The Animatrix

"Free your mind."

2003 1h 42m EN

👍

7.2

SOLID

★7.2TMDB · 1,863

AnimationScience Fiction

Synopsis

Spoiler shield

Straight from the creators of the groundbreaking Matrix trilogy, this collection of short animated films from the world's leading anime directors fuses computer graphics and Japanese anime to provide the background of the Matrix universe and the conflict between man and machines. The shorts include Final Flight of the Osiris, The Second Renaissance, Kid's Story, Program, World Record, Beyond, A Detective Story and Matriculated.

“Free your mind.”

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Cast

Keanu Reeves
Neo ("Kid's Story") (voice)
Carrie-Anne Moss
Trinity ("Kid's Story" and "A Detective Story") (voice)
Clayton Watson
The Kid ("Kid's Story") (voice)
Pamela Adlon
Jue ("Final Flight of the Osiris") / Manabu ("Beyond") (voice)
Melinda Clarke
Alexa ("Matriculated") (voice)
John DiMaggio
Crew Man ("Final Flight of the Osiris") / Kaiser ("Program") (voice)
Kevin Michael Richardson
Thadeus ("Final Flight of Osiris") / Cop ("Kid's Story") / Agent #2 ("World Record")
Tom Kenny
Operator ("Final Flight of Osiris")

Credits

Behind the camera

Director: Peter Chung
Writers: Yoshiaki Kawajiri, Kōji Morimoto, Shinichiro Watanabe
Languages: English, Japanese
Countries: Japan, United States of America, South Korea

Want more? Switch to Cinephile mode in the header for DP, composer, budget, box office, production companies, keywords, and release history.

Did you know?

Fun facts 🍿

1 / 8

MONEY

Did you know

Grossed $68M — a 13.6× return. The kind of profit studios chase for a decade.

MoodPlayr · trivia#01

2 / 8

ERA

Did you know

Released 23 years ago.

MoodPlayr · trivia#02

3 / 8

WORLD

Did you know

Dialogue crosses 2 languages: English, Japanese.

MoodPlayr · trivia#03

4 / 8

WORLD

Did you know

International production across 3 countries: Japan, United States of America, South Korea.

MoodPlayr · trivia#04

5 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Original score by Don Davis. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.

MoodPlayr · trivia#05

6 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Editor Christopher S. Capp shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.

MoodPlayr · trivia#06

7 / 8

CAST

Did you know

Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss and Clayton Watson carry the top of the cast.

MoodPlayr · trivia#07

8 / 8

FACT

Did you know

Marketing tagline: "Free your mind.".

MoodPlayr · trivia#08

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Peter Chung directs. Don Davis scores. Christopher S. Capp cuts. Made its budget back several times over at the box office. Produced in Japan, United States of America, South Korea. Dialogue in English, Japanese.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

1Grossed $68M — a 13.6× return. The kind of profit studios chase for a decade.
2Released 23 years ago.
3Dialogue crosses 2 languages: English, Japanese.
4International production across 3 countries: Japan, United States of America, South Korea.
5Original score by Don Davis. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.
6Editor Christopher S. Capp shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
7Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss and Clayton Watson carry the top of the cast.
8Marketing tagline: "Free your mind.".
9IMDB entry: tt0328832 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.
10Classified under 16 themes, including "martial arts", "artificial intelligence (a.i.)", "hacker", "virtual reality".
11Released under 20 different titles around the world.

The technical file

Original score: Don Davis
Editing: Christopher S. Capp
Runtime: 102 min · 1h 42m
Aspect ratio (typical): 1.37:1 (Academy)
Status: Released
Budget: $5,000,000
Box office: $68,000,000
Return: 1360% of budget
Original language: EN
Certification (US): NR
IMDB: The Animatrix (2003)

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Peter Chung

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Community reviews

What people are saying

NeoBrowser2013-07-20
Featuring nine animated shorts set in and around The Matrix, written and directed by the cream of Japanese anime creators, with the Wachowski brothers' blessing, The Animatrix arrives with a weight of expectation similar to Reloaded. However, while it's visually sublime - a magical mystery tour of animation styles- it doesn't fully deliver. Overall, the disc is debilitated by story issues and an overwhelming number of downbeat endings, which place it far from the cathartic exhilaration of the original movie. The Wachowskis themselves penned The Second Renaissance Part 1, a beautifully designed look at life pre-Matrix, using a faux newsreel style to chilling effect as the machines rise. Dark-edged, brutal and less smoothly styled, The Second Renaissance Part 2 shows those machines creating The Matrix. Program - the most truly manga-fied effort - is a love story set in Medieval Japan; artistically startling, but less profound than it thinks it is. An athlete breaks out of the Wachowskis' wonderland through sheer willpower in stylized short World Record. Bouquets for its strange, angular art; brickbats for a confusing story. A Kid's Story, on the other hand, is suffused with a dream-like quality, as Clayton Moore (who appears in Reloaded and Revolutions) tries to escape The Matrix with Neo's help. Until a climax which betrays the internal logic of The Matrix, Detective Story is by far the best of the shorts - a spot-on black-and-white noir about a detective enlisted to find Trinity. Beyond (a group of children exploit a glitch in The Matrix) is slight and atmospheric; while Matriculated (outside The Matrix, humans reprogram a machine) is a visually stunning, frankly hallucinogenic trip which out-Kubricks 2001. Lastly, The Final Flight Of The Osiris, the much-vaunted precursor to Reloaded: a triumph for CG photorealism, but the story is wafer-thin. Verdict - Though undeniably beautiful, overall, the disc is debilitated by story issues and an overwhelming number of downbeat endings, which place it far from the cathartic exhilaration of the original movie. 3/5 - Empire Magazine
GenerationofSwine2023-01-11
★ 10/10
Ooooh, yeah, I just ripped into Revolutions for breaking from the way The Matrix and Reloaded looked and now... the Animatrix. And I'm not going to do the same thing. All the segments looked a little different, which I liked. But this comes along and it sort of fills in the backstory of the Matrix world. Almost like the, brothers at the time, sisters now looked at the Matrix and realized that Sci-Fi geekdom was loving it and they had to really explain a history so that the geeks like me had something to sink our teeth into and argue about at the comic book store on Wednesday nights. And then, with the Animatrix, they gave it to us... and THANK YOU.

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