Max original film The Matrix was released March 31st, 1999.
#TheMatrix trilogy hauled in $1.636B at the international box office.
rottentomatoes: 83%
metacritic: 73
imdb: 8.7
Neo
Thomas Anderson gets acclimated to the reality of the situation aboard the Nebuchadnezzar.
“What? What the hell? ‘Follow the white rabbit.’ Who is it? Yeah. Yeah. You’re 2 hours late. You got the money? Hold on. If you get caught using that… right. My computer, it… you ever have that feeling where you’re not sure if you’re awake or still dreaming? No. I can’t. I have work tomorrow. Yeah. Sure. I’ll go.” — Neo
“How do you know that name? Who are you? Trinity. The Trinity? That cracked the IRS D-base? Jesus. I just thought, um… you were a guy. That was you on my computer. How did you do that? Of what? Who is? ‘What is the matrix?'” — Neo
“Oh, shit! No. Shit. Shit. Yes, Mr. Rhineheart. Perfectly clear. Yeah, that’s me. Hello? Morpheus? Who’s coming for me? What, right now? Oh, shit! What the hell do they want from me? How? Ok. What if they–how do you know all this? No way! No way! This is crazy! This is insane. Why is this happening to me? What did I do? I’m nobody. I didn’t do anything. I’m gonna die. Shit. Oh, shit. Unh! I can’t do this.” — Neo
“Yeah. Wow, that sounds like a really good deal. But I think I got a better one. How about… I give you the finger… and you give me my phone call. You can’t scare me with this Gestapo crap. I know my rights. I want my phone call. Munh… mmmf! Aah! Oh!” — Neo
“What are you talking about? What– what is happening to me? Yes. What the hell is this? From what? What? Fine. Why? What is that thing? Oh, my God. Aah! God! Hurts! Jesus Christ, that thing’s real?!” — Neo
“It’s an honor to meet you. You could say that. No. Because I don’t like the idea that I’m not in control of my life. The Matrix? What truth? You did all this? What does that mean? Did you– this can’t be. It’s cold. It’s cold. Aah!” — Neo
“Am I dead? What are you doing? Why do my eyes hurt? Morpheus, what’s happened to me? What is this place? When? Right now, we’re inside a computer program? This… this isn’t real? A.I.? You mean artificial intelligence? No. I don’t believe it. It’s not possible. Stop! Let me out! Let me out! I want out! Take this thing out of me. Take this thing… don’t touch me! Get away from me! Stay away from me! I don’t believe it. I don’t believe it.” — Neo
“I can’t go back, can I? For what? You don’t– you don’t have any– Zion? It’s a city? Where is it? Jujitsu? I’m going to learn Jujitsu? Holy shit! Hell, yes. Hell, yeah. I know kung fu. You’re– you’re too fast. I know what you’re trying to do. Whoa. Okey-dokey. Free my mind. All right, no problem. Free my mind. Free my mind. No problem, right. Aaaaahhhh! Waaaahhh! Uhh! Uhh! Ohh! Ohh! I thought it wasn’t real. If you’re killed in the matrix, you die here?” — Neo
Trinity
“Is everything in place? I know, but I felt like taking a shift. Don’t be ridiculous. Morpheus believes he is the one. It doesn’t matter what I believe. Did you hear that? Are you sure this line is clean? I better go.”
“Shit. Morpheus, the line was traced. I don’t know how. Are there any agents? God damn it. Get up, Trinity. Just get up. Get up!”
“Hello, Neo. I know a lot about you. My name is Trinity. That was a long time ago. What? Most guys do. Right now, all I can tell you… is that you’re in danger. I brought you here to warn you. They’re watching you, Neo. Please just listen. I know why you’re here, Neo. I know what you’ve been doing. I know why you hardly sleep, why you live alone, and why, night after night, you sit at your computer. You’re looking for him. I know, because I was once looking for the same thing. And when he found me… he told me I wasn’t really looking for him. I was looking for an answer. It’s the question that drives us, Neo. It’s the question that brought you here. You know the question, just as I did. The answer is out there, Neo. It’s looking for you… and it will find you if you want it to. Shit.”
