The Matrix Revisited Movie Review

The Matrix stands as one of the greatest films of the 1990s, and it's one of the most important ones, too. And why not give such a milestone film the mega-documentary treatment?

The Matrix Revisited is now on hand to tell anyone who cares to listen and learn about the most minute facets of the making of The Matrix, exploring everything from the studio's early nervousness to fight training to storyboards to wardrobe to the pioneering and widely-copied "bullet time" camera trick. While you've seen a lot of these before on endless behind-the-scenes documentaries. (In fact, you've seen some of this on the original Matrix DVD, which some correctly feel is robbing us, at least a little, by not simply including this documentary with it in the first place.)

Regardless of your economic position on the film, The Matrix Revisited is indeed an eye-opening piece of work that takes you further behind the scenes than most films of this ilk have ever done. There is plenty of footage of the Wachowski brothers, giving you the blow by blow (no pun intended) of how they brought their vision to life. All of the principals and virtually every crew member has his or her say here, but it never becomes boring like those endless talking-head interviews. (Scariest moment: short doc featuring some of the movie's rabid Internet fans. Yikes.)

We're really on the set here -- and if you're the kind of guy (and admit it, you're probably a guy) who'd be thankful to cart Evian back and forth on the set, then this is definitely the disc for you. If you're the kind of guy who is desperate for a sliver of info about the upcoming Matrix sequels, well, this is about the only place you'll find it.

The 10-disc Matrix DVD box set is an exhaustive set containing 35 hours of bonus material alone. Each of the three films contains numerous commentary tracks, and each film is buttressed by a feature length documentary like The Matrix Revisited. The Animatrix is also included along with three additional discs full of archival material, interviews, philosophical inquiries, trailers, and extra footage. Any Matrix fan will want to own this set and keep it on the top shelf, where the cat can't get to it.