Reviews

If a movie's success was judged by the amount of times it is imitated then the Matrix must be one of the greatest modern cinematic pieces. Never has a film set new bench marks in this type of genre since Disney's Tron in the late 70's. However I do believe that this original masterpiece by the Wachowski brothers has created a two tier audience, those that love it and those that loathe it! I'm glad I'm part of the former group and have to say The Matrix is one my most heavily worn DVD's in my collection. The origirnality of the special effects really sell this film well, in fact the self same effects have been parodied a heck of a lot since from Shrek to Team America which further reinforces it's impact in cinematic history. The cast is a good choice even if many have little regard for Keanu Reeve's acting ability it works well here and I could not imagine anyone else better suited for the role of Morpheus than Lawrence Fishbourne. Equally interesting is the way Hugo Weaving plays the sinister Mr Smith. To look at the actual script you would not regard the part as malevolent but Mr Weaving turns it into the guy you really love to hate! This has similar shades to Ricardo Montalban's Khan in Star Trek 2 where some of the line looks mundane of even laughable but are made into something completely unexpected by the actor portraying the character. And finally The Matrix has one of the few scenes in a movie that I'd place in the top ten movie scenes of all time. This was when Neo recovers after being "killed" and realises he is 'the one'.

Final word - If you never seen the film then at least go out and rent it to decide if you love or loathe it. If you find you like it you will probably be wondering why it has taken up until now to see it!

Like most films in this type it has quite a few trappings of a disaster movie genre, but that is not to say that this is a such a bad thing, just don't expect too many surprises. Also if you hate disaster films then give this one a wide berth. However unlike other films of this type though at least Rob Cohen decided to get stuck in on the action within the first ten minutes rather than wasting over half and hour with a complex background story that nobody cares about or are simply not interested in and the Daylight maintains a relatively fast pace from here to the end.

Is also a good performance from Stallone who as the hero in this movie, surprisingly to some is not the most gung-ho character. That is left to Mortensen's gloriously over the top character instead!

*Spoiler Alert*

One thing I particularly liked about Daylight is that Latura (Stallone) does not set out to get the survivors out of the tunnel merely to asses the situation and stay with them until proper help arrives but events eventually conspire against both him and the survivors leaving him with little choice but to try and get them to safety. *End Spoiler Alert!*

Also a mention needs to be made regarding the high quality of the special effects, which from starting with the terrific explosion and fireball at the beginning of the film follow throughout the film to ensure your are kept watching to the end as well as giving the tunnel itself a sort of character something I've not seen since Backdraft. In fact at one stage Latura even shouts "Keep trying you b*stard".

Overall a must see for all disaster flick fans and for any one else then you could do a lot worse than rent or buy this.