A Sociological/Marxist Analysis of "The Matrix"

[MaverickChaos]

First of all, I have simply copied my post from another forum, so I apologise if this is patronising to experienced left-wingers such as yourselves who just come across this thread and think "No Shit, Sherlock"

But I wanted to make a contribution to these boards so here it goes:


I'll begin with a question: "what does the Matrix mean?"
If you can't answer that "Does it have any meaning at all?"

Once you've thought about that, read my analogy. The Matrix is an Anti-Capitalist film, care to debate that with me?
I'll begin by mentioning who the characters are relative to society.

The Matrix - a dream world created by Hegemony to enshrine the Proletariat in a state of False Consciousness while the ruling class Capitalists can breed and exploit them for their own ends. It is portayed as an Westernised world
The Sentinels - The ruling class Capitalists, who built the Matrix for the aforementioned purpose. They have realised once their resources have died out, and the humans (Proletariat) have ended the class war, they can gain far more from indoctrinating and exploiting them for power (used in the literal sense in the movie) Perhaps portayed as Machines due to the heartless, remorseless nature of our rulers.
The freedom fighters - Neo is a man born into the Matrix who realises something is wrong with the system he lives in. Trinity and Morpheus confirm Neo's beliefs and allow him to "free his mind" and become a Vanguard for Communism. Once he does this he is freed from the boundaries of the system, and works around it so that he becomes more powerful than his rulers.
Agents - The state repressive apparatus used to enforce the ideology of the machines, they have much power due to the ignorance of the inhabitants of the Matrix. Again, they criticise Neo of being "only human" when they have freed themselves from the values of humanity. They have become omnipresent and omnipotent. They see humanity as "a disease".
Zion - the last remaining fortress of Communism, they defend their ideas with their lives as the Machines race to destroy it.
Red pill or the Blue pill? Neo takes the Red Pill, which is the traditional colour of Communism. Coincidence? Blue is also used on the Machines, and the alternate pill.
Jacking in, Jacking out If you jack someone out of the Matrix, they die. You need to allow them to see the light for themselves rather than forcing the ideals of Communism onto them.
Cypher: Too "weak" to stick with Communism. Sells out to the ideals of Capitalism because he's too materialistic. Supports the phrase "a man cannot live on bread alone". But who gives a shit? That motherfucker burns
Other little things supporting my analogy: Rage Against the Machine are used for the Credit sequences for the first two films, who are openly Communist. The Wachowski Brothers also directed "V for Vendetta" which is another Anti-Totalitarian film.

[rocker935]

Wow, very well done.

Considering that I was only about 9 when I first saw this movie, I missed a lot of these references. I think I'm going to go back and watch this movie again. Thanks for the quality post.

[Vageli]

I agree with everything you've written. Also something you may want to note: in later movies the agents no longer work for the machines but for their own gain (perhaps becoming corrupted with the power they hold over the weak). And your take on Cypher is interesting and I should have realized it sooner, especially when he was willing to trade in the safety of his "friends" for the promised riches he would have in the Matrix. Hell, the whole scene of him negotiating with Agent Smith could be used as an anti-Capitalist argument in and of itself.

Well done.

[Kropotesta]

I'm impressed but don't really see them as a vanguard. Sure they intellectuals, Morpheus, but I don't see them trying to influence to many workers and the like. Then I ain't seen it for a far while.

[Plagueround]

While I don't know if the intent was specifically anti-capitalism, it's definitely an anti-control statement...and since capitalism is a form of control, the analysis works. I only hope that when the real world revolution is going on, we can have a cave rave just as awesome as theirs. ;)

[Digitalism]

Wow man, this is pretty eye opening. I've never given this thought! Now let me just copy paste that on a HUGE, well known movie forum!

[MaverickChaos]

Wow, thankyou for all of your comments. I honestly didn't think it was that deep considering the posts I've seen on this forum. I haven't seen the film in quite a few years either, so there are obviously references I've missed out - that was all just from memory.

If you posted that in the movie forum, can I please have a link to the thread?

[MaverickChaos]

I'm impressed but don't really see them as a vanguard. Sure they intellectuals, Morpheus, but I don't see them trying to influence to many workers and the like. Then I ain't seen it for a far while.

Well Morpheus have influenced more workers, but with the repressive powers of the state they have been forced to only free those who are already willing in some form. They obviously couldn't get away with mass propaganda rallies, as the population wouldn't accept it due to the indocrination and totalitarian hegemony.

[Raúl Duke]

Although I would like to add that as I recall in the end the matrix doesn't get destroyed (however, it changes I think...)...

Also the jacking in and out analogy is a little odd and communism itself is "materialistic".

