The Matrix

The Matrix 1991

“The Matrix” is a visually dazzling cyberadventure, full of kinetic excitement, but it retreats to formula just when it’s getting interesting. It’s kind of a letdown when a movie begins by redefining the nature of reality, and ends with a shoot-out. We want a leap of the imagination, not one of those obligatory climaxes with automatic weapons fire.

The plot involves Neo (Keanu Reeves), a mild-mannered software author by day, a feared hacker by night. He’s recruited by a cell of cyber-rebels, led by the profound Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne) and the leather-clad warrior Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss). They’ve made a fundamental discovery about the world: It doesn’t exist. It’s actually a form of Virtual Reality, designed to lull us into lives of blind obedience to the “system.” We obediently go to our crummy jobs every day, little realizing, as Morpheus tells Neo, that “Matrix is the wool that has been pulled over your eyes–that you are a slave.” The rebels want to crack the framework that holds the Matrix in place, and free mankind. Morpheus believes Neo is the Messianic “One” who can lead this rebellion, which requires mind power as much as physical strength. Arrayed against them are the Agents, who look like Blues Brothers. The movie’s battles take place in Virtual Reality; the heroes’ minds are plugged into the combat. (You can still get killed, though: “The body cannot live without the mind”). “Jacking in” like this was a concept in “Strange Days” and has also been suggested in novels by William Gibson (“Idoru”) and others. The notion that the world is an artificial construction, designed by outsiders to deceive and use humans, is straight out of “Dark City.” Both of those movies, however, explored their implications as the best science fiction often does. “Dark City” was fascinated by the Strangers who had a poignant dilemma: They were dying aliens who hoped to learn from human methods of adaptation and survival.

The Big Sleep

Book by Raymond Chandler

First released in 1946 and now being revived for selected screenings around the country and an extended run at the National Film TheatreThe Big Sleep is a film of infinite interest. In its famously knowing trailer, Humphrey Bogart walks into the Hollywood Public Library and asks for “a good mystery like The Maltese Falcon“. A librarian gives him a copy of what is misleadingly described as “Raymond Chandler’s latest”, adding: “What a picture that’ll make!” Well, it did, and the result can be approached from a number of distinct and complementary directions.

First, it’s a Warner Brothers production, made at the height of Hollywood’s big studio era and announced by Warner’s logo, which looks like a federal badge of social responsibility. Jack L Warner, who’d headed the studio since the early 1920s, determined what films were made, how and by whom, their cost and which contract performers appeared in them; their smart, stocky, wisecracking heroes looked a lot like Warner himself.

The Roadwarrior

Mad Max 2, the ultimate film in the series. An awesome action film that never ceases to blow people away with it’s interesting/quirky/crazy characters and action packed chase sequences. It sets the standard for every other Mad Max film and stands as one of the greatest action films of all time.

The year is 2021. The world is in the grip of a fearful pandemic. Governments struggle to maintain law and order. George Miller’s The Road Warrior starts in the dying throes of the battle for gas. Max (Mel Gibson) has a cool car (‘the last of the V8 Interceptors’), a loving friend in his dog and a tough, survivalist attitude. Max comes across a peaceful community under siege from various violent malcontents who have penned them into a compound where one of the world’s last few oil-wells is still providing a source of the black stuff. Max manages to get inside, and agrees to help them capture a driving rig to help them export their precious cargo to safety. Once his mission is complete, all Max wants is his car back and a full tank of fuel; “I’m just here for the gasoline’ says Max, but his humanism is stirred by watching a child’s face delighted by the chimes of a music box.

A ‘white-line nightmare’, The Road Warrior is one of cinema’s best action films; a series of brilliant calculations means that despite the futuristic setting, absolutely everything we see on screen looks practical and real because it is; building your own cars, weapons and compounds never looked so probable or impressive. Max is an everyman, simply trying to get by without the aspirations for power and control that others have, and like ordinary people everywhere, he gets shafted over and over again as a result. “The vermin have inherited the earth’ as a bit of graffiti says, and the best result we can hope for against such persistent opposition is to survive another day. The Road Warrior isn’t perfect, use of filters and speeded up film is regrettable, and even on blu-ray some of the night-time scenes look very grainy. But it is a classic turbo-charge tale of men and machines, and in times of crisis, sends out a positive message that someone, some-way, we’ll get through this together, even if ordinary people being the fall guy is the only option in the daily grind.

The Empire Strikes Back

The adventure continues in this “Star Wars” sequel. Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill), Han Solo (Harrison Ford), Princess Leia (Carrie Fisher) and Chewbacca (Peter Mayhew) face attack by the Imperial forces and its AT-AT walkers on the ice planet Hoth. While Han and Leia escape in the Millennium Falcon, Luke travels to Dagobah in search of Yoda. Only with the Jedi master’s help will Luke survive when the dark side of the Force beckons him into the ultimate duel with Darth Vader (David Prowse).

Titanic

Titanic is a 1997 American epic romance and disaster film directed, written, co-produced, and co-edited by James Cameron. Incorporating both historical and fictionalized aspects, it is based on accounts of the sinking of the RMS Titanic, and stars Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet as members of different social classes who fall in love aboard the ship during its ill-fated maiden voyage.

Upon its release on December 19, 1997, Titanic achieved significant critical and commercial success. Nominated for 14 Academy Awards, and won 11, including the awards for Best Picture and Best Director, tying Ben-Hur (1959) for the most Oscars won by a single film. With an initial worldwide gross of over $1.84 billion, Titanic was the first film to reach the billion-dollar mark. It remained the highest-grossing film of all time until Cameron’s Avatar surpassed it in 2010. A 3D version of Titanic, released on April 4, 2012, to commemorate the centennial of the sinking, earned it an additional $343.6 million worldwide, pushing the film’s worldwide total to $2.18 billion and making it the second film to gross more than $2 billion worldwide (after Avatar). In 2017, the film was re-released for its 20th anniversary and was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry.

The Bourne Identity

The Bourne Identity, a 2002 action thriller and its two sequels are probably the best spy movies ever made. Based on a Robert Ludlum novel of the same name, and directed by Doug Liman, the Bourne Identity’s  insight into the workings of the intelligence community prefigured the Snowden revelations regarding US government surveillance. The acting is superb, the directing is first class and Tony Gilroy’s and William Blake Herron’s script is intelligent and well crafted. It is regarded by many critics as a neo-noir classic.