Hottoceame The Age of Commercialism

Grimerlana Plenty to Like, Plenty to Dislike

Catangro After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

Aubrey Hackett While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.

freemantle_uk 2003 was seen as the year of the Matrix, with the release of two sequels and a computer game that actually linked to the plot of the film. Also released was a DVD of 9 short animated films, most written and made in Japan and made as Anime. Japan makes some of the best animation in the world. Sadly most of these shorts are disappointing. The best of them is the first part of a prequel to the first Matrix film.The Second Renaissance is made as a historical file. It tells how humans made machines in their own likeness. Humans live the high life whilst machines are the grunts, the workers of society, second class citizens. In the year 2090, a machine, BI-66ER was put of trial for murder, after killing his owners who wanted to deactivate him. The machine does not have a fair trial and riots start around the world. The governments of the world order to dismantle machines. Many machines leave human society and form their own country in the Middle East, O1. 01 has a productive economy and easily undercut the human nations, forcing them into economic crisis. The human blockade 01 and reject the machines requests for peace, thereby it was the humans who were responsible for the war that enslaves them.The Second Renaissance is a interesting watch, with excellent, traditional animation style and sets a compelling world. It shows how the machines were mistreated and that humanity sowed the seeds of their own destruction. There is a political and social world and the short tells a lot in it short running time. The short shares themes and a style to the classic silent film Metropolis, partly the beginning with the underworld. They are the themes of slavery, the mistreatment of the working class and racism. The short also has some religious themes and religious iconography. Mainly that men saw themselves as God and created the machines in their own likeness. Seeing themselves as the rightful masters of the machines. The machines too use religious iconography, mainly forming their nation in 'cradle of human civilisation' and the machines coming to the United Nations dressed as Adam and Eve, offering an apple.The animation style is beautiful, done in the traditional anime style (like Akira). The set designs are great, combine futuristic with historic cities, e.g. Washington D.C.. There is well down future scene, and surprising violence, which is key to the film. The director, Mahiro Maeda, also directed the anime sequence in Kill Bill Vol. 1, so has good credentials to Hollywood. He is willing to use violence and know how to keep a story going.The only real complain is a continuity error to the first Matrix film because Morpheus mentions that the humans have no historical records or know who started the war. But its a good watch.

william (willsgb) this is the first of a two part back-story to the conflict between the machines and mankind in the Matrix world and it delivers spectacularly by combining observations on man's fear of the unknown and of being usurped with politics, extensive religious and historical imagery, subverting expected portrayals of parties involved and an at least partially believable and thus terrifying vision of our near future. it isn't perfect and some plot points and images are at once obvious and contrived but it has the desired effect and impact and tells a visceral and cautionary tale.this first part sets the scene - human societies have developed advanced and capable robots, mostly humanoid, to serve people doing menial, unskilled jobs, labour, construction etc. and thus the populace has become lazy and derogatory towards them. one robot, however, rebels and kills his owner, stating at his subsequent trial that he simply did not want to die. he is destroyed but when the robot masses' destruction is ordered to protect humanity many robots rise up in protest, with many human sympathisers alongside them.the imagery here is exploitative, recounting race riots and abuse, Tiananmen square, the holocaust and an overly provocative scene of a robot in a human girl's guise getting harried, hammered in the head and then shot dead as it pleads 'i'm real'. it lays on the ground, clothes and skin torn and breasts hanging out. it's an obvious and obscene image designed to present human fear towards uncontrolled elements and aggression towards groups based on the actions of individuals.anyway, this first portion is much like a compressed version of the film I Robot, but it soon develops into a recognisable Matrix back-story as the surviving robot contingent is exiled and congregates in the middle east, in the cradle of civilisation as the narrator informs us. there, the machines regroup and begin to produce new AI and to manufacture mass technology and trade it with human nations. we see a commercial for a car that uses the circular energy hover engines that the ships the rebels in the movies use and we see sentinel type robots flying around Zero One, the name of their city. their goods and trade make their economy soar affecting other economies detrimentally and human governments and authorities establish a blockade in response. the machines send ambassadors in the form of Adam and Eve resemblances to a UN congress to negotiate a peaceful resolution to the blockade, but they are forcibly removed and the scene is set for war in the second part.the animation is by Studio 4°C who work on quite a few of the Animatrix and it's evocative and visually stimulating, rendering different scenes like imagery montages, CCTV footage and particular scenes of import distinctive and overall presenting the story perfectly. the plot may not be an original concept and it may draw on simplistic sheep mentalities and plot models and resort to provocative material for impact but after the tantalising mystery offered by the first film and Morpheus' vague brief info-dumps this is a nice exposition of the cataclysmic events that left the world ravaged and in the hands of the machines that serves as a warning and as a vehicle for many observations and comments on the human condition, the development of AI and the importance of harmony and co-operation and the devastating consequences of conflict and prejudice, themes expanded on in the movies.

dispet along with it's partner, this is the greatest piece of animation ever created. the images and styles are amazing, and match perfectly with the story which is a brilliantly realistic reinterpretation of our own world, where is has been, and where it could go. quite affecting and sometimes painful to watch, it it a masterpiece of the visual art.

tcoultis 'The second beginning' as it's title explains, shows us the beginning of the end for the human race. Set long before the matrix existed, this short anime written by the Wachowski's shows us the world that could lay infront of us in the not to distant future, set at the turn of the 21st century, the second renaissance delves into issues common with human behaviour; greed, power, control, vanity etc.The use of robots or artificial intellegence as slaves or servents is common among science fiction/fantasy stories. The second renaissance is no exeption to this concept, however instead of a simple man vs. machine layout, this story explains the struggle that the machines put up with, the struggle for acceptance in a world ruled by humans. Where the matrix films show us the human perspective, these short animations tell both sides of the story.The second renaissance part 1 + 2, answer many questions brought up by the original Matrix film, such as how the war broke out, how the sky was blackend, what led to the use of humans as batteries and it also introduces us to the machine city called 01, which may have relevance to the upcoming Matrix Revolutions film.I won't give away too much of the story, as I do not want to ruin the experience for perspective viewers, however, I will recommend it to anybody interested in the world of the matrix or simply anybody interested in Japanese animation (anime).9/10.