When one of the Wachowski brothers told Cinescape in early '98 that Matrix would be their version of Star Wars (but "a weird Star Wars, a strange cyber-punky thing") I was more than a little skeptical. After all, how many times had we seen movies or television series try in vain to recapture and capitalize on the magic that George Lucas created in his cinematic galaxy far, far away? Heck, Lucas himself hasn't been able to recapture the magic, including with his much-anticipated film that was released only weeks after The Matrix, Star Wars: Episode One -- The Phantom Menace. Indeed, comparing ones work to the original Star Wars is quite a high standard to set. Amazingly, the brothers met the lofty standard with The Matrix.

Naysayers pointed out that the story fueling The Matrix is nothing new. Yet, such was the case with Star Wars. Like Luke Skywalker, Thomas "Neo" Anderson is but one of the timeless epic hero's thousand faces. Neo's tale is the classic heroic quest, the journey in which the central figure is ripped out of his hum-drum life and develops from an oblivious innocent into the messiah who will rid his world of a prevailing evil.

Like the original Star Wars, it is not the special effects that make The Matrix magical. Don't get me wrong, the FX are beautiful, but they are only one aspect of the film that is stellar. What sets the special effects work in The Matrix apart from the FX in the summer of 1999's Star Wars film is that they aren't used in excess. Indeed, the Wachowski brothers entire directing style is a delicate balance between balls-to-the-wall action and subtle imagery. For their action scenes, they borrow from the pulse-pounding techniques of John Woo, yet they do not let this style run amuck, as Guy Ritchie often does in his films.

The performances in The Matrix match the excellence of the film's other aspects. Keanu Reeves brings an effective good-looking confusion to Neo, a character who is somewhat bewildered by having what he thought was his reality torn away from him. When it comes time for Neo to make his stand, unsure of whether he really is the prophesied "One" or whether he's just a pretender, Reeves infuses a Iook of steady determination in his character's eyes, pulling off his scenes admirably.

Laurence Fishburne nails the mysterious Morpheus, making a fine John the Baptist to Neo's Christ figure (or a fine Obi-Wan Kenobi to his Luke Skywalker if that better satisfies you). Carrie-Anne Moss' Trinity is more appealing with every viewing of the film, and Joe Pantoliano's nuanced performance as the Judas-like fallen angel Cypher can be appreciated more each time it's seen as well (what makes Cypher all the more effective is that his regret of taking the red pill instead of the blue pill is extremely easy to understand). We must not forget Hugo Weaving as the menacing Agent Smith, "The Man" personified. From the opening scene to the climax, Weaving provides a truly loathsome and worthy nemesis to Morpheus' ragtag band of freedom fighters.

1999 was supposed to bring the movie that revised the standards by which future sci-fi films would be judged, the movie that would be the heir to Star Wars. It did. Only that movie wasn't Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, was The Matrix.

RATING: 5/5 Stars

- Chris Kivlehan