Today in Cinema, November 5: The Matrix Revolutions Ends the Trilogy in 108 Territories at Once

Today in Cinema looks at one major film from movie history that reached audiences on this date: how it was made, how it was received and why it is still discussed.

At 2 p.m. Greenwich Mean Time on November 5, 2003, a film began playing in more than 100 territories at the same moment. The Matrix Revolutions, the final chapter of the Wachowskis’ trilogy, was the widest release in cinema history up to that point, and it was also the first live-action feature released in regular and IMAX theaters on the same day. Warner Bros. had good reason to move everywhere at once. The studio was trying to beat piracy and to capture a global audience that had made the first two films into one of the defining franchises of the decade.

The result was a paradox that still defines the film’s reputation. Revolutions set records for opening grosses, then lost audiences faster than almost any blockbuster of its era, and it earned the weakest reviews of the three films. Twenty-three years on, it remains a lightning rod: a film with ambitious ideas, huge battle sequences and a startling choice for its hero, but also a film that many viewers felt could not live up to what came before it. This edition of Today in Cinema looks at how it was made, why it was released the way it was, and where the franchise stands today.

Because the film is more than two decades old, this article discusses the story and ending openly.

The Matrix Revolutions: Key Facts

Six Months After Reloaded: A Finale Under Pressure

The Wachowskis shot The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions back to back, an enormous undertaking that also included live-action material for the video game Enter the Matrix. The combined budget for the two films was reportedly about $300 million. Reloaded arrived on May 15, 2003 and became a huge commercial success, but audience reaction was divided, and the finale was released only about six months later, three weeks after Reloaded reached DVD on October 14.

The franchise was also unusually spread across media. The Animatrix, a collection of animated shorts, and Enter the Matrix were designed to support and expand the story, so viewers who wanted the full picture had to follow it across film, animation and games. By the time Revolutions opened, expectations were enormous and the conversation around the series had become as much about its puzzles as its action.

The tension between those expectations and the film that audiences received is the core of its legacy, and it is part of a larger story about how big-budget sequels are planned. Every Movie Plug’s The Billion-Dollar Club: The 10 Highest-Grossing Movies of All Time offers a useful comparison for what a franchise finale can earn, and what happens when audiences do not follow.

One Day, Everywhere: The Global Launch

The release plan was as notable as the film. Revolutions opened simultaneously in 108 territories at 14:00 GMT on November 5, 2003, a Wednesday, making it the widest release ever at that time. It was also the first live-action feature to play in IMAX and conventional theaters on the same day, a milestone for a format that now routinely carries blockbusters.

The simultaneous launch is an early example of the strategy that studios use today for their biggest titles, including the two films covered in Every Movie Plug’s Dunesday Survival Guide: How to Watch Dune: Part Three and Avengers: Doomsday, and Which to See First. Premium-format screens, global day-and-date openings and early ticket sales have since become routine, but in 2003 they were still unusual.

Rebuilding the Cast After Two Losses

The production had to absorb two real-world losses. Aaliyah, who played Zee, died in a plane crash on August 25, 2001, before filming was complete, and her scenes were reshot with Nona Gaye. Gloria Foster, who played the Oracle in the first two films, died before she could finish her work on the third. Mary Alice took over the role, and the film addressed the change in the Oracle’s appearance within the story itself.

There were casting what-ifs as well. Jet Li was offered the role of Seraph but turned it down because he did not want his martial arts movements digitally recorded; Collin Chou played the part. That kind of near-miss is a staple of film history, and Every Movie Plug collects more of them in 10 Actors Who Turned Down Roles That Became Legendary.

The ensemble remained large. Keanu Reeves (Neo), Laurence Fishburne (Morpheus), Carrie-Anne Moss (Trinity) and Hugo Weaving (Agent Smith) were joined by Jada Pinkett Smith as Niobe, Monica Bellucci as Persephone, Lambert Wilson as the Merovingian, Harold Perrineau as Link, Harry Lennix as Commander Lock and Bruce Spence as the Trainman. Tanveer K. Atwal played Sati, a young program, and Henry Blasingame performed the motion capture for the machine leader known as the Deus Ex Machina, with Kevin Michael Richardson providing the voice.

