Wednesday, June 25, 2003

Nahant 2002-Are Your Kids Playing Safely?

Here's a little flashback at our first(?) summer weekend at nahant last year =)


Keep on keepin on~

Thursday, May 15, 2003

MATRIX French...

"nom de dieu putain bordel salope connard merde nique ta mere!"

Thanks to Paris Jen for the reconstruction. =)

Keep on keepin on~

MATRIX RELOADED thoughts...

Raw rambling on RELOADED. Although some of it's not so complimentary, it didn't stop me from seeing it three times on the big screen. =)
could've done without the BALLY'S ad during the neo/trinity love scene. could've done without that completely. no need to see their skin. i get that this non-matrix real world of humans would be very much about touch and skin and visceral sensation after a minute or two...

whatsherhead from ANGEL (jasmine) and CLEOPATRA2525 and XENA and FIREFLY made a sorta cameo in zion as link's wife's friend. link was a good, altho somewhat movie-formulaic, addition to the neb's crew.

why have the kid new-worshipper up front so much? sort of a movie red-herring? a we'll-make-you-think-he-means-something-but-really-he's-gonna-die setup? or just to show that he's got (unwanted, unasked-for) acolytes...that he's now doing what morpheus did for him... guiding people out of the matrix...? functionally, he saves neo's life from the smith-infected human. i really couldn't tell that that was hugo weaving when he first appeared in the movie. maybe he's morphing into a smith appearance as time goes on? f'd up.

when neo said, "something's different...i can feel them..." i thought for a moment that they never left the matrix. the AI, or maybe smith, had snatched them mid-stream and inserted them into this other construct. or perhaps that the "real world" is another layer of the matrix.

before seeing the movie, i realized that it was a near-death experience, basically, coming back from the dead, that got neo to believe/gave neo/activated his matrix abilities. apparently, smith doing the same, by example? by infection? did the same for him. he can't fly tho, heh.

the smith mob fight scene got to be a bit disappointing once the numbers got beyond 12 to 20 smiths...too obviously CG...too much like a virtual fight game. i've seen jet li in his movies fight engage and fight off hordes. granted, the hordes weren't composed of all equals or near-equals...that DOES make something of a difference.

smith - pinnochio?

was hoping for some kind of gratitude from smith, for setting him free from the AI. perhaps he's become something that he hated, and for whatever reason, still hates. he IS still trapped within the matrix...altho one of him has sort of gotten out. infected a human psyche...he was cutting his hand before making a go of killing neo...a struggle for control.

CONTROL.
SYSTEMS OF CONTROL.

too much exposition. too much talking. the first movie integrated the action and information. this one seemed to compartmentalize action and information, not mesh them. the ideas behind everything ARE pretty big...did they NEED to be? that there were other ONEs...that the architect planned for them, counted on them, to draw out the anomalies...outside of the matrix, into a zion/city...within the matrix, within the ONE. morpheus talked about fighting the war for 100 years. that means that the human calendar is at least 500 years off. does the matrix need to be RESTARTED when the ONE joins the SOURCE? or does it just keep on going and 30 new batteries plugged into the matrix just happen to become much more likely to wake up and go start zion again...?

i guess a restart would take care of the "era issue" within the matrix. restarting/replaying the 20th century within the matrix over and over again for everyone...sort of DARK CITY that way. gotta give people who are older than zero fake memories/history/knowledge....

why didn't DURACELL get a deal w THE MATRIX...?
JK says all GM cars on the road in the freeway scene...
didn't see any powerade, but spotted a heineken lighted sign in the blade runner/hong kong market...

how did they get the audience to like the keymaker so quickly? to feel so sad when he passed away? old asian guy. i was sad. it's a bit surprising. he doesn't fight, but he has no problem jumping on the back of a motorcycle, hanging out on top of a tractor trailer, jumping off and being snatched away by neo, opening one backdoor to come out another and avoid all the smiths.

what's smith's motivation? "i'm going to take away from you what you tried to take away from me...PURPOSE." odd. so he's rogue, but he still has his purpose...? and what IS his purpose? the destruction of zion? he's still an agent of the AI by programming...altho as an anomaly, an exile, he would be hunted by other agents...he overrides one when it arrives on the scene of the melee...

WEREWOLVES, VAMPIRES, GHOSTS!! did they exist as lore in the real world before the matrix?

i wondered to myself about ghosts within the matrix. if there ARE spirits, can they visit the matrix and the real world? what can they influence? just reminded now of virtu and verite, from...frack...the zelazny book about future virtual reality...frack. i should find that - it was GOOD. and ghosts and spirits, their world, their existence, sort of BORDERED the virtual world...the environment was similar enough that they could live/pass/exist there...a border realm...

the neo-trinity relationship was a bit too wordy and whiney. neo in general was very luke skywalker... a few steps back and down from where he ended in the first movie. i can understand doubts about being a prophet and all, but to hear him whine about it was annoying. and having trinity confront him in like four different scenes about whatever's bothering him..."you can tell me..." "you don't have to tell me..." "i'm never letting go..."

neo bringing trinity back from the dead was...i dunno...it was right, i guess, but maybe she didn't have to die...? having him do two airborne/superman saves within one movie was a little much. altho while watching, both were pretty satisfying when they came.

what about the level of tech outside of the matrix. how do humans pick up/build/create/maintain that...? the counselor maybe gives some hints about needing tech, but not knowing how it works...?

chocolate orgasm - totally unnecessary - as an example of causality?!

then again... monica belluci!

Keep on keepin on~