“Get in. It’s necessary, Neo, for our protection. From you. Please, Neo, you have to trust me. Because you have been down there, Neo. You know that road you know exactly where it ends. And I know that’s not where you want to be. Apoc, lights. Lie back. Lift up your shirt. We think you’re bugged. Try and relax. Come on. Come on. Oh, shit. No, I’m not. Clear. This is it. Let me give you one piece of advice. Be honest. He knows more than you can imagine. Mm-hmm. It’s going into replication. I got a fibrillation. He’s going into arrest.”
“I hope you’re right. Easy, Neo. Come on.”
Morpheus
“I know. They cut the hard line. There’s no time. You’re going to have to get to another exit. Yes. You have to focus, Trinity. There’s a phone at Wells and Lake. You can make it. Go.”
“Hello, Neo. Do you know who this is? Yes, I’ve been looking for you, Neo. I don’t know if you’re ready to see what I want to show you, but unfortunately, you and I have run out of time. They’re coming for you, Neo, and I don’t know what they’re going to do. Stand up and see for yourself. Yes. Now. Do it slowly. The elevator. Yes. I don’t know, but if you don’t want to find out, I suggest you get out of there. I can guide you, but you must do exactly as I say. The cubicle across from you is empty. Go! Now! Stay here for just a moment. When I tell you, go to the end of the row to the office at the end of the hall. Stay as low as you can. Go now. Good. Now, outside there is a scaffold. We don’t have time, Neo. To your left, there’s a window. Go to it. Open it. You can use the scaffold to get to the roof. There are two ways out of this building. One is that scaffold, the other is in their custody. You take a chance either way. I leave it to you.”
“This line is tapped, so I must be brief. They got to you first, but they’ve underestimated how important you are. If they knew what I know, you would probably be dead. You are the one, Neo. You may have spent the last few years looking for me, but I’ve spent my entire life looking for you. Now, do you still want to meet? Then go to the Adams Street Bridge.”
“At last. Welcome, Neo. As you no doubt have guessed, I am Morpheus. No… the honor is mine. Please, come. Sit. I imagine that right now you’re feeling a bit like Alice… tumbling down the rabbit hole, hmm? I can see it in your eyes. You have that look of a man who accepts what he sees because he is expecting to wake up. Ironically, this is not far from the truth. Do you believe in fate, Neo? Why not? I know exactly what you mean. Let me tell you why you’re here. You’re here because you know something. What you know, you can’t explain, but you feel it. You’ve felt it your entire life. That there’s something wrong with the world. You don’t know what it is, but it’s there, like a splinter in your mind, driving you mad. It is this feeling that has brought you to me. Do you know what I’m talking about? Do you know what it is? The Matrix is everywhere. It is all around us. Even now, in this very room. You can see it when you look out your window or when you turn on your television. You feel it when you go to work… when you go to church… when you pay your taxes. It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth. That you are a slave, Neo. Like everyone else, you were born into bondage, born into a prison that you cannot smell or taste or touch. A prison… for your mind. Unfortunately, no one can be told what the matrix is. You have to see it for yourself. This is your last chance. After this, there is no turning back. You take the blue pill, the story ends, you wake up in your bed, and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill, you stay in Wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes. Remember… all I’m offering is the truth. Nothing more. Follow me. Apoc, are we online? Time is always against us. Please, take a seat there. The pill you took is part of a trace program. It’s designed to disrupt your input/output carrier signal so we can pinpoint your location. Have you ever had a dream, Neo, that you were so sure was real? What if you were unable to wake from that dream? How would you know the difference between the dream world and the real world? Be what? Be real? Apoc? Tank, we’re going to need a signal soon. Apoc, location. Now, Tank, now.”
“Welcome to the real world. We’ve done it, Trinity. We found him. I don’t have to hope. I know it. Far from it. Your muscles have atrophied. We’re rebuilding them. You’ve never used them before. Rest, Neo. The answers are coming. More important than ‘what’ is ‘when.’ You believe it’s the year 1999, when, in fact, it’s closer to 2199. I can’t tell you exactly what year it is because we honestly don’t know. There’s nothing I can say that will explain it you, Neo. Come with me. See for yourself. This is my ship, the Nebuchadnezzar. It’s a hovercraft. This is the main deck. This is the core… where we broadcast our pirate signal and hack into the matrix. Most of my crew you already know. This is Apoc, Switch, and Cypher. The ones you don’t know– Tank and his big brother Dozer. The little one behind you is Mouse. You wanted to know what the matrix is, Neo? Trinity. Try to relax. This will feel a little weird.”
