Fans blame murders on The Matrix

KAREN MCVEIGH
kmcveigh@scotsman.com


ON THE day the much-hyped sci-fi thriller, The Matrix Reloaded, became the most lucrative film in United States history, its makers were forced yesterday to confront the less palatable news that their creation has been linked to a series of murders by obsessive fans.

The film’s stars, including Keanu Reeves, Laurence Fishburne and Jada Pinkett-Smith, and Joel Silver, it’s producer, who flew from Cannes to London to promote the blockbuster, looked shocked when asked about the reports.

"I haven’t heard of that," said Silver, at a press conference in the East End of London. "I don’t know what links those are. Fifteen million people have seen the movie. It’s a wonderful fantasy story linked to the real world, and I can’t comment on what makes people do what they do."

The second part of The Matrix trilogy, The Matrix Reloaded, which opened in the US last week, has received mixed reviews, some of them critical, about its extreme, sanitised aggression.

A violent tale of epic battles between men and machines, which traps humans in a computer-simulated world, the movie is famous for blurring the line between fantasy and reality. But in the US, a series of murders carried out by fans of the film suggests that some of them have severe difficulties understanding the difference.

Josh Cooke, 19, who lived in Oakton, Virginia, kept a The Matrix poster hanging on his bedroom wall and had a trench-coat like the one worn by Neo, Reeves’s character. The teenager bought a 12-gauge shotgun, similar to one of those used by Neo to shoot "agents", and gunned down his mother, Margaret, 56, and father, Paul, 51, in the basement of his home in February. He then called the police to report the killings.

Cooke’s lawyer says he believed he was living inside the "matrix" - the computer-generated virtual world of the film - like Reeves is forced to do in the trilogy. "He’s just obsessed with it," his lawyer, Rachel Fierro, told the Washington Post.

In court papers issued to the Fairfax Circuit Court last month, Ms Fierro said that her client "harboured a bone-fide belief that he was living in the virtual reality of the Matrix at the time of the alleged offences".

Robert Horan, a local prosecutor, said he did not think the film caused violence. "Millions of people have seen it and not killed anybody," he said.

However, The Matrix, written by the Wachowski brothers and inspired by William Gibson, the sci-fi writer, and Geof Darrow, the cult comic-book artist, has emerged as a key influence in several similarly violent crimes.

Last week, an woman in Ohio who told police that she lived in the Matrix was found not guilty of killing her landlord on reasons of insanity.

Tonda Ansley, 37, said she believed her dreams were not really dreams, but places where "they drug you and take you somewhere else".

In a similar case in San Francisco in 2000, a man who said he believed he was inside the Matrix was also found not guilty on reasons of insanity when he killed his landlady.

Lee Boyd Malvo, 18, one of the two men accused of taking part in the Washington sniper attacks last year, wrote: "You are a slave to Matrix control", in his jail cell.

While expressing their condolences to the victims, Warner Bros Pictures argue there is no connection between the film and the killings.

The second instalment of the trilogy, which opens in Britain on Friday, broke US box-office records after taking £83 million in its opening week.

It also smashed the opening weekend record for an R-rated film, in which under-17s must be accompanied by an adult.

While its dazzling special effects have impressed many, its pseudo-philosophising tone and bewildering plot have left others baffled.

When asked by one frustrated journalist the question on everyone’s lips - what are the film’s central themes? - Fishburne, who plays Captain Morpheus, answered: "Who am I, why am I here and what is my purpose?

"It’s up to you to go and see the film again and go figure all that s*** out."


http://www.thescotsman.co...=568402003

It is always SO easy to blame artists for sharing their work. These reports always SEEM to originate in the US.



Maybe reality in the US is indeed different from anywhere else...

I blame the Org for making me suffer incoherent bouts of sweetness!

I AM A MEAN :HAM: !

If people want to blame societies failings on a film (which is just stupid anyway) at leaste blame something like Pulp fiction or Goodfellas. In the matric the goodies are shooting are computer viruses in mind form and aliens and shit.

I'm scared to go see the new Matrix movie in case it turns me into a killing machine!

ian said:

!!! oh no!!!

ian said:

It's not THAT good anyway.

Trinity IS naked at one point, but Neo's big butt is in the way.

And I must admit that I got rather violent. Around the part that one of the characters swears in French.
The French audience would clap and shout at French Fries being filmed, sad lot.

Once again, insantify trying to lay blame on something. First God, now the Matrix. It's just straight craziness!

Blackcat said:

Maybe the Matrix IS god!

IceNine said:

Do you really believe that Ice?

Blackcat said:

I believe that there is no god, there is only nature. The Matrix is a funny little fantasy world.

IceNine said:

these matrix people are in the same boat with the "GOD told me to" folks. i've never heard the voices so i can't make a judgement call on how looney they really are.

it's like the people that copy the jackass movies. they get what they deserve.

i watched tom and jerry my entire childhood. tell me that wasn't some violent *hit for young impressionable children to be watching. but i've never heard of "tom and jerry' made me do it.

this seems to be a fairly new thing. in like the last ten years or so. i don't remember ever hearing about blaming movies and music until metallica got sued for the song some kid blamed for his suicide.

the parents want to blame anyone but themselves. face it, you failed to instill a good enough appreciation for life in your child. you failed in that respect as a parent. and no matrix or GOD can be your excuse for your failure.

out of curiousity, what do people who don't believe in GOD believe in. what does it mean when you say "there is only nature"?

Losers.

pimpdoutt said:

Many people who don't believe in god only believe in nature... nature, meaning everything that is observable and natural. We say that there was no special creation and that the earth is inhabitable simply because it is located at the proper distance from a star and orbits in such a way as not to become too hot or too cold for life. We are not special and we only exist because conditions accidentally happened that allowed us to exist.

This is sometimes known as the principle of terrestrial mediocrity.

Some peoples kids Anything will give them a reason to kill.

minneapolisgenius said:

seriously... fuck those stupid fucking fucks... ...

Dudes...it's called a 'Psychotic Episode' that makes people do things like this...very sad.

EllisDee said:

Fuck!

minneapolisgenius said:

fuckin-'a

EllisDee said:

right.

minneapolisgenius said:

fuckin' right... ... you must use "fuck" in some way to convey the true seriousness of the situation at hand...

pimpdoutt said:

Shhh pimpdoutt, don't let out the secret. God & nature are one and the same...shhh

EllisDee said:

Fucking losers!

minneapolisgenius said:

there ya fucking go... now you're getting the fucking hang of it...

just let out all that agression...

IceNine said:

Could you please elaborate on this concept.

EllisDee said:

I have no agression.

minneapolisgenius said:

fuck that... everyone has agression... ... now let's get to the fucking agression... :LOL:...

Blackcat said:

It means that there was no planning involved and everything came about as a result of natural events. We exist because of probability and the existence of conditions that allow us to exist.

IceNine said:

another question ice, i find it interesting too that alot of people that don't believe in GOD are prone to say things like, "*uck GOD" and such. from an outsider's point of view to me, it looks like the people who don't beleive in GOD have all this anger towards GOD. or is it towards the idea of GOD? i'm not sure. but it's a common statement from non beleivers.

and to add to what BLACK C said, isn't GOD and nature the same thing?

dont take this as an attack on you. I've only known one person in my life that didn't beleive in any GOD.

pimpdoutt said:

Saying "fuck god" is a way of saying "fuck you" to organized religion and all the horrors that have been committed in the name of god. Saying "fuck god" is simply a statement against the hypocrisy of organized religion.