But you already know what I'm going to tell you. · 4:06am Jan 20th, 2016
Star Wars: The Force Awakens has been out for a while now.
I still haven't seen it. I just wasn't too hyped to see this one. Instead, I read a bunch of spoilers and reviews, even asked friends about it, to piece together what it's like (and it's pretty close to what I predicted). Much like how many people now only experience videogames via Pewdiepie or Markiplier, I'm doing the same for movies because I never feel like going to the theater. (Though I did go watch Tarantino's Hateful Eight! That was a disappointment. I should've stayed home.)
I'LL WATCH IT EVENTUALLY. It's just a lower priority compared to getting myself some home copies of the original trilogy.
(for some reason I'm getting the Mario Kart 64 trophy ceremony music stuck in my head when I look at this. congrats girls, you just unlocked the Special Cup!)
It got me thinking recently, back to early 1999, that heavily hyped up movie that blew our minds with the possibilities of CGI, and launched a rather disappointing trilogy. But at least it inspired some pretty decent side-stories made by other directors.
You know the one...
Phantom whatnow? I meant The Matrix, obviously! 
All that Star Wars talk was a complete misdirection, it has nothing to do with the rest of this.
I keep thinking about a certain memorable scene and how it uses some clever writing to make an impact on the audience. Even though a lot of the overall story of The Matrix was kinda stupid, the storytelling itself was masterful.
This scene ties the entire movie together and it's briliant.
It starts off as a typical "explain the plot" lecture, where your mind is probably only half paying attention. Yeah yeah, rebellion against the system, normal people are your enemies. The metaphor is so vague that people have applied it to just about every cause. 
The only interesting thing that stands out on screen is the woman in the red dress. She's colorful and breaks up the monotony. Even if you're not attracted to her, you were probably distracted anyway. More interesting than being fed obligatory plot details.
The scene becomes humorous, as Morpheus predicts that Neo (and most likely the viewer too) wasn't paying much attention to his speech. Then unexpectedly it shifts to scary: an Agent pointing a desert eagle at Neo's face! 
NOW we're paying attention! That shocking jolt communicates Morpheus's message far more effectively than any of his words. The simulation is frozen, no more distractions, because now we actually want to hear what he has to say about the villains.
Remember, the Agents haven't hinted at their abilities just yet. Aside from the chase scene in the beginning, they've mostly stood around looking menacing. Using that viewer shock that's still lingering, Morpheus gets to set up some obvious foreshadowing. Ok, we can easily imagine how they can "punch through a concrete wall" much like Superman. But with "men have emptied entire clips at them and hit nothing but air" I first wondered if they just ran really fast or something. This pays off in the most famous scene in the entire movie, where we finally get to see exactly how they avoid bullets.... and then Neo must immediately try to do the same. You know the one.
Whew, that bullet dodge was awe-some at the time. Even better that it was kept hidden until then, so we can see it from two different perspectives, one after another. It's been imitated and parodied countless times, but it was so powerful in the original movie precisely because it wasn't revealed until the perfect moment. You never saw it happen, you only heard Morpheus talk about it, like a rumor. Tell, don't show...?
But back to the first clip. More important is the next part foreshadowing Neo's destiny:
"What are you trying to tell me? That I can dodge bullets?"
"No, Neo. I'm trying to tell you that when you're ready. You won't have to."
What does THAT mean? Don't be so cryptic, Morpheus! We know it's foreshadowing, but it's not obvious what it's leading up to. I don't know about everyone else, but that little mystery was stuck in my head the entire movie. Pushed to the back while all the action scenes unfold, but not forgotten.
Oh. OH. So that's what it meant! 
This scene wasn't imitated quite as much as the bullet dodge, but I remember people talking about it just as much. Maybe because it was just a cool special effect, but the bullet dodge is much more impressive technically, and is revealed first anyway. "Eye Candy" doesn't quite explain it. It's the climax, and Neo's moment of revelation, and I'd like to think that the audience awakened a little too. It wasn't just about cool gunfights, now they finally understand the message.
... Not necessarily in words, though. I don't think I could explain the gnostic and buddhist premises too well myself, and I'm pretty sure most people still have no idea what the quote "There is no spoon" even means (besides sounding cool. put it on your internet sig!). But thanks to the buildup starting in the Red Dress scene, I'd like to believe that most viewers could feel what this movie was trying to say. Neo stopping bullets in midair wasn't just some new superpower he acquired, like Magneto from X-Men, but it was something else on a more profound level.
well, they sure ruin that in the sequels by having Neo casually stopping bullets like it's a superpower. how mundane.