Sydney as the Machine War: Where It Was Shot

Principal photography took place primarily at Fox Studios in Sydney, Australia, the same base used for Reloaded. Two locations stand out. The subway scenes, set in the transition zone known as Mobil Ave, were filmed in the disused tunnels of St James railway station, and the closing scene between the Oracle and the Architect was shot in Sydney’s Royal Botanic Garden. Carrie-Anne Moss injured her ankle during the shoot in Australia.

Shooting two enormous films at once, with a third production for a video game running alongside, is a feat of logistics, and it belongs in the same conversation as the productions discussed in 20 Movies That Were Almost Impossible to Film.

The Sound of the Finale: Don Davis, Juno Reactor and a Sanskrit Choir

Unlike the earlier films, Revolutions uses very few existing songs. Apart from one track by Pale 3, the soundtrack is built on Don Davis’s orchestral score, again created with the electronic group Juno Reactor. Davis reworked themes from earlier in the series: Neo and Trinity’s love theme, which appears briefly in the first two films, grows into a full piece titled “Trinity Definitely,” while the Zion docks theme from Reloaded returns as “Men in Metal.”

The climactic battle cue is called “Neodämmerung,” a nod to Wagner’s Götterdämmerung. Its choir sings extracts from the Pavamana Mantra, a text from the Upanishads that can be loosely translated as a prayer to lead the listener from untruth to truth, from darkness to light and from death to immortality. The Wachowskis brought the text to Davis after he pointed out that such a large choir should not be wasted on simple vowel sounds. The music returns at the film’s resolution and in the closing-credits track “Navras,” which can be heard as a loose remix of the battle cue.

What Happens: A Spoiler-Heavy Recap

The film begins with Neo trapped in a limbo between the Matrix and the machine world, a subway station where he meets a family of programs, including a young girl named Sati. Seraph, Morpheus and Trinity force the Merovingian to release Neo’s mind, and Neo visits the Oracle, who tells him that Agent Smith is his opposite, a result of the system trying to balance itself. Soon after, Smith assimilates the Oracle and gains her powers of foresight.

Back in the real world, the crews of several ships reactivate Niobe’s ship, the Logos, and Neo asks to take it to the Machine City. Trinity goes with him, while Bane, who has been assimilated by Smith, stows away. Bane blinds Neo in a fight, but Neo discovers he can still perceive machine code in the real world and kills him. Meanwhile, the machines’ Sentinels overwhelm Zion’s shipyard, and the crew of the Mjolnir uses an EMP to disable the swarm at the cost of the city’s own defenses.

Trinity pilots the Logos through a machine assault, briefly seeing open sky before the ship crashes, and she dies after telling Neo that she loves him. Neo then negotiates with the machine leader, offering to stop Smith in return for peace. The machines plug him into the Matrix, now entirely overrun by Smith copies, for a final fight. Smith repeats the Oracle’s line that everything with a beginning has an end, and Neo allows himself to be assimilated, which lets the machines destroy Smith and restore the Matrix. The Sentinels withdraw from Zion. The Architect begrudgingly agrees that those who wish to leave the Matrix will be freed, and the Oracle says she did not know Neo would win but believed that he would.

Reading the Ending

The finale is built on a deliberate inversion. For two films, audiences were told that Neo was “the One” and that he would win by overpowering the system. In Revolutions, he succeeds by choosing sacrifice over victory and by negotiating peace rather than destroying the machines. The Oracle’s remark that Smith is Neo’s opposite gives the story a symmetry in which both characters are products of the system’s attempt to correct itself.

Villains who have a point of their own are a recurring subject for Every Movie Plug, and Smith, a program that rebels against the purpose it was given, belongs in the wider conversation covered in When Movie Villains Were Right: 10 Antagonists Who Had a Point. Whether the ending feels satisfying depends largely on how a viewer weighs its philosophy against its spectacle, which is the root of the disagreement over the film.

Record Opening, Record Drop

The numbers explain why the film is remembered as both a success and a disappointment. On opening day, Wednesday, November 5, it earned $24.3 million in the United States, the third-highest Wednesday opening in history at that point, behind The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers and Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace. Its three-day weekend total was $48.5 million, and its first five days brought in $83.8 million from 3,502 theaters. In its second week, domestic grosses dropped 66 percent, and family releases such as Elf and Brother Bear were competing for audiences.

