Our 11 Favorite 'Matrix' Scenes, Ranked

The effect, created by placing cameras in a 360-degree circle around the action and then stitching their images together in a way that makes viewers feel like they're moving around a slow-motion scene, popped up in quite a few fights. But the most remembered, most iconic use of the tactic comes during the rooftop scene where Neo (Keanu Reeves) effortlessly dodges one Agent bullet after another, inspiring Trinity to note "you move like they do" and plant the seed that Neo might truly be The One. The Wachowskis weren't the first to use it, but nearly every movie or videogame that has borrowed the effect since has tipped their hat to what the directors did—and nearly everyone who has ever seen the movie has wished they could move like that too. It's what the Wachowskis were hurtling toward from the moment Neo opts for the red pill: the realization of self. As Trinity explains to Neo after he sees the same cat not once but twice, experiencing déjà vu means that the architects of the Matrix have changed something, created a glitch. —Angela WatercutterYou don’t need to have seen The Matrix to know what the movie's most influential scene is. After Morpheus rescues Neo from a slime pod, he sits Neo down to tell him he's in an undetectable mind prison called the Matrix and offers him a choice: a red pill and knowledge of the world's harsh truths, or a blue pill and a return to comfortable slavery. —Emma Grey EllisOf the many "whoa"-tastic moments that Keanu Reeves has in The Matrix, none may be better than this line: "I know kung fu." He's just learned what the Matrix is, how he can be placed in it, and—most importantly—that information can be downloaded right into his brain. After Tank uploads all manner of special skills into his head, he has a moment of clarity and says, yes, "I know kung fu." Morpheus' response—"Show me"—leads to an epic face-off, which is cool, but it's this idea that skills could be magically placed in one's head that sticks with you long after the movie is over. Only later in the trilogy, when her true power and nature become clear, can you reconcile the two, but in the moment, it's hard not to feel like you're the one being toyed with—and that, so much subtler than the whoa-man revelations of the Matrix itself, might be the greatest mindfuck of all. A phone call between two unseen voices.Yeah.Is everything in place?You weren't supposed to relieve me.I know, but I felt like taking a shift.Knowing everything you know now, the opening image of The Matrix makes perfect sense, but sitting in that darkened theater 20 years ago, it very much did not. Moments later, when police officers broke through a door to arrest a woman clad in black vinyl, you realized that confusion was fine, because you'd never seen anything like what you were seeing right now.