What makes it different from others?

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

Easily the biggest piece of Right wing non sense propaganda I ever saw.

Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

Well, the thing about the movie is that it has great animation, stories, representation, suspense, concept and thrill…. But well, all though it will make you think, rethink, contemplate and stick to till the end enjoying the film to the last bit….. But the thing is you won't make anything out of it. Cause the doesn't show a story but a couple of them. It's basically a side addition to the Matrix series and if you wanna understand this anime…. You gotta watch the Matrix series first….So don't watch this before you watch that….But don't dare to miss this after watching the Matrix series.... It goes everywhere the film didn't.... It's totally worth the time....

As part of the hype generated by the "Matrix Reloaded," this series of anime shorts was developed and distributed to provide more insight to the worlds in the Matrix saga (and possibly to wrangle up some more fans). With the efforts of Yoshiaki Kawajiri, Shinichiro Watanabe, Peter Chung, and other Japanese directors, it's a varied collection that offers multiple insights and a variety of styles and quality. This collection is like a sampler plate for anime (incidentally, it was the first anime I really watched and got into, and it inspired me to check out the real thing)."The Final Flight of the Osiris" is the first of the lot, and of all computer-animated films I know of, this one still shows superior quality. Characters look incredibly life-like at times; by modern standards, it resembles a video game clip more than anything, but considering that there aren't a whole lot of CGI movies with human characters, this film is quite impressive. It's a short, action-packed, and fairly invoking. Above all, it helps bridge the gap between the first two Matrix movies."The Second Renaissance" Parts I and II serve as the Matrix prequel, chronicling the war between man and machine. It's extremely bleak and quite violent. With its portrayal of nuclear devastation, environmental warfare, and the eventual enslavement of the human race, these two episodes really get to me. The animation is quite smooth and slick, with lots of memorable imagery. It is fast-paced, almost erratically so, but the biblical-style narrative keeps it entrancing. In a proper Matrix marathon, I place these before the three main movies, and it is worthwhile seeing for all Matrix fans."Kid's Story" doesn't have the same momentum as the last few episodes, but it is a nice little story that shows how the Kid character comes into being in the Matrix sequels. Its slower pacing and sketchy graphics don't really appeal to me, but it is another requisite bridge between the first and second movies."Program" has always been my favorite of the lot, featuring fantastic visuals and fast-paced action. The duel between two lovers is quite intense, and their actions really underscore the philosophical issue of whether or not it's better to live a lie or suffer the truth. The animation quality here is strong and the character designs are excellent."World Record" is one of my least favorites in this collection. It does have a really funky style and quality, with interesting visuals. It is a pretty good story, but it is lacking in action."Beyond" strikes me more as a Miyazaki-style story, with its emphasis on child-like whimsy and wonder. It has a cast of likable kids, some wonderful visuals, and it is a cute little story overall. Once again, it doesn't offer much action, but it isn't totally dull either."A Detective's Story" is my least favorite of the lot. It does have some nice film-noir style visuals and characters. I'm just disappointed in the story, which is a little too short to serve as an effective mystery, and by its conclusion it doesn't really resonate."Matriculated" is something very weird and trippy, almost dream-like at spots. It's a solid and original story with a profound conclusion and some interesting implications. Its visuals are fantastic, and it's the one other story here that I consider most worthwhile.All of these stories show quality animation style and quality; some of the digitally-animated backgrounds may show some anomalies, but it holds up for the most part. Voice-acting can be a little cheesy, but is still decent. Production designs are strong, with plenty of cool settings, vehicles, weapons, robots, and objects that correlate to the Matrix movies well. The feature also has one of the coolest soundtracks.I highly recommend at least the first three stories to Matrix fans; the feature as a whole I'd recommend as a rental to anybody who's interested. But if you're getting this as part of the Ultimate Collection DVD or Blu-Ray package, why not check it out? 5/5 (entertainment: 4.5/5, stories: 5/5, films: 4.5/5)

