I was a soldier of Zion

Ifound myself in a different reality. Bodies of all races were strewn across a field, wounded and bloody; their battle-weary expressions revealing that thousand-yard stare we’ve come to associate with severe post-traumatic stress. An occasional moan escapes, in futility. Their uniforms, torn and muddy, appeared to be of a different time and planetary system. Star Wars, by the looks of it. But wait, the troops haven’t all quite suffered from a fatigue worse than death–there was one soldier, idly smoking a cigarette, a few others tossing a hand of cards, another one doing homework under a tree. I looked at the dirt wedged beneath my fingernails. It had somehow disappeared, and my wounds too, have healed. "I need more gore," someone calls out to a distant, ununiformed lady wielding a can of–hairspray. Hmm. This can only mean one thing. I only think I’d just fought in an epic war against artificial intelligence. I’d been programmed to believe I’m an actual soldier!

How on earth did this weird chain of causality begin? Suddenly it all came rushing back in rapid slide-show succession. The ad in the paper. The race to the old Enmore Theater, the long queues, the competitive glances, the fervent ethnic pride. Then, one day, the phone call – "Would you like to be an extra in the Matrix?" And that was how I found myself here, woken in disbelief, sprawled on a lawn outside a sound stage inside the Fox compound in the middle of Sydney, trying to avoid conversation with a bunch of similarly dressed people who were under a different illusion – the desperate, 15-minutes-of-fame seeking kind.

The life of an extra – the very word conveys its un-necessity, its disposability and dispensability, like an extra toothbrush, toe, or side order of fries. The extras were the most reviled among cast and crew. "When do we get to go on set?" "When is it, lunchtime?" "Can we go home now?" whinges were only interspersed with "Oh my God, my ankle just brushed the corner of Keanu Reeves’ stand-in’s trench coat!" and the even less plausible "Oh my God, the camera was directed right at me." We were the unprofessionals, the starstruck, the hopeful wannabes craning and cramming to get in the shot, dying to be "discovered." Even I, in all appearances the paragon of blasé, was secretly sending telepathic messages to the Waichowski brothers as I loitered nonchalantly around the digital equipment between takes. I wonder if they got them.

But I have to admit, it was still the best way to make $300 in three days. The only rough part was having to show up at the studios as early as 6 a.m., but they clothed you, constantly fed you, and only put you to actual on-set work for a small amount of time, sometimes not at all. Sitting around on one’s ass was the biggest boredom, but I did meet a lot of interesting people. The extras for the part being filmed were all Zionites – you know, the real people. If you’ve seen Reloaded, you, like many critics may have noticed that most of them were of-color. And this was not some "blacks are cool" marketing ploy. It was because, according to mga direk, white blood is weak and in the future gets mostly diffused within the viscous swirls of other racial types. So I hung out with all colors of the Benetton coalition, from massive kung-fu kicking Samoans, rasta-Fijians and shiny Nigerians, meditative Nepalese and crack-talking LA homies, to Australian Chinese gangsters, lusty Latinas, and the occasional minority Wasp.

The funny thing was, no one knew what the hell we were filming. The secrets of the