“This… is the construct. It’s our loading program. We can load anything from clothing to equipment, weapons, training simulations. Anything we need. Is it really so hard to believe? Your clothes are different, the plugs on your arms and head are gone, your hair has changed. Your appearance now is what we call ‘residual self-image.’ It is the mental projection of your digital self. What is real? How do you define real? If you’re talking about what you can feel, what you can smell, what you can taste and see, then real is simply electrical signals interpreted by your brain. This is the world that you know, the world as it was at the end of the 20th century. It exists now only as part of a neural-interactive simulation that we call the matrix. You’ve been living in a dream world, Neo. This is the world as it exists today. Welcome to the desert… of the real. We have only bits and pieces of information. But what we know for certain is that at some point in the early 21st century all of mankind was united in celebration. We marveled at our own magnificence as we gave birth to A.I. A singular consciousness that spawned an entire race of machines. We don’t know who struck first, us or them, but we know that it was us that scorched the sky. At the time, they were dependent on solar power, and it was believed that they would be unable to survive without an energy source as abundant as the sun. Throughout human history, we have been dependent on machines to survive. Fate, it seems, is not without a sense of irony.”
“The human body generates more bioelectricity than a 120-volt battery and over 25,000 BTUs of body heat. Combined with a form of fusion, the machines had found all the energy they would ever need. There are fields, Neo, endless fields, where human beings are no longer born. We are grown. For the longest time, I wouldn’t believe it. And then I saw the fields with my own eyes, watched them liquefy the dead so they could be fed intravenously to the living. And standing there, facing the pure horrifying precision, I came to realize the obviousness of the truth. What is The Matrix? Control. The Matrix is a computer-generated dream world built to keep us under control in order to change a human being into this. I didn’t say it would be easy, Neo. I just said it would be the truth. Breathe, Neo. Just breathe.”
“No. But if you could, would you really want to? I feel I owe you an apology. We have a rule– we never free a mind once it’s reached a certain age. It’s dangerous. The mind has trouble letting go. I’ve seen it before, and I’m sorry. I did what I did because… I had to. When the matrix was first built there was a man born inside who had the ability to change whatever he wanted, to remake the matrix as he saw fit. It was he who freed the first of us, taught us the truth. As long as the matrix exists, the human race will never be free. After he died, the oracle prophesied his return and that his coming would hail the destruction of the matrix, end the war, bring freedom to our people. That is why there are those of us who have spent our entire lives searching the matrix, looking for him. I did what I did because… I believe that search is over. Get some rest. You’re going to need it. Your training.”
“How is he? Show me. This is a sparring program, similar to the programmed reality of the matrix. It has the same basic rules, rules like gravity. What you must learn is that these rules are no different than the rules of a computer system. Some of them can be bent, others can be broken. Understand? Then hit me… if you can. Good! Adaptation, improvisation. But your weakness is not your technique. How did I beat you? Do you believe that my being stronger or faster has anything to do with my muscles in this place? Do you think that’s air you’re breathing now? Hmm. Again. What are you waiting for? You’re faster than this. Don’t think you are, know you are. Come on, stop trying to hit me and hit me. I’m trying to free your mind, Neo, but I can only show you the door. You’re the one that has to walk through it. Tank, load the jump program. You have to let it all go, Neo, fear, doubt and disbelief. Free… your mind. Your mind makes it real. The body cannot live without the mind.”
Cypher
“Yeah. You weren’t supposed to relieve me. You like him, don’t you? You like watching him. We’re gonna kill him. You understand that? Do you? You don’t, do you? Hear what? Yeah, of course I’m sure.”
“It means buckle your seat belt, Dorothy, ’cause Kansas is going bye-bye.”
“Everybody falls the first time, right, Trin?”
