Saturday, December 06, 2008

History Lesson

What most people don’t realize is that The Matrix is really a remake of the 1969 East German film Wirklichkeit ist eine Illusion, also lassen Sie uns sprechen Rätsel, Eintragfaden-Polizei und Tanzkampf (”Reality is an Illusion, so Let Us Speak Riddles, Shoot Police and Dancefight”). This film was made in response to the large number of philosophically obscure European films released in 1968 and the East German communists didn’t want to be left in the dust by their Western opposite numbers (It’s the RED pill for a reason).

Unfortunately the East German censors were either not “read in” on the project or they didn’t care and they refused to approve of its release and the film was placed into storage until the fall of the East German communist government in 1989. After a very short limited release a number of VHS copies of the film made it to Los Angeles and the rest is history.

(Yes, I’m kidding.)

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