[ckaihatsu]

*** WARNING: THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS ***

MaverickChaos -- thanks for introducing this thread. I'm a big fan of The Matrix series, mostly because it has the richest story threads I've ever seen. It is a finely crafted, high-concept piece of work, not to mention its technical sophistication and production values.

I actually have designated a genre for this type of premise / storyline, which I call a "philosophical thriller", meaning that the entire construction of the movie's universe rests on a philosophical construction, namely the brain-in-a-jar one: How do we know that we're actually real bodies inhabiting a real world, and that *I'm* not actually just a brain floating in a jar of liquid, with wires hooked into my brain, feeding me all of the correct impulses to give me the *impression* that I'm an individual body, living in a real world, with others around me?

It's the ultimate dualistic / idealist trip, one which serves as an *excellent* premise for imaginative storylines, like The Matrix series, or The Thirteenth Floor, or eXistenZ, and, to a lesser extent, The Running Man.

(Honorable mention for straight dystopian themes: Equilibrium, and the Cube series.)



The Matrix - a dream world created by Hegemony to enshrine the Proletariat in a state of False Consciousness while the ruling class Capitalists can breed and exploit them for their own ends. It is portayed as an Westernised world



While I don't know if the intent was specifically anti-capitalism, it's definitely an anti-control statement...and since capitalism is a form of control, the analysis works. I only hope that when the real world revolution is going on, we can have a cave rave just as awesome as theirs. ;)


The backstory of the rise of the Matrix, along with several side-stories that serve to flesh out more of the Matrix world, are provided in a series of 9 short animations in the 'Animatrix' -- it's some of the best stuff you'll ever watch.

Basically society has developed humanoid-type robots that gain artificial consciousness and grow into the role of an oppressed minority. If you want genuine political themes they exist at this stage in the story. There is even a segment about one butler-type robot in particular, by the name of [bee-one-six-six-ee-are], 'B166er' -- who is in the direct likeness of the Bigger Thomas character from Richard Wright's _Native Son_ -- Bigger Thomas was an archetypal character -- a simple-sided black youth who falls victim to frustration and violent lashing-out caused by the racist station he has to inhabit in life, created by society around him.

The conscious machines grow into a mass minority who begin to rise up and demand their rights alongside human rights. They are dismissed by the people's world body, the UN, and are even treated as an inclement threat, with military offensives to follow. (I'll leave off here.)



The Sentinels - The ruling class Capitalists, who built the Matrix for the aforementioned purpose. They have realised once their resources have died out, and the humans (Proletariat) have ended the class war, they can gain far more from indoctrinating and exploiting them for power (used in the literal sense in the movie) Perhaps portayed as Machines due to the heartless, remorseless nature of our rulers.


This is more of a side note -- on a tangent: The only flaws I could find in the entire structure of the Matrix world -- and they're rather minor, technical ones -- are that human beings would be *poor* sources of raw energy -- why go through the trouble of growing human bodies when you could just source energy directly from whatever you're feeding them? Over the long run it would be a diminishing base of energy. Also, I noticed that once a person had been liberated from the Matrix their body would be disconnected from the pod and it would be flushed down into some sort of sewer system. You would think that the machines would guard that sewer system since they know that a human resistance movement exists which recruits its bodies -- literally -- from the sewer system.... Anyway.... They're minor points.



The freedom fighters - Neo is a man born into the Matrix who realises something is wrong with the system he lives in. Trinity and Morpheus confirm Neo's beliefs and allow him to "free his mind" and become a Vanguard for Communism. Once he does this he is freed from the boundaries of the system, and works around it so that he becomes more powerful than his rulers.


I wish the Matrix series *did* have more of a vanguard theme -- unfortunately it doesn't -- the main plot is more messianic, with Neo being "The One", or a regurgitation of "the great white hope".

Trinity, incidentally, is more motherly than wife-ly -- she "births" Neo into the real world (onboard the Nebuchadnezzar) by extracting the machine-bug from his stomach and then bringing him to Morpheus to choose the red pill or blue pill.

Neo is characterized as digital-spiritual, since he is already well versed in computer programming and online information networks -- they are the technological predecessors of the much-more-advanced Matrix information backbone in the future he is brought into. He and Trinity are shown to be more adept with all things virtual and cognitive-oriented -- materially "spiritual" -- almost like a modern-day Jesus-Madonna team...!



Agents - The state repressive apparatus used to enforce the ideology of the machines, they have much power due to the ignorance of the inhabitants of the Matrix. Again, they criticise Neo of being "only human" when they have freed themselves from the values of humanity. They have become omnipresent and omnipotent. They see humanity as "a disease".


The agents (Agent Smith) are all programs in the Matrix that run at the behest of the mainframe of the machine world, which has been locked in a terminal struggle with the human race ever since the humans waged war against the nascent machine world, and machine rights. Now the human race is the minority, and they are waging an underground campaign of resistance to the Matrix program, and to the actual machine world that runs the Matrix program.

