Here is something very interesting: an Animatrix short that defies the typical story of someone coming to the truth, or close to it, and rather an exploration of the ways in which the Matrix as a program can cause amazing and surrealistic experiences outside the realm of ordinary experience. The aside in "Reloaded" about the supernatural coming from glitches in the system was an interesting revelation but not entirely developed as well with those dread-headed albinos; this short more than makes up for it.
A young girl loses her cat and enlists a couple of even younger pranksters to help her find it. They track the cat to an abandoned, "haunted" house, where weird things are afoot. Things seem to come and go out of empty space at random, the laws of physics can be defied (and played with), and objects are rendered into various levels of suspended animation. At first the young girl finds them terrifying, but slowly begins to enjoy the freedom she has over reality, and plays with it. However, her adventure is short-lived once the Agents key into the fact that there is an area of the city that is "unrendered".
This short is really smart in the way it mixes both audience familiarity with the Matrix with a sense of wonderment and freedom to the new laws as defined by a (broken) part of the overall program. The animation itself clues into what is actually happening, whereas it's also kept in mystery through the eyes of the characters, who interpret only what they can see. It has also a somewhat sober and saddening ending. It's also nice that this experience doesn't lead to visits by Neo, Trinity, or Morpheus, but that it gets to stand on its own.
I'm actually surprised that this short wasn't directed by Satoshi Kon. The animation style reminded me strongly of some of the better episodes of "Paranoia Agent". If you, the reader, are one who was intrigued by this specific animation and want to see more things like it, check out the aforementioned series and his feature-length "Paprika", as well as other movies he's made.
--PolarisDiB
A young girl loses her cat and enlists a couple of even younger pranksters to help her find it. They track the cat to an abandoned, "haunted" house, where weird things are afoot. Things seem to come and go out of empty space at random, the laws of physics can be defied (and played with), and objects are rendered into various levels of suspended animation. At first the young girl finds them terrifying, but slowly begins to enjoy the freedom she has over reality, and plays with it. However, her adventure is short-lived once the Agents key into the fact that there is an area of the city that is "unrendered".
This short is really smart in the way it mixes both audience familiarity with the Matrix with a sense of wonderment and freedom to the new laws as defined by a (broken) part of the overall program. The animation itself clues into what is actually happening, whereas it's also kept in mystery through the eyes of the characters, who interpret only what they can see. It has also a somewhat sober and saddening ending. It's also nice that this experience doesn't lead to visits by Neo, Trinity, or Morpheus, but that it gets to stand on its own.
I'm actually surprised that this short wasn't directed by Satoshi Kon. The animation style reminded me strongly of some of the better episodes of "Paranoia Agent". If you, the reader, are one who was intrigued by this specific animation and want to see more things like it, check out the aforementioned series and his feature-length "Paprika", as well as other movies he's made.
--PolarisDiB