Does anyone else just not get movies like Matrix Reloaded

They don’t do anything for me.

You have these people leaping and flying about as the fight, because somehow they can suspend the laws of nature. But wait! It’s a movie, so the camera can make the suspension of natural law possible, or make it appear as if natural law is being suspended. No wait, the story has that written into it, so I should imagine that I’m watching real action being played out in front of the cameras. No wait, that’s not it…and so on. It was the same with Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. The running vertically up a bamboo pole just seemed silly.

I can watch science fiction. In fact I love SF. But I have to believe that the action is taking place in the real, physical universe. Superhero type movies aren’t bad, but I still have to imagine that Superman, or whoever, is able to exercise his powers in the real world. Mixing in virtual reality, or suspension of the laws of nature in a way that beggars belief, even in a fantasy, just kills it for me.

Does anyone else have the same reaction?

I did have that problem with Crouching Tiger, precisely because it wasn’t science fiction or a superhero movie. I thought the flying was symbolic at first, but they started flying over walls and it just broke down.

Er… I don’t think The Matrix was ever confusing about why they moved as they did. Being able to defy the laws of physics is a core part of the basic premise of the movie.

Yea…they know how to “hack” the physical constraints programmed into the Matrix, giving them the ability to “cheat”.

So, basically, you can’t stand movies that don’t take place in the “real world”? To throw in some Matrix-ish logic, how do you know that this world is real?

You can suspend disbelief as it pertains to natural laws being broken as long as the laws are bent so far, but not any further? At what point does the transition take place? Superman can fly and stop bullets. Neo can fly and stop bullets. Why do you tolerate the first and reject the second?

Superman flew around the Earth backwards so fast that the rotation of the Earth reversed, and because of that time went backwards. It’s messed up physics like that that I can’t stand. The Matrix, existing as a computer simulation, means that no physical laws were being broken at all.

Speaking of which, you mentioned that you can’t stand the mixing in VR. I guess you hated Tron?

I’m just trying to pin down exactly what it is that turned you off to the Matrix. Myself, I love sci-fi movies, action movies, and kung fu movies. The Matrix was a sci-fi, action, kung fu movie. So, of course, I loved it.

It’s actually easier for me to accept that sort of thing in the case of “The Matrix”, because it’s explained very clearly “Hey, we can do anything, because it’s all just a simulation anyway.”

Now, if the movie tries to tell me that something is actually POSSIBLE, when I know that it’s IMPOSSIBLE, that causes me problems. To make this work, the movie has to be very careful about the set-up and the internal logic.

For some movies, the set-up is already done… Star Trek, Star Wars, any superhero movie… I go in KNOWING that these events take place in a universe with physical laws that are different in specific, known ways.

Movies that are clearly AWARE of themselves as being absurd have an edge here, too. The “Naked Gun” series, for example. They clearly don’t expect me to believe in them.

With a movie that claims to occur in what might be MY universe, or a movie that throws in impossibilities that aren’t covered by the set-up, I have problems.

For example, I can accept that Wolverine can walk away from a 50-story fall… but don’t ask me to accept that Cyclops can… or James Bond… or Jack Ryan… John McClaine…

Think of it this way. If I’m watching Superman lift a truck over his head, I need to believe that the truck really does weigh five tons, and he’s really lifting it…not that he has somehow magically changed the truck’s weight to that of a ball point pen. Obviously the super strength, not to mention the flying, is inconsistent with the laws of nature, but nearly everything else in a Superman movie or TV show is consistent with Newtonian physics. What I’m getting at is that I admit some violations of physical laws might be necessary for a good SF movie, but I like to see it against a background of normal physical nature, to provide some contrast. In the Matrix series, the lines of reality and unreality are too blurred for my taste.

Actually I did like Tron, because the world protrayed was for the most part very consistent.