The agents have free reign to dominate society in the Matrix, as the bourgeoisie does to a large degree in our real world -- being in a dominant position, and infinitely transmorgrifiable, they are masters at creating social reality in the Matrix, so as to constantly outmanuever the life-choices of all individuals who are plugged-in by default (while their real bodies are immobilized in those pod-farms)

We later learn that some areas are somewhat outside of the domain of the Matrix proper, and that there are other programs which are more independent -- they can be likened to third-party software programs while the agents are definitely OS-platform-specific routines -- those that perform the standard functions of the mainframe computer

When Neo, aided by Trinity's love (or synergy) overcomes the force of the agents in the Matrix, he greatly supersedes their ability, and that of the makeup of the Matrix itself, thereby liberating the agent programs from their attachment to the functioning of the mainframe itself -- the agents become 'free agents', still carrying out their fundamental program instructions, but now detached from any master responsibilities -- kind of like the ronin, or samurai freed from service after the fall of feudalism in Japan. The agents encounter a profound existential crisis because they still have their abilities but will not know the meaning of victory once they accomplish it



Zion - the last remaining fortress of Communism, they defend their ideas with their lives as the Machines race to destroy it.


Zion is the last remaining fortress of the resistance, that is -- a rough analogy might be the tunnels of the Viet Minh during the Vietnam War.



Jacking in, Jacking out If you jack someone out of the Matrix, they die. You need to allow them to see the light for themselves rather than forcing the ideals of Communism onto them.


This isn't true -- Neo was killed in the hallway by the agents' bullets, but he got reinforcement from Trinity's love, which allowed him to overcome death in the Matrix. In the Animatrix the character Kid managed to rescue himself through investigation into his given reality and he chose to commit suicide in the (default) Matrix world, after he realized it *was* an artificial world -- that was enough to release his physical body from bondage in the pod, and he was then rescued into the resistance -- the Matrix equivalent of attaining Nirvana, I suppose.

The movie notes that people need to be rescued when they're relatively young or else the cognitive dissonance that results from being brought into the real reality is too much for them -- note that Neo barfed and freaked out, initially.



Cypher: Too "weak" to stick with Communism. Sells out to the ideals of Capitalism because he's too materialistic. Supports the phrase "a man cannot live on bread alone". But who gives a shit? That motherfucker burns
Other little things supporting my analogy: Rage Against the Machine are used for the Credit sequences for the first two films, who are openly Communist. The Wachowski Brothers also directed "V for Vendetta" which is another Anti-Totalitarian film.


Cypher is obviously the mole, or sell-out, in the resistance -- he informs the agents as to the whereabouts of the expedition group, thereby leading them to the correct location to trap the group in the building. Morpheus is captured and tortured in an attempt to get his passcodes to the Zion mainframe which would compromise the resistance's home refuge. In the Animatrix there is a character who is a young, too-professional private detective who plays right into a mercenary role for the machines and has to be executed by Trinity because of it.



I'm impressed but don't really see them as a vanguard. Sure they intellectuals, Morpheus, but I don't see them trying to influence to many workers and the like. Then I ain't seen it for a far while.


Well Morpheus have influenced more workers, but with the repressive powers of the state they have been forced to only free those who are already willing in some form. They obviously couldn't get away with mass propaganda rallies, as the population wouldn't accept it due to the indocrination and totalitarian hegemony.


Again, I'd say that the human population really forms more of a resistance movement, like an underground railroad, away from bondage in the Matrix, for those few who can manage to escape. The numbers and role in material production are nowhere near what's needed for a communist movement.

The plot of the Matrix series actually gets fairly intricate toward the conclusion. The resistance realizes that they are vastly outnumbered and overpowered by the machines, and time is quickly running out as the machines drill closer to the Zion refuge. The conventionally minded general is overruled by the council which acquiesces to Morpheus' long shot of allowing Neo to take a ship to the machine world, based on his own dream-like vision and conviction.

The climax and conclusion fulfills the messianic-oriented storyline that's put into motion with the Neo character as the protagonist. He is the anomaly of messianic force that defies and upsets the Architect's engineering of the Matrix -- Neo alone makes it to the machine world to cut a deal -- he argues that the Agent Smith program has become like a virus that even the machine world -- akin to the operating system of a mainframe computer -- cannot control. The Agent Smith program threatens to spread uncontrollably, and Neo offers to use his greatly enhanced ability to fight Agent Smith to a defeat, in the best interests of the humans and of the machines.

The machine world agrees and Neo alone proceeds to fight Agent Smith in a battle royale for the salvation of the human world, its freed component now numbering only in the thousands, bunkered in at Zion.



