It again stars Keanu Reeves(Point Break, Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure) as Neo, Laurence Fishburne(Apocalypse Now) as Morpheus, Carrie Ann Moss(Memento) as Trinity

The war with the A.I. is reaching it’s climax, the last human fortress Zion is under attack by the machines, and unless our protagonists can do something, their life and civilisation will be wiped out.

The antagonist, Agent Smith played by Hugo Weaving(Lord of the rings: The Fellowship of the ring) has somehow managed to get his personality out into the real world, while in the Matrix like a malevolent virus he has taken over everyone, and is waiting for Neo to turn up for their final encounter.

We learn a little about the unfolding in the life of the real world for Morpheus, Neo and Trinity, with people constantly wanting something from Neo in the real world, keeping him away from Trinity more than he would like, to send messages to their loved ones, whose minds haven’t been “unplugged” yet, to constantly protecting his friends and companions from Agents, who like regular software have been given upgrades to combat the threat of Neo. The complicated relationship between Morpheus and his lost love Niobe played by the wife of Will Smith (who was the original choice to play Neo by the Wachowski brothers) Jada-Pinkett Smith is developed a little further.

Less time is given to the other A.I. as was done in the previous sequel, and instead focuses on the main thrust of the story, the war between civilisation and the A.I. and if Neo, Morpheus and Trinity have any say on how it will all end.

The suspense that has been building up for a few years since the original Matrix is well played upon, and the conclusion is a fitting end to the roller coaster of cinematic vision and innovation that hasn’t captured the minds of many movie goers since.

Many saw this final sequel as redeeming some of the disappointments some of the fans saw in the second sequel, and it is not an underestimation to say the Matrix trilogy is to the current I.T. and Internet savvy generation what Star Wars was, to the generation of the late 70′s and 80′s.

The directors Andy and Larry Wachowski better known as the Wachowski brothers have reportedly refused to do any interviews about The Matrix or it’s sequels, possibly to continue and preserve it’s cult status.

As with many sequels, there are never as critically acclaimed or well received by the fans as the originals, and this is no exception. That said for cult fan status it was a long wait, with a superb teaser trailer broadcast during the Super Bowl, that had many fans salivating. This sequel did reveal a little bit more about the composition of the real world our protagonists lived in and the Matrix world the frequented.

In this sequel we are introduced to a whole other A.I. living in the Matrix, Persephone played by the beautiful Monica Bellucci(The brothers Grimm) and her husband Merovingian played by Lambert Wilson(The Lazarus Project, Babylon A.D.), and The Oracle was also revealed as another system of control, unfortunately the original actress Gloria Foster who played The Oracle, died soon after completing her scenes.

Morpheus believing a prophecy told to him by the Oracle, that getting Neo to the source will end the war and set them free from the A.I., along with Trinity try to get Neo to the location of the source, battling some nifty Programs along the way, a pair of them having the ability to move through objects and other people(which is plausible as no one in the Matrix is really flesh and bone, but a kind of simulation).

The Wachowski brothers on the few times they did talk about The Matrix, said they always wanted to make a movie that combined their love of Kung-Fu and the Martial Arts with Science Fiction, and The Matrix captures this beautifully.

The interesting thing about the Matrix and it’s sequels is the hidden meanings littered throughout every scene, going back to look at various scenes again, and reading up about it, the hidden religious references combining key aspects of the world’s major religions is quite interesting, from the “Know thyself” writing when Neo first meets The Oracle to his first encounter with The Oracle’s protector Seraph played by Collin Chou(The Forbidden Kingdom, DOA: Dead or Alive) (apparently The Wachowski brothers tried to get Kung-Fu legend and three times Chinese high kick champion Jet Li to play _ but he declined indicating he didn’t want people to ignore the storyline and focus that he is in the movie)telling Neo “you never truly know anyone until you fight them“.

It stars Keanu Reeves(Point Break, Bill and Ted Excellent Adventure) as Neo/Mr Anderson(apparently Will Smith(Independence Day, I. Robot) was asked by the Wachowski brothers to play Neo, but he declined the role saying he wasn’t mature enough as an actor to carry out the role), an I.T. guy seemingly bored with his existence, he is contacted by the mysterious Morpheus played by Laurence Fishburne(Apocalypse Now), wanted by many for alledgedly terrorist activities.

It turns out that Neo isn’t really living in the real world at all, but under slavery, as he and the rest of humanity are under, being hooked up to a machine, providing life source for A.I(Artificial intelligence) that has taken over the planet over a war with humanity, leaving only a few renegades to continue the war against the A.I.

As Morpheus succinctly puts it “What if you were in a dream you couldn’t wake up from, how would you know what is real and what is not?”.

This all makes sense at this point, because as a prelude to this mind boggling discovery, there was an action sequence, where Trinity played by Carrie-Anne Moss(Memento) runs away from a couple of agents, into a phone box, and whilst she has the ear-piece of the phone to her ears, one of the agents runs down the phone box with a truck, with Trinity’s body nowhere to be found in or around the phone box after this encounter(apparently after showing that ten-minute action sequence to their executive producers, they signed up immediately).

Morpheus has been told a prophecy by the Oracle played by Gloria Foster that he will find The One that will put an end to the slavery and set humanity free from A.I., and he believes Neo is that one, however Neo needs some convincing, especially as Morpheus, Trinity and a host of others take him to see the Oracle, to see what predictions she has in store for him.

During this scene an interesting occurrence takes place, that just separates The Matrix from just another science fiction movie, Neo sees a black cat, and sees the cat again, he mutters to himself “deja vu”, immediately everybody in the entourage tenses up and he is asked what he saw, he relays what he saw, and everyone finds a hiding place, weapons at the ready, with Trinity explaining to Neo that deja vu happens when the A.I. change something in the Matrix, and sure enough the antagonist Agent Smith played magnificently by Hugo Heaving(Lord of the rings: The fellowship of the ring), is just around the corner.

It is a ground-breaking story line coupled with some superb action sequences, with great twists along the way makes for a classic science fiction movie.

It stars Ryan Phillipe(Crash) as the seemingly good natured Dutchman Martijn(his dutch accent is flawless) with a Moroccan girlfriend Saadia played by Touriya Haoud going to Morocco to setup a food aide programme, to help her people.
Along with Gavin played by Colm Meaney(Star Trek The Next Generation) as his happy-go-lucky tour guide, instead of making the necessary contacts to setup his food programme, they are unceremoniously abducted in a bus in Morocco, drugged, and when Ryan Philippe wakes up, he is confronted by Ahmat played by the magnificent Laurence Fishburne(Morpheous in the Matrix), who proceeds at first to toy with him by having him play chess before going to other means to extract his information. His African accent is spot on, and along with his associate Aicha played by Gina Torres(Firefly), with an equally impressive African accent, they proceed to go about extracting information by the uneasy methods of the film title.

The acting is brilliant, and you feel for the poor dutch fellow who has been abducted unnecessarily when he was only looking to start up a food programme to help the people of Morocco, the torture scenes are not for the faint hearted, and you will wince in a few scenes, and you can no doubt guess from the title that each appendage has in store for it some gruesome scenes.

It is a nice fun film, especially the scenes with the US military up against the bad autobots.