Animatrix is a collection of nine animated shorts related to different aspects of Matrix. The stories are directly or indirectly related to what happens in the movie, filling-in some unexplained facts, and exploring the matrix from an outsider-insider point of view."Final Flight of the Osiris" (Andy Jones) is a literal transcription of an episode in the movie. The animation itself is amazing, and the opening scene extremely sexy, but the virtuosity of the video-game animation is not paired with a creative approach. I suspect, it was included in the compilation to catch the eye of those video-gamers who might end buying the Matrix's video-game."Program" (Yoshiaki Kawajiri) is an Akira-style short animation piece. The use of basic colors (white, red, black and gray, traditional Japanese elements (castles, samurais, swords, bamboo, silhouettes), and an edgy Manga action creates a visually astonishing piece of animation. It re-creates Cypher's betrayal of his crew of renegades, but giving it a medieval-Japan-Samurai twist."World Record" (Takeshi Koike) is an original piece that uses the matrix concept to expand it on its own, unconnected to any direct episode in the movie. It is about the awakening to the reality of the matrix by the main character, a famous Afro-American runner. The piece is shot in a mix of grays, blacks, beige and yellow colors, and uses shading brilliantly. The backgrounds are very artsy, according to Koike they were inspired by Gaudi's architecture. I found the piece, despite being made by a Japanese, very American in its vibe and energy, in the drawing of the characters and their personalities; still, there is a powerful unique narrative that is very Japanese, that tries to tell a story without forgetting technical innovation. Terrific is the way the movement of the athlete is captured, slowed and micro-analyzed, and also the fact that the Afro-Americans are not drawn in brown colors but in different shades of gray. Supercool."The Second Renaissance 1 and 2" (Mahiro Maeda) fill in the missing story of what happened to the Human Race until they became dominated by the machines. In another words, it offers a mythology of the Matrix that was only hinted in the movie. It uses colorful Mandalas (with a mix of Buddhist and Brahman elements)attached to the female goddess-narrator, but has subdued colors when the documentary-like piece fill the viewer with the details of the war between humans and machines. It has a terrific story-telling, and it is very universal in a way. It uses elements of all religions, shows humans from different religions and cultures, depicts the violent acts of the humans using embedded references to tragic events happened in recent wars (WWII, Vietnam, Irak) and offers an unadorned, still entertaining, view of the sins of the modern human race."Beyond" (Koji Morimoto) is a beautiful naturalistic short, Ghibli-Studio-like in the use of colors, shadows and lighting, the magic realism of of daily life, and the virtuosity of the drawing. The episode has a connection to the Matrix, the cat appearing from another dimension in the movie, is the one here. But that is is. Morimoto creates for us an error in the matrix program affecting a house visited for the characters in this movie. The house is sort of enchanted, and visitors can levitate. It replies with verisimilitude to the question, how would humans notice a loop in the program? how would affect them? Simply wonderful."Kid's Story" (Shinichiro Watanabe) tells about the awakening to the reality of an American teen student who has been contacted by Neo. It has a lucid dream approach and has some lyric moments. However, this is mostly an escape story, full of action and angst. The animation style is a bit weird, as it the movie was constantly blur. This is intentional, and it is used to tell the viewer that our character is in a reality that is not dream, still not completely awake. The piece is extremely dynamic, with a great music, and some poetic moments, but not as engaging as the others."A Detective Story" (Shinichiro Watanabe) is a masterpiece of animation, drawn in a grainy BW that mimics ink-drawing, but adding some cut-out colors, typical of some American comics for adults. It also replicates the mood and style of the detective B-movies of the 50s, but mixed with a retro-futuristic Chinatown approach the matrix (very Dark-City in a way). It is super-stylish and engaging, linked to the movie by the search of Trinity. The music is very jazzy, perfect for a 1950s sort of film. I would have liked to be longer and a bit more daring, so much I enjoyed it!"Matriculated" (Peter Chung) is a very psychedelic, hallucinogenic, colorful and philosophical piece of animation, and the most daring, from a narrative point of view, of the lot. It does reverse the matrix principles of the machines using a program mimicking human reality and subconscious world to put them at their service. In this short, the renegades reprogram the captured machines and connect them to their consciousness so it tricks the machine thinking that is a program and that they are also machines. It explores the concept of universal consciousness, and how machines could be fooled. It is a very Asimov approach to the story.Animatrix is funky, artistic, and very entertaining. Not for small kids, though. The main problem with the compilation is that the quality of the pieces varies enormously, and that you need to watch it after the Matrix (the movie), and understand the intricacies of the matrix itself to comprehend the stories in the shorts. It is not rocket-science, but if you haven't done that, the movie won't work for you. Animatrix is a companion to the film, therefore, watching it on its own could be disappointing, unless you are interested in animation per se.

Warning Spoilers included.Let's look at "Final Flight Of The Osiris first. This CGI short film has graphics so advanced that the first time I saw the film, I mistook the characters for real people. These visuals serve as an example of the lengths the films go to to inspire awe in the viewer.Then take a gander at "The Second Renaissance Parts 1 and 2" Which tell the tale of how the machines were, in essence massacred by humanity at first, but then rose up and crushed an ever more desperate Human race. "Kid's Story" Is quite beautiful to look at and tells the tale of a kid who senses that something is wrong with the world he lives in.That was just a small sample of the 9 Short films which compromise "The Animatrix". The others continue in this mold, but I want to focus my attention on "The Second Renaissance". These 2 shorts are the best of the lot, and come packed with mind-blowing visuals and awe-inspiring Storytelling. They both are documentaries about the rise of the machines, which leads to the matrix trilogy. The first part deals with the fall from grace of the machines. Opening with a beautiful shot, the short then encompasses the entire world and it's history of antagonism against the "loyal and pure" machines, who only want to be respected. Once a machine kills a human to save itself, humanity realizes that a rebellion is nigh, and orders the destruction of all Artificially intelligent machines. The film uses images from humanity's darkest days, from the Holocaust, to the Vietnam War's atrocities to fully shock the viewer.The machines build a city in the promised land (biblical imagery is present throughout both shorts), and name it 01, the new nation quickly destroys the global economy with it's cheap products and man prepares for war. Part 2 deals with the fallout of man's choices and actions. The short opens with a sustained nuclear bombardment of 01, after which the machines strike out against humanity with huge armies. The machines massive victories cause humanity to turn to desperate measures for victory, they destroy the skies, and ensure the Matrix's rise. The machines win, in a climactic battle (the greatest battle ever put on film), and the humans surrender, the machines set up the power plants and use humans (conveyed in horrifying images of torture) as batteries. This is all whilst the narrator (ironically a Zion mainframe historical file, hence a machine) expresses her sadness, and delivers the most powerful line in the movie, "May there be mercy on man and machine for their sins".This is the most disturbing, and most powerful film I've ever seen.All of the shorts are directed by acclaimed Anime directors, and drawn in the Anime style (with the exception of Osiris), from the film-Noir "Detective Story", to the stunning "Matriculated", the result is a collection of absolutely stunning films that will leave you disturbed, and questioning what it means to be human.