Animatrix, The (DVD)

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How you respond to "The Animatrix" depends on how much you like the Wachowski brothers´ vision as seen in "The Matrix" motion pictures. Aside from a few visual effects innovations, I thought that 1999´s "The Matrix" was simply another competently-made action movie. I wasn´t really astounded by what it did because I´d seen plenty of martial arts sequences and gunfights that were more exciting than what I saw in "The Matrix". However, I looked forward to seeing "The Matrix Reloaded" because Larry and Andy Wachowski have an eye for what looks cool on film. Unfortunately, "The Matrix Reloaded" was a turn in the wrong direction for the franchise as the sibling filmmakers decided to infuse the movie with half-baked ideas and dialogue that sounds cool but means nothing. I also tired of its interminable action set pieces and its waste of its two most intriguing characters/actors, The Merovingian and Persephone.

At any rate, after the financial success of "The Matrix", the Wachowski brothers decided to approach several production houses that specialize in making what is commonly known in the United States as anime--an incorrect term, really, because anime is the French word for animation, and the Japanese refer to animation as...well, ah-ni-may-shon. The result is "The Animatrix", a collection of nine animated short films that have something to do with "The Matrix" trilogy. Some of the short films are simple stories about random people and machines. One of them, "Final Flight of the Osiris", offers a story thread that is referenced in both "The Matrix Reloaded" and the "Enter the Matrix" videogame.

The "The Animatrix" DVD offers the following short films:

--"Final Flight of the Osiris" (Andy Jones, Square USA, Inc.)

--"The Second Renaissance Part I" and "The Second Renaissance Part II" (Mahiro Maeda, Studio4°C, Tokyo)

--"Kid´s Story" (Shinichiro Watanabe, Studio4°C, Tokyo)

--"Program" (Yoshiaki Kawajiri, Madhouse Studios, Tokyo)

--"World Record" (Yoshiaki Kawajiri, Madhouse Studios, Tokyo(

--"Beyond" (Koji Morimoto, Studio4°C, Tokyo)

--"A Detective Story" Shinichiro Watanabe, Studio4°C, Tokyo)

--"Matriculated" (Peter Chung, DNA, Seoul).

The best one of the bunch is probably "Final Flight of the Osiris", in which the crew members of the Osiris have to deliver a package inside The Matrix in order to warn Zion of an impending invasion by the machines. "...Osiris" was made by the Square Pictures team that created "Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within", and it looks fabulous. The piece manages to squeeze a romance and some witty visuals into its brief running time.

The two "The Second Renaissance" shorts describe how humanity came to be enslaved by machines. Plot-wise, these two are probably the most important to the "The Matrix" universe, though artistically, everything is done in a straightforward, perfunctory manner. "Kid´s Story" gives us a glimpse of a high school student´s Neo-like awakening. "Program" takes us inside a test of a young girl´s resolve to fight The Matrix. "World Record" focuses on a runner who nearly runs into an awareness of The Matrix. "Beyond" involves a couple of youths who stumble upon an area where faulty programming lets them play around like Neo does--they just haven´t had their minds freed yet is all. "A Detective Story" follows a detective´s search for Trinity. I was so bored by the time that I got to "Matriculated" that I didn´t even bother watching more than a minute of it.

There are plenty of visual flashes in "The Animatrix", but some of the shorts are very, very slow. They´re not slow in the methodical sense--they simply drag their feet. I didn´t get any sense of enrichment from watching this DVD--not in terms of understanding the world of "The Matrix" and certainly not in terms of appreciating animation. As with the movies, I´ve seen better elsewhere when it comes to what "The Animatrix" offers.

I liked "The Matrix"--I really did. However, given what is being shown in "The Matrix Reloaded" and "The Animatrix", I´m convinced that the Wachowski brothers bit off more than they could chew properly. There are some good things in "The Animatrix", but given that anything on the DVD has to be understood within the context of the motion picture series, this is a purchase for die-hard fans only.

Video:
The 2.20:1 anamorphic widescreen video image is pretty impressive--if a tad dark. Some of the shorts were computer animated, and some of the shorts were drawn by hand. None of the films seems to suffer from any source print defects (such as scratches, dust particles, etc.), and there aren´t any big-time compression artifacts, either. However, even with all the lights off in my home theatre room, I thought that the DVD could´ve been done with a tad more brightness than given. (Since everything is very stylized, some viewers may take issue with the "fuzziness" of the animation.)