Will these films end up earning box office returns as cool as Carrie-Anne Moss looks wearing that leather outfit and those shades? Well, the overwhelming hype on the Web seems to suggest as much!

The first "Matrix" took in $460 million at box offices globally and was the first film to sell over a million copies on DVD. It constituted a benchmark film, with its jaw-dropping state-of-the-art special effects and cinematography, and catapulted its then mostly unknown writer-directors, Larry and Andy Wachowski, into superstardom. Well...Their name became well known, anyway. (The two brothers have made every effort to stay out of the media spotlight.)

Their paranoid vision of a world where reality is a computer-simulation and mankind is in a kind of comatose slavery to super-sophisticated machines has definitely struck a nerve with the movie-going public.

Now, along come the sequels! Made back-to-back at Fox Studios Sydney, Australia between March 2001 and September 2002, "The Matrix Reloaded" and "The Matrix Revolutions" are produced at a combined cost of $300 million. Intended as one big film that takes place over a 24 hour period, this is probably the costiest movie project ever, having the combined cost of all three "Lord of the Rings" movies. (The original "Matrix" cost $66 million.)

Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Anne Moss and Laurence Fishburne are all back, as well as some new characters, one of which will be an evil Matrix temptress, played by Monica Bellucci.

"Reloaded" will end in mid-frame, after a chase sequence along a walled motorway that "makes all other cinematic car chases look like the Keystone Cops" (according to the producer), and that alone "should ensure that everyone is queuing up to see "Revolutions". A third of the films' budget went towards special effects, once again under the control of John Gaeta, who won the Oscar for the first "Matrix".

And get ready for more of those awesome "Kung Fu style" fight scenes that were such staples of the original film. The actors have all been trained by Woo-Ping Yuen, who choreographed the fight scenes in "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" and directed Jackie Chan's early films.

The elusive Wachowskis (two thirtysomethings from Chicago) leave the talking to their producer, the bearded Hollywood veteran Joel Silver, when it comes to discussing the much-anticipated films, and they're reluctant to reveal much about their vision. "They think the films should speak for themselves and the audience should take from them what they want to take. They feel that if they're precise about it, it'll rob the audience of their enjoyment.", explains Silver.

So...Release those films, already! I don't know about you guys, but I can no longer handle the wait! *L*

See all of you at the theatre, then! Ah, and feel free to buy me some popcorn and a drink. ;) Until next time, peeps! Ta-ta!

RABID TRIBBLE (CL4)
Live long and multiply by the millions! And may those millions prosper!