Merovingian is a rogue computer program. He exists in the Matrix, but he doesn't obey the machines who created it. He's a smuggler who secretly moves programs into and out of the Matrix. 

"Reloaded" has an incredible 15-minute car chase that's worth the price of the film in itself.  "Reloaded" is a great film, even if I didn't include it in my top 100. It's a film that deserved to be made.

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The Matrix (5 Stars)

Dancer's Top Films #5

Made in 1999, "The Matrix" is a film that's revolutionised films, and not just science fiction films. The mixture of virtual reality, kung fu action and the bullet time cinematography has wowed audiences and critics alike.

The story isn't completely original. In 1984 "Terminator" had already predicted a world run by machines. The difference is in the application of the story. The machines in "Terminator" seek to eliminate the human race, apart from a select few who're required to work for them. The machines in "The Matrix" have put all of mankind into a virtual trance, a dream state. Mankind is enslaved, but doesn't know it. Only those who are particularly perceptive have a feeling that something is wrong with the world. It's not the real world at all, it's a computer simulation called the Matrix.

The film is full of religious imagery. Keanu Reeves plays Thomas Anderson, a computer hacker who uses to code name Neo. An ancient prophecy exists that a man will come who will save mankind from the machines. Neo is told that he is the One.

It's not so much religious imagery as religious hints. Neo is contacted by a mysterious woman called Trinity. He's told that the last free city on Earth is called Zion.

But before you think that it's only Biblical imagery, the prophecies are delivered by an Oracle. That's a name given to women who gave messages from the Greek Gods.

The film has a green tint throughout. When you watch it you might not notice it at first, because your eyes adjust to the greenness. It's just like the people in the Matrix who've grown used to what they see.

Even though Keanu Reeves plays the main character, I think the character who carries the film is Laurence Fishburne as Morpheus. He's the captain of the ship Nebuchadnezzar, but he plays a significant role because of a prophecy given him by the Oracle: he's been told that he would discover the One. How he recognises Neo as the One isn't stated, but he's so convinced that Neo is the Saviour that he's willing to sacrifice his life to save him.

One other way that "The Matrix" revolutionised cinema was the viewing habits. The first DVDs were on the market in 1996, but the advanced cinematography in "The Matrix" made it the film that encouraged people to buy their first DVD player.

Simply put, this is one of the best films ever made. It's a film that enthralls people who don't usually like science fiction films. It's a masterpiece. I feel like my short review doesn't do it justice.

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Mortal Engines (2 Stars)

This is a post-apocalyptic action film. It takes place a thousand years after a catastrophe called the Sixty Minute War destroyed civilisation, splitting the Earth open and rearranging the continents. The survivors have developed rolling cities that chase and swallow other cities for fuel. The most aggressive predator city is London, which has travelled to Bavaria in search of old technology to build new weapons.

I don't like post-apocalyptic films, apart from very few exceptions. They all tend towards speculation and silliness. The idea of rolling cities is ridiculous, because the mechanical problems are insurmountable. This is a cute film with some nice special effects, but it can't be taken seriously.

One more matter: I always like to hear your thoughts on my blog posts. Most comments are left on my Facebook page, where I advertise my posts, but I would prefer to hear from you in the comments box below.

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The Matrix (5 Stars)

The remastered version of "The Matrix" has been shown in cinemas around the world to celebrate its 20th anniversary. This is something that should happen more often. What I mean is, old films should be shown in cinemas more often. If a film was a good film five years, ten years or 20 years ago, it'll still be a good film today. There used to be a cinema in Stuttgart that only showed films of the past. It usually showed a different film every day. I remember that it used to show "Faster Pussycat Kill Kill" on a regular basis, about once a month.

Admittedly, I'm talking about a cinema that closed more than 20 years ago. That was the time before DVD's, so there was more of a market to watch old films. Today there are Blu-ray discs, and true cinema fans have large television sets, but it's no comparison to what I watched tonight. Seeing "The Matrix" on a 14.2 meters x 6.6 meters screen overwhelmed me.

The cinema was almost full tonight. I assume that most of the people in attendance were fans of the film, but there were a few young women sitting near me who hadn't seen it before. I envy them. I didn't see "The Matrix" in the cinema when it was first released in 1999. I saw it a year later on television. It's a film that was made to be watched on the big screen, and seeing it this way for the first time must be an experience.

Watching it today I noticed, more than ever before, how Laurence Fishburne is overacting. He speaks slowly, deliberately, enigmatically. Normally I wouldn't consider this to be good acting, but it's perfect for this film. Anything else would have spoilt the effect.

I got into a discussion with a friend about the sequels. He doesn't think they should have been made. I disagree. I've already discussed this subject briefly in the past, but maybe I can go into it in more detail next time I watch "The Matrix Reloaded". Maybe what I've already written is enough. I don't know. I'll have to read it again to make up my mind.

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Captain America (4½ Stars)

This is the fifth film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, released in July 2011. Now Marvel has introduced four of the Avengers, Thor, Iron Man, the Hulk and Captain America. (There were two Iron Man films).

Stan Lee appears in a three-second cameo as a general watching Captain America being welcomed as a war hero. Or at least, he would have watched Captain America if he had turned up. Steve Rogers aka Captain America is more interested in fighting the war than in wasting time at stupid ceremonies.