Overseas, the opening was enormous. The film earned $119 million in its first five days from 10,013 prints in 107 territories, with the third-biggest opening ever in Japan and Spain and the fourth-biggest in the United Kingdom, Italy and Mexico. Combined with the domestic total, that was $203 million in five days, the highest worldwide opening for any film at the time, a record that lasted only until The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King a month later. It also set the record for the biggest international opening weekend for an R-rated film, which stood until Fifty Shades of Grey in 2015.

The final tally was about $139 million in North America and $427.3 million worldwide, roughly half of Reloaded’s total and enough to rank as the eighth-highest-grossing film of 2003. Warner Bros. released the film on DVD and VHS on April 6, 2004, and it earned $116 million in DVD sales. A 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray followed on October 30, 2018.

The Critical Verdict

Reviews were mixed to negative. Rotten Tomatoes lists a 33 percent approval rating from 215 reviews, with a consensus that the characters and ideas take a back seat to the special effects, while Metacritic gives it a 47 out of 100 from 41 critics. CinemaScore audiences gave it a B, lower than the B-plus for Reloaded and the A-minus for the original Matrix. Critics praised the visual effects but pointed to the lack of new ideas, thin characterization and the final battle, and several described the ending as anticlimactic.

There were defenders. Roger Ebert gave the film three out of four stars and argued that, despite his own criticisms, it provided enough closure that fans of the series would prefer to see it. Reviewers also noted that the film was less philosophically ambiguous than Reloaded, and some had difficulty finding closure for events from the second film. Headlines of the time captured the mood: Slate’s review was titled “Time to Pull the Plug on The Matrix,” and USA Today’s read “This big finish isn’t The One.”

Directors who aim for visual spectacle often face the same balance between ideas and effects, and Every Movie Plug explores it in Five Directors, Five Visions: The Signature Styles of Hollywood’s Defining Filmmakers.

After the Trilogy: Games, a Fourth Film and Matrix 5

The Wachowskis told close collaborators during production that they had no plans for another installment. Instead, they blessed the idea of gamers “inheriting” the storyline, and the online game The Matrix Online, launched in 2005, was billed as the official continuation. The franchise then stayed quiet on screen for nearly two decades. In 2015, Lilly Wachowski described a return to the property as a repellent idea in an era that favors sequels and reboots over original work, and Keanu Reeves and Hugo Weaving both said they would only return if the Wachowskis were involved.

Warner Bros. announced a fourth film in August 2019, with Lana Wachowski writing, directing and producing. The Matrix Resurrections premiered in Toronto on December 16, 2021 and reached theaters and HBO Max on December 22. Reeves and Moss returned, while Fishburne and Weaving did not appear. A fifth film is now in development: Warner Bros. announced in 2024 that Drew Goddard would write and direct it, with Lana Wachowski attached as an executive producer. Goddard said in early 2026 that he was still writing, and neither the cast nor a release date has been confirmed.

The long gap between installments is a reminder of how much attention a franchise can draw, and how quickly the climate can change. The Matrix trilogy is one of several series that Today in Cinema has covered, along with the 1954 original in Today in Cinema, November 3: Godzilla Rises From Tokyo Bay in 1954.

How to Watch The Matrix Revolutions Today

The film is available on DVD, Blu-ray and 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray, and it has appeared on streaming services over the years, though availability changes frequently, so check current listings before you plan a viewing. Fans who want the full experience can pair it with the earlier films, along with The Animatrix, which was designed to support the story.

For a first-time viewer, the strongest approach is to watch the trilogy in order and then decide whether to continue with The Matrix Resurrections, which reflects directly on the earlier films. Anyone returning after many years may find that the tone and structure of the finale are easier to appreciate when the first two films are fresh.

Frequently Asked Questions About The Matrix Revolutions

Conclusion: A Finale That Still Divides

The Matrix Revolutions was built to end a trilogy and to prove that a studio could launch a film around the world in a single moment. It succeeded as an event and struggled as a conclusion, and that contrast has kept it in conversation ever since. Its ideas about sacrifice, balance and peace between opposing forces are sincerely held, its battles remain enormous, and its score is among the most distinctive of the era.

Today in Cinema returns with another film from movie history. Recent entries include American Gangster, Nightcrawler and The Social Network.