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Keanu Reeves might be God. This
was the enlightening piece of wisdom that I learned by watching
The Matrix: Reloaded.
Sure, I could be wrong, but let’s examine the evidence:
Keanu first entered public consciousness as Ted (or was it
Bill?) in Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure and
later in Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey. While one
wouldn’t think that this paragon of slackerdom denotes
a higher power, remember that not only did he travel back
and forth through time, but he also defeated Death in games
of Chess and Twister. Clearly, this is a being with powers
greater than our own.
Following that, Keanu appeared in Bernardo Bertolucci’s
Little Buddha as, well, Buddha. Clearly, his understanding
of this world is greater than our own. Next, Keanu beat the
Devil at his own game in The Devil’s Advocate,
a film that he made when he was 33 years old. Think about
it. And say what you will about Speed, but only a higher
power can successfully navigate the public transportation
system of Los Angeles.
This leads us to the role of Neo. So far, in the first two
Matrix films, Neo has developed the ability to change the
world to fit his needs, to fly, and to bend the occasional
spoon. He dies, twice (once physically and once metaphorically),
only to rise up again more powerful than he was before (just
like Obi-Wan!). And if that’s not enough, at the end
of The Matrix: Reloaded (spoiler alert!) he brings
Trinity back to life. If those aren’t God-like abilities,
I don’t know what is. Hell, his name is Keanu! Onomatopoetically
speaking, it’s not all that different from Yahweh.
So, Keanu might be God. More evidence:
1) God is physically beautiful. Eye-gougingly gorgeous. Six-foot
one inches of Hawaiian perfection. Sure he might appeal to
both straight women and gay men, but everyone knows that God
is universally hot.
2) God knows Kung Fu. Of course he does. How else would God
be able to successfully fight the Devil? Or, in the case of
The Matrix: Reloaded, how would he be able to fight
100 identical devils, all taking the shape of Hugo Weaving.
3) God also can’t act. Sure, God can do karate kicks
in mid-air, a feat that I doubt Marlon Brando could have pulled
off even during his skinny years. But it takes more than that
to star in an action movie. And God shows the same intensity
bringing Trinity back to life as he does when ordering a ham-and-cheese
sandwich.
What about the disciples, might you ask? Both Morpheus and
Trinity (Laurence Fishburne and Carrie-Anne Moss) return.
They both kicked a plethora of ass, especially during the
climactic action sequence: a seventeen-minute car chase on
an open freeway, culminating in a game of chicken between
two 18-wheelers. And they looked damned good while doing it.
Trinity was once again decked out in a latex dominatrix outfit
(is God a bottom?), while Morpheus is brilliantly dressed
in a black and purple three-piece suit, looking like he stepped
out of a remake of Uptown Saturday Night.
And all the action set pieces were brilliant. Unparalleled.
Well worth the price of admission. Which is good, because
the rest of the film was mind-bendingly dull. It was chock
full of God-awful dialogue, and bad sophomore-year philosophy.
During all of the expositional speeches (and there were way
too many of them) I was banging my head against the seat in
front of me, praying for the characters to stop talking. I
suggest that when you see this film, you go with someone who
has seen it before. Then you’ll know when it’s okay
to leave the theatre for popcorn, and still get back in time
for the ass-kicking.
One last thing I learned from watching The Matrix: Reloaded.
In the future, there is still rave music. A meeting in Zion
(the last human city) turns into an all-night rave complete
with glow sticks and the touring cast of Stomp. This vision
of the future scares the hell out of me. But not as much as
another sequel.
Let us pray.
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Above: Keanu doing his thing in 'The Matrix'
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