Matrix Reloaded, The

Film Threat Kevin Carr

Doesn’t waste any time with the unnecessary details of what happened in the first film. It just assumes you know what the hell is going on. The story literally explodes onto the screen.

Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy

All you could hope for from a summer movie: dazzling action, jaw-dropping effects, cool clothes, steamy romance and more of the nifty "Matrix" mythology introduced in the 1999 original.

Washington Post Michael O'Sullivan

The Matrix Reloaded is about sensation, not logic. As such, it delivers, in spades, exactly what you should expect from a popcorn flick -- thrills, chills and spills -- plus a little more for good measure, just to keep anyone from whining who might want a beginning, a middle and an end.

Variety Todd McCarthy

Delivers enough thrills, kicks and cool moments to satiate geeks, fans and mere general viewers worldwide -- until the "Revolutions" installment wraps up the trilogy in November.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

It is an immensely skillful sci-fi adventure, combining the usual elements: heroes and villains, special effects and stunts, chases and explosions, romance and oratory.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

Moves like a bullet and, even if they're overblown, the action sequences are still mostly exhilarating and hypnotic. Moreover, the film's human dimension and character development is richer and more rewarding than the genre requires, and its philosophical underpinning more intellectually audacious and seductive: The film is more of a mind-trip than I expected.

Dallas Observer Andy Klein

The Wachowskis still hold the current franchise on intellectually engaging action films. It's not like I won't be heading back for a second (or even third) look.

Newsweek David Ansen

A cliffhanger with no real ending. When the lights come up, think of it as the start of a six-month intermission. For better and worse, Reloaded leaves you hungry for more.

Salon.com Andrew O'Hehir

I found The Matrix Reloaded so exhilarating. It's a sadder, wiser, more grown-up movie than its predecessor. It was made, one might almost say, for a sadder, wiser, more grown-up world.

Film Threat Clint Morris

Not unlike its predecessor -– might be hard to swallow, but it’s so delicious you just can’t help but want more. Not unlike one of those gobstoppers you can find in any candy store -- Hard to chew, nice to endure, if you will.

San Francisco Chronicle Carla Meyer

Turns out the first "Matrix" was the One, but the second is still loads of fun.

New York Post Lou Lumenick

The dazzling 14-minute chase includes cars, motorcycles, a couple of 18-wheelers - and nonstop martial-arts battles and leaps inside and on top of the vehicles. That scene alone will justify the price of admission for many.

USA Today Mike Clark

Salvaged by its rally, Reloaded seems less tired than "X2," its current sequel rival. But since its creators have said it's only half of a movie, we won't really know until The Matrix Revolutions arrives Nov. 5 whether this chunk is fizzle or sizzle.

Boston Globe Ty Burr

The thrill isn't gone from the sequel, but the surprise is, and it hurts more than you'd think.

Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman

One dazzling (if overlong) bridge: technologically advanced, brilliantly designed, spectacularly executed, solid as steel in its unspectacular elements. But unlike its 1999 predecessor, this is a movie that nobody but avid video gamers and motorcyclists needs to see more than once.

New York Daily News Jami Bernard

The philosophy is even less plausible. But the action -- oh, the action! There's nothing else out there like it.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

The Wachowskis have put together a mix of culture, kung fu, sci-fi and speculation, that makes them the warped wonders they are. When the film ends with a "To Be Continued," the hooks are in for The Matrix Revolutions on November 5th. Maybe I've been programmed to say it, but I am so there.

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

If The Matrix Reloaded is a trip through high-toned mediocrity, not nearly as suggestive or cohesive as ''The Matrix,'' it's one of the most wizardly mediocre movies I've seen in quite some time.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

Only time and Matrix Revolutions will determine if the material contained here is just a noisy, visually lively distraction or whether there are deeper currents we're not yet aware of.

Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey

All of the elements that made The Matrix a mass-cult phenom -- breathtaking physical gymnastics wedded to the brain-cramping mental and spiritual kind -- resurface in Reloaded.

The New York Times A.O. Scott

Relax, the staging of the action sequences is as viciously elegant as you've been primed to expect, though there is a dispiriting more-of-the-same aspect to the picture.

Time Richard Schickel

You are never exactly bored by The Matrix Reloaded. But there is something alienating about it, maybe because it fails to fulfill its possibly loony intellectual aspirations.