Switch
“Take off your shirt. Stop the car. Listen to me, Coppertop. We don’t have time for 20 questions. Right now there’s only one rule– our way or the highway. It’s on the move. You’re gonna lose it. It doesn’t mean anything.”
The Nebuchadnezzar
“Almost. Still nothing. Targeting almost there. Lock. I got him.”
“He still needs a lot of work. Hi. He’s gonna pop.”
“Morning. Did you sleep? You will tonight. I guarantee it. I’m Tank. I’ll be your operator. Holes? Nope. Me and my brother Dozer, we’re both 100% pure, old-fashioned, homegrown human, born free right here in the real world. Genuine child of Zion. If the war was over tomorrow, Zion’s where the party would be. The last human city. The only place we have left. Deep underground, near the Earth’s core where it’s still warm. You live long enough, you might even see it. God damn, I– I got to tell you, I’m– I’m fairly excited to see what you’re capable of, if Morpheus is right and all. We’re not supposed to talk about this, but if you are, it’s a very exciting time. We got a lot to do. We gotta get to it.”
“Now… we’re supposed to start with these operation programs first. That’s major boring shit. Let’s do something a little more fun. How about… combat training? Hey, Mikey, I think he likes it. How about some more?”
“10 hours straight. He’s a machine.”
“Morpheus is fighting Neo. Jesus Christ, he’s fast. Take a look at his neuro-kinetics. They’re way above normal. I don’t believe it. So what if he makes it? No one’s ever made their first jump. I know, I know. But what if he does? He won’t. Wh-what does that mean? What–“
The Matrix
“Unh! Freeze! Police! Hands on your head! Do it! Do it now!”
“Oh, shit. Hey, I’m just doing my job. You give me that juris-my-dick-tion crap you can cram it up your ass. Ha ha! I think we can handle one little girl. I sent 2 units. They’re bringing her down now.”
“Aah! Aah! That’s impossible.”
“It’s Choi. I know. It’s her fault. 2 grand. Hallelujah. You’re my savior, man. My own personal Jesus Christ. I know. This never happened. You don’t exist. Something wrong, man? You look a little whiter than usual. Mmm, all the time. It’s called mescaline. It’s the only way to fly. Hey, it sounds to me like you need to unplug, man. You know, get some R & R? What do you think, Dujour? Should we take him with us? Definitely. Come on. It’ll be fun. I promise.”
“You have a problem with authority, Mr. Anderson. You believe that you are special, that somehow the rules do not apply to you. Obviously, you are mistaken. This company is one of the top software companies in the world because every single employee understand that they are part of a whole. Thus, if an employee has a problem, the company has a problem. The time has come to make a decision, Mr. Anderson. Either you choose to be at your desk on time from this day forth, or you choose to find yourself another job. Do I make myself clear?”
“Thomas Anderson? Ok. Great. Have a nice day.”
Agent Smith
“Lieutenant. Lieutenant, you were given specific orders. The orders were for your protection. No, lieutenant. Your men are already dead.”
“Doesn’t matter. Yes. We’ll need a search running.”
“As you can see, we’ve had our eye on you for some time now, Mr. Anderson. It seems that you’ve been living two lives. In one life, you’re Thomas A. Anderson, program writer for a respectable software company. You have a social security number, and pay your taxes, and you… help your landlady carry out her garbage. The other life is lived in computers where you go by the hacker alias ‘Neo’ and are guilty of virtually every computer crime we have a law for. One of these lives has a future… and one of them does not. I’m going to be as forthcoming as I can be, Mr. Anderson. You’re here because we need your help. We know that you’ve been contacted by a certain individual, a man who calls himself ‘Morpheus.’ Whatever you think you know about this man is irrelevant. He is considered by many authorities to be the most dangerous man alive. My colleagues believe that I am wasting my time with you, but I believe you wish to do the right thing. We’re willing to wipe this slate clean. Give you a fresh start. All that we’re asking in return is your cooperation in bringing a known terrorist to justice. Hmm. Oh, Mr. Anderson… you disappoint me. Tell me, Mr. Anderson… what good is a phone call if you’re unable to speak? You’re going to help us, Mr. Anderson… whether you want to or not.”
Agents
“She got out. The informant is real. We have the name of their next target. The name is Neo. It has already begun.”