Anyway, the point is that the movie worked so well because that crucial foreshadowing isn't just some clever HINT HINT by the writers, it's the movie planting questions in the viewer's mind. But not just that, we're actually told all the answers early on, and only later when they're shown visually does it all light up inside us. Stopping the bullets is a visual metaphor, and we don't need another long explanation or speech to absorb the idea. It's clever, and the audience is clever enough to follow on the same wavelength when you communicate your story the right way. Grab their attention, and right when they're most vulnerable, feed them questions.
As a complete contrast, the sequel's most crucial moment is having Architect McTalksaLot dump info into your ears for 10 minutes.
How many people were excited about THAT? How many understood it, or cared about understanding it?
and then the 3rd movie has more characters talktalktalk in a subway while nothing interesting happens. the big important moment was some Jesus imagery and then sunshines and rainbows. Nobody wanted to watch that again. then Inception copied most of the Matrix with an even dumber story and no profound moments. ok getting off topic.
All of this is kinda like Luke trusting in the Force to guide his shot in the Death Star trench. when the first movie came out, the Force wasn't explained too well, it got much more fleshed out in the second movie with Yoda. but that exciting climactic moment where he lands the shot without his targeting computer... it let audiences intuitively understand what The Force was all about. they couldn't explain it, but they could belive in it. oh hey, I managed to tie this back to the beginning of the post with Star Wars! just as planned! 
I'm not Bad Horse or BookPlayer with expert writing advice. and I don't know anything about filmmaking either. I just couldn't stop thinking about that movie scene from 17 years ago and how effective it was. kinda like the shark reveal scene in Jaws. oh, dangit, I guess Jaws did it all first. now I gotta rewrite all this about a different movie. 
Late warning: persons who haven't seen The Matrix and don't want to be spoiled should refrain from reading this post.
I totally agree. This hits on what I believe communicating through story really boils down to. Humans draw meaning from experiences. Plain and simple. A happy life begets a happy person; not a cynical one. In the same way, the strongest message a reader will draw from your story--the one that will stick the most--is what comes from the 'experiences' within the story. That's the kind of meaning you feel, and it isn't delivered in words. It's delivered through what happens. It comes through emotion, mixed perfectly with thought. That's how you get famous scenes and stories that change culture.
Very enjoyable blog post ^.^
But seriously you don't like Inception? Hooooooowwwwwwwwww D:
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certainly, it's like connecting to the audience's intuition is most important when you want your story to be immersive. I think. I'm still not sure how to sum it up in a simple sentence.
maybe the Oracle scene makes a better metaphor for all this. she doesn't tell people the future, she opens doors so they can find it themselves. and that's what the filmmakers here were doing too.
which makes me wonder why they forgot all this when making the sequels!
It's alright, still kinda fun. just not on the Matrix's level. for me at least, it seemed manipulative rather than trying to say something deep.
all of Christopher Nolan's stories seem to do that to me. fun to watch yet I feel very uncomfortable afterwards. I think I don't like him.
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Yeah, it's very tough to put a thumb on; we're trying to describe things that don't easily lend themselves to words, like intuition. I think the Oracle is a great example, because looking at her one way, she guides, but you could also see it as being very manipulative. She knows all the right buttons to push. Which is it, exactly? Either or, or both? I feel like stories walk the same line. They're all about being manipulative, but if the author isn't careful, the reader will see what you're trying to do and bail out, at least emotionally. At the end of a good story I think we often aren't sure whether it was us who walked through the door or the story that pushed us while we were distracted.
I think it was in a youtube review of the matrix movies that I heard the Wachowski brothers weren't as involved with the script writing for the sequels. One of them penned out a rough outline and then a group of people wrote the script. I don't know how accurate to reality that is, but it would help explain a lot. While there are parts of the sequels I still enjoy, they really shouldn't have been made. The original works perfectly on its own.
No, I agree, actually. I don't think I've ever felt Inception was trying to be as profound or philosophically robust as the Matrix. My love for the movie has always been its ability to suck me in emotionally. And there's something about literally delving into a character's subconscious that just really absorbs me. Also, and like the Matrix, its action scenes have you thoroughly invested, making them that much better.
Overall I just feel it's a great character story, wrapped up in a really cool heist movie. With epic music. Bwaaaaaaaaang.
Did you ever see Interstellar?
> 17 years ago
Augh, and I had already graduated from college when it came out. Stop making me feel old
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You know some of the people in the writeoff were born after 9/11, right?