That's not the way his career starts out. After being injected with the super-soldier serum he's sent on tour with chorus girls to whip up support for America's war effort. This is a good cause. Wherever he goes large donations are gathered, but it's not enough for him. Steve Rogers would rather be in Europe fighting Nazis. Eventually he runs away from the tour and goes behind enemy lines to rescue captured American soldiers. That's why Captain America was a war hero and I'm just an Internet blogger. I'm not a fighter. I would have preferred to spend every evening on stage with sexy chorus girls.

I find it difficult to believe that I didn't like this film much when I first reviewed it. I enjoy it more every time I watch it. I know that I criticised Captain America carrying a gun when he went into action with the Howling Commandos, but even that seems acceptable now. It was his first active service, so he hadn't yet found his style. It was in his later years that he relied entirely on his shield.

That isn't the case for Agent Peggy Carter. She was never biologically enhanced, so she has to rely on a gun when doing battle.

It doesn't matter where she is. She even has her gun ready in the middle of a New York Street.

When you're looking down the barrel of her gun it's time to surrender.

If your hands aren't raised high in the air by now it's too late.

The whole of the Marvel Cinematic Universe is leading up to Thanos acquiring the Infinity Gauntlet, so we're introduced to the Infinity Stones (which don't all look like stones) early on. The Red Skull finds the Space Stone, which he calls a tesseract, even though it's only shaped like a cube. He uses this stone to power his weapons.

The Infinity Stones were first introduced into Marvel's comics by Jim Starlin and Steve Englehart in the late 1980's. The combination of the stones was described as the ultimate weapon, making a person an omnipotent God. In recent years Marvel has become obsessed with these stones, and inferior authors have written many stories about them. Technically, the stones belong to the post-canon years, but the Starlin and Englehart stories, culminating in the Infinity Gauntlet saga, are among the best Marvel stories ever written. The story of the stones in the films is watered down, but I grudgingly accept that it's a necessity to portray them this way in the film medium.

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The Matrix Revolutions (5 Stars)

As I've said before, "The Matrix Reloaded" and "The Matrix Revolutions" are two halves of the same film. They should be watched back to back, as I've done by watching them yesterday and today.

The rogue programs play more of a role in the the third film. We find a program called the Trainman, whose duty it is to smuggle programs in and out of the Matrix. Programs hacking programs? Things are getting complicated. Sati, who has the appearance of a young girl, is a program due to be deleted because she has no apparent purpose. Her parents, also programs, love her and want her to survive, so they use the Trainman to bring her to the Oracle for protection. This shows that although the Oracle is working for the machines she's willing to be rebellious and follow her own agenda.

Smith has now become a virus, infecting all of the Matrix. He's become so powerful that he could infect and destroy all the programs in the real world. Only Neo is capable of destroying Smith, with the Oracle's help, so he makes a deal with the machines. If he destroys Smith the Matrix will be upgraded to the next version, Matrix 7.0, without Zion being destroyed. In the new version it will be made easier for people to unplug themselves, if they wish to. To round things off, Sati's purpose is revealed in the new Matrix. Remember that the next time you want to delete a program.

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The Matrix Reloaded (5 Stars)

There's one thing I'd love to ask the Wachowski Brothers if I ever met them. Did they intend to make a sequel when they made "The Matrix" in 1999? It was complete in itself and didn't need a sequel. However, the two sequels slot ideally onto the original film like three pieces of Lego. Maybe I should say "sequel" in the singular, because the two sequels are actually a single story told in two halves. It could have been released as a single four and a half hour film.

In the second film there are drastic changes. The first film is all about the prophecy that The One will come and save mankind from the machines. In the second film we find out that the prophecy is a lie, invented by the machines to control humanity. The One is used to periodically reboot the Matrix with new upgrades. The Matrix that is shown in the films is the sixth version, Matrix 6.0. Parallel to each new version of the Matrix Zion has to be destroyed and reborn. Understandably, this revelation is crushing to Morpheus, because the prophecy has been what has kept him going all his life.

Most shocking of all is that the Oracle isn't human, she's a computer program written by the machines. She's a counterpart to the Architect, the program that created the Matrix. The Architect has been trying ever since the first version to balance the equations and keep the Matrix in perfect harmony. The Oracle's job is to unbalance the equations, preparing the way for the next version. Her job of unbalancing equations is done by foretelling the future to selected humans, which makes it seem like she's on humanity's side, but she's really working for the machines.

The second film also introduces rogue programs. There are programs that fail or programs that serve no purpose. There are obsolete programs left over from former versions of the Matrix. Some of these programs dutifully allow themselves to be deleted, while others are driven by self-preservation and hide in backdoors in the Matrix. This concept is expanded in the third film.

And then there's Smith.....

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The Matrix (5 Stars)

Today I introduced my son Benjamin to Netflix. He's never used it before, so I invited him to share my account. He was overwhelmed by the selection offered. I didn't want to influence him. I told him he could pick whatever he wanted for us to watch together. And he picked "The Matrix". A brilliant choice. He hadn't seen it before, but he'd heard it was good.

Now he finally understands why I make seemingly random comments like "There is no spoon".

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