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The Matrix film image; man and woman stand in elevator shaft

The Matrix

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Can a computer hacker save the world? Maybe if you hack deep enough…

By any reckoning this is one of the most influential movies of the past quarter-century. The Matrix didn’t just change the way films looked and moved, it altered the way we perceived the world(s). For example, what if “virtual reality” is the only reality we recognize. You can find the roots of WikiLeaks and Q-anon here.

That’s not to say the Wachowskis — pre-transition — originated much of anything. Rather, The Matrix synthesized all manner of cross-cultural currents, scientific and technological, aesthetic, artistic, philosophical, and rolled them all into a heady sci-fi action flick about a bland non-entity who might just be the one to wake humanity from its hypnotic inertia. The film is front-loaded with ideas and in the end it settles for adrenaline, but it remains an essential millennial touchstone, the zeitgeist electric.

 

Staff Pick: Juan

Intro by Sean Wicks, VFX Production (Sound)

 

A wildly cinematic futuristic thriller that is determined to overpower the imagination.

Kenneth Turan, Los Angeles Times

 

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Director

Lilly Wachowski & Lana Wachowski

Cast

Keanu Reeves, Carrie Ann Moss, Laurence Fishburne, Hugo Weaving, Joe Pantoliano

Credits
Country of Origin

USA

Year

1999

Language

English

19+
136 min

Book Tickets

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Credits

Screenwriter

Lilly Wachowski, Lana Wachowski

Cinematography

Bill Pope

Editor

Zach Staenberg

Original Music

Don Davis

Production Design

Owen Paterson

Art Director

Hugh Bateup, Michelle McGahey

90s, Baby!

Ten years. 11 weeks. 90 films from the 1990s. This summer, 90’s Baby! takes a deep dive into a defining decade of cinema.

Being John Malkovich

Dir. Spike Jonze
113 min

There's real yearning in this bizarre, mind-bending comedy about voyeurism, sex, and the human desire to play God from writer Charlie Kaufman and director Spike Jonze. You can't get much further out of the box than this.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema
Lessons of Darkness
Lessons of Darkness film image; smoke pillars rising from the ground

Lessons of Darkness

Dir. Werner Herzog
54 min

Werner Herzog's unforgettable documentary reveals the unfolding disaster of the Kuwaitian oil fields in flames in 1991 as a sweeping inferno of mesmerizing power.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema

Office Space

Dir. Mike Judge
90 min

This razor sharp comedy from Mike Judge (King of the Hill) captures the indignities of life as a wage slave with rare acumen and caustic wit. Evidently the impending millennial bug weighed heavily on people's minds back in 1999.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema

Beau Travail

Dir. Claire Denis
93 min

Inspired by Herman Melville's Billy Budd, Claire Denis' transfixing Beau Travail is set in East Africa. Sgt Galoup (Denis Lavant) reflects on his time in the French Foreign Legion, and the impact of the handsome Sentain (Gregoire Colin).

VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre
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Three Kings

Dir. David O Russell
115 min

George Clooney headlines David O Russell's bold, brazen attempt to get to grips with the immediate aftermath of Operation Desert Storm, as 4 US soldiers try to liberate a missing shipment of gold amidst the chaos and carnage.

VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

10 Things I Hate About You

Dir. Gil Junger
97 min

Heath Ledger and Julia Stiles became the thinking teen's heartthrobs with this smart update on Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew, transposed to a Tacoma, Washington high school.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

But I'm a Cheerleader

Dir. Jamie Babbit
85 min

Megan (Natasha Lyonne) is the perfect All-American Girl, or so she thinks. That is until she’s shipped off to conversion therapy. This pitch black comedy is wrapped in a saccharine bow, featuring the icon herself, RuPaul, as a conversion counsellor.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

Magnolia

Dir. Paul Thomas Anderson
188 min

This deeply personal 1999 California opus is ripe for rediscovery. Mapping the emotional traumas of half-a-dozen major characters as they crisscross the San Fernando Valley in search of either recognition or reconciliation, it's PTA's riskiest gamble.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema

Election

Dir. Alexander Payne
103 min

Tracy Flick (Reece Witherspoon) is running for Student President, but Mr. McAllister (Matthew Broderick) has other ideas... This remarkably sour millennial comedy from Alexander Payne (The Holdovers; Sideways; The Descendents) hits twice as hard today.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema

Ghost Dog: Way of the Samurai

Dir. Jim Jarmusch
116 min

Ghost Dog (Forest Whitaker) is an assassin, but he's also an existential loner who adheres to his personal code. Despite the thriller trappings, this is really a lampoon of that genre, and a melancholy reverie for the cultural melting pot we call home.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

The Straight Story

Dir. David Lynch
112 min

David Lynch goes a different direction in this linear Midwestern about a septuagenarian (Richard Farnsworth) who drives nearly 400km on a lawnmower to visit his ailing brother (Harry Dean Stanton).

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre
90s Surprise Film
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90s Surprise Film

150 min

The 90s movie we have all been missing... Join us for a celebratory wake for this year's 90s, Baby series! What you will be seeing is top secret (no, not Top Secret!, that was 1984) but it will be at least 26 years old and it will be new to this series.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema

The Wind Will Carry Us

Dir. Abbas Kiarostami
118 min

Kiarostami's dry comic masterpiece follows a Tehrani film team's thwarted attempts to document a traditional Kurdish funeral... Trouble being, there's no one to bury, and, worse, virtually no cell service...

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

Fight Club

Dir. David Fincher
139 min

1999 was a very good year for movies, but nothing captured millennial angst quite so vividly as David Fincher's bruising black comedy about what it means to be a man today. This modern classic does everything short of rattling your seat to get a reaction.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema