Re: Matrix

[Don Smith <dasmith at rotse2_physics.lsa.umich.edu>]

Hi,

Nikki wrote:
> (Like the significance of the book in which Neo hides his disks.) 

Hey, I've *read* that book.  It's completely impenetrable prose for the most
part (if you thought the Architect's speech was hard to follow, forget about
Baudrillard), but there are some good nuggets in there.  Like "the desert of
the real", although it's not meant quite the way it's used in the film.  One of
the things I loved about the first film was this kind of play: the book had the
insides cut out, thus making it a simulation of a real book.  And of course,
it's in the Matrix, so it's a simulation of a simulation of a book about
simulation.  Not only that, but the chapter it's opened to is called "On
Nihilism", which is actually a chapter title in Baudrillard's book.  And all
through M2, I was meditating on the deeper irony of a movie about the horror of
living in a computer simulation being presented to us largely as... a computer
simulation.

> I'm seeing it tomorrow night, supposedly. It's weird having someone to 
> see movies with. But I think I like it.

Is there a story here?  ;-)

Yours,
-- 
Don Smith                           Robotic Optical Transient Search Experiment
donaldas at umich_edu                                 http://xte.mit.edu/~dasmith/

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