Although I would like to add that as I recall in the end the matrix doesn't get destroyed (however, it changes I think...)...

Also the jacking in and out analogy is a little odd and communism itself is "materialistic".


In the end Neo is overcome by Agent Smith, but this does two things:

- Agent Smith is unable to appreciate the meaning of the victory he thinks he has just won -- in accordance with dialectical materialism his victory is his defeat because no part of his programming gives him any *meaning* in achieving a total victory over the humans, despite all of his tough talk.

Freed from the mainframe, and in the role of an independent agent, Smith has the *ability* to overcome Neo, and does, but then is simultaneously thrown into a state of confusion because he's reached the limits of his programming.

- Neo, defeated in battle, has obviously reached his own limits of ability, but it doesn't matter, because his alliance with the machine world comes into play and his consciousness is merged with that of the machines -- he willingly sacrifices his consciousness / being to the machine world, thus humanizing it, and, as part of the deal, the machine world calls off its attack of the sentinels on Zion. The Matrix, and all outlying environs, along with all of its minority programs, are released from the infestation / hegemony of Agent Smith, *and* from the engineering of the machine world / Architect.

Presumably the consciousnesses of all human beings are free to roam the universe of the Matrix, uncoerced or mindfucked. The issue of the real bodies in the pods is left unaddressed -- perhaps a phase of Reconstruction would presumably follow....


Chris




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[Os Cangaceiros]

I took a film class once, and we analyzed the Matrix as an example of postmodernism. Specifically, the whole notion that Jean Baudrillard had of "simulacrum", and the illusion and symbolism of the Matrix replacing the actual material world, and in a sense absorbing the truth in it (in other words, illusion becoming reality). Taking that into account, I'm not sure that it could be analyzed through the strict lense of materialism, at least that's not what the creators intended for it.

Interestingly enough, we also studied quite a bit of Gramsci and Benjamin, and in general the whole idea of "cultural hegemony".

Asian philosophy also seems to factor in quite a bit.

[MaverickChaos]

So I take it that ckaihatsu is a fan of the Matrix then?

[MaverickChaos]

Yes, the Matrix could also be analysed quite easily from the Post-Modernist standpoint - questioning our perception of reality and so forth, but I just wanted to stick to one perspective of it - which I can see now that I didn't do very well thanks to ckaihatsu.

[ckaihatsu]

I took a film class once, and we analyzed the Matrix as an example of postmodernism. Specifically, the whole notion that Jean Baudrillard had of "simulacrum", and the illusion and symbolism of the Matrix replacing the actual material world, and in a sense absorbing the truth in it (in other words, illusion becoming reality).

Taking that into account, I'm not sure that it could be analyzed through the strict lense of materialism, at least that's not what the creators intended for it.

Interestingly enough, we also studied quite a bit of Gramsci and Benjamin, and in general the whole idea of "cultural hegemony".

Asian philosophy also seems to factor in quite a bit.


Agora,

After initially being around politics for awhile I was quickly becoming weary of the overly academized -- if you will -- style of the political meanings that were routinely being discussed. There are a finite number of themes in politics, and one can become familiar with them fairly quickly. In the past few years I've been constructing diagrams for precisely this end. Here's one, which is a worldview -- which I also subscribe to -- that encompasses the themes you've brought up.

Worldview diagram
http://tinyurl.com/ypmxx3



Taking that into account, I'm not sure that it could be analyzed through the strict lense of materialism, at least that's not what the creators intended for it.


I'm glad you qualified your statement here, because I'm sure you realize that it doesn't matter *what* any author puts down on paper, or on the screen -- the rest of us can certainly go ahead and provide a materialist rundown on any particular creation.



So I take it that ckaihatsu is a fan of the Matrix then?


Yeah, ya think?



Yes, the Matrix could also be analysed quite easily from the Post-Modernist standpoint - questioning our perception of reality and so forth, but I just wanted to stick to one perspective of it - which I can see now that I didn't do very well thanks to ckaihatsu.


Well, I, too, would like to view The Matrix strictly as a political metaphor, but it doesn't work out quite that smoothly. The messianic part really gets in the way, and the human population is too outnumbered for them to be as formidable as we'd like.

One of these days either I, or maybe someone else, will write a good story that is based on a successful global communist struggle -- to date I just haven't seen any, but it'd be nice...!

[Os Cangaceiros]

Agora,

After initially being around politics for awhile I was quickly becoming weary of the overly academized -- if you will -- style of the political meanings that were routinely being discussed.

Heh, yeah, usually I try not to sound like such a pseudointellectual. This subject interests me, though, and I have a bit of training in it...with emphasis on the word "bit". I'm not too big on Marxism, exactly, but I do find some of the cultural analysis to be interesting.