Village Voice J. Hoberman

Where The Matrix was a heady cocktail of gnostic Zen Philip K. Dick cyberpunk '60s psychedelic bull, well spiked with high-octane digitally driven Hong Kong action pyrotechnics, those elements reloaded soon separate out. The refreshing draft of effervescent movie magic leaves a sludgy sediment of metaphysics.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen

Inevitably, the one ingredient that does remain constant are the performances -- once again, there aren't any (the lone exception is Gloria Foster's mommy Oracle, although, even here, the shine is off the joke). Of course, for the hyperactive principals, this gig isn't about acting -- it's about athleticism, which suits Keanu Reeves's talents just fine.

Premiere Glenn Kenny

The intellectual aspirations of this series are just window dressing. Which left this viewer to enjoy the freeway chase sequence (which really is cool), Hugo Weaving’s smirk, and even the PlayStationish stuff.

Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez

This cold, generally soulless movie does feel like it was made by people who are taking themselves way too seriously. Remember the delicious anticipation you felt when The Empire Strikes Back was over? You won't feel that way when The Matrix Reloaded reaches its cliffhanger finale. You'll just feel relief.

TV Guide Maitland McDonagh

More comic book-like and less intriguing than the original, the film's punch-drunk cyber-mysticism still has a darkly seductive allure that sets it apart from juvenile, Star Wars-style space opera.

Washington Post Stephen Hunter

No, it's not great. No, it's not a disaster.

Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern

In this second installment of the trilogy, lithe bodies endowed with superior brains do all sorts of spectacular things, but the movie has the dead soul of a video game.

Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan

If a concept is to sustain itself over a multipart story, it must make an emotional connection, and this "Reloaded," especially with stars cast for their lack of affect and affinity for blankness, cannot do that.

The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt

Unlike "The Matrix," all fights and stunts -- including a 14-minute freeway chase -- have a disturbing tendency to repeat intricately choreographed action. Thus, computer technology and overkill supplant the ingenuity of the original film's action.

Chicago Tribune Mark Caro

For such a rich visual movie, "Reloaded" tells far more than it shows; the pivotal scenes involve people explaining things to Neo. Too many plot turns resemble detours, and even the ever-amusing Smith feels like a red herring in the scheme of things.

Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow

As a whole, The Matrix Reloaded is thin on magic, charm, surprise and fun. It's less like an all-out escape, or even a thrill ride, than a sensory workout. At best, it's a treadmill-like bridge to the hoped-for splendors of episode three, The Matrix Revolutions.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

Suffers mightily from sequelitis. Forced to explain what’s going on and what’s going to be going on in the next and final installment (due out in November), the Wachowskis have laced the film with a series of crushingly dull and often incomprehensible scenes of exposition and yakky gabfests.

New York Magazine Peter Rainer

This monstro-budgeted sequel to The Matrix has more than twice as many special effects as the original... there is also more than twice as much philosophic bull as before--and there was plenty of that the first time around.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Nathan Rabin

In making The Matrix's leaden answer to "The Phantom Menace," the Wachowski brothers seem to be afflicted with George Lucas Syndrome: They're so enthralled by the convoluted mythology of their own private universe that they've lost touch with its human core.

Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt

Like its predecessor, it's a hugely ambitious picture...But also like its predecessor, it cares far more about action, adventure, and violence than feelings, relationships, and ideas.

The New Yorker Adam Gopnik

For anyone who was transfixed by the first movie, watching the new one is a little like being unplugged from the Matrix: What was I experiencing all that time? Could it have been . . . all a dream? [19 May 2003, p.68]

LA Weekly John Powers

Although (Reeves) acting inclines toward the wooden, it's always been his weird genius (if that's the term) to exude a charmed aura, an uncanny sense of being the chosen one -- remember, he's been the Buddha. I'm not sure any other actor could play Neo nearly so well, for the others would all be working to seem like The One (as he's known), while Reeves conveys that quality just by showing up.

Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum

The martial arts choreography is neither graceful nor exciting--it's worthy of a video game. Only after cars, trucks, and a motorcycle join the action--easily outclassing all the actors--does the movie take on a modicum of vitality.

Slate David Edelstein

As messy and flat-footed as its predecessor is nimble and shapely. It's an ugly, bloated, repetitive movie that builds to a punch line that should have come an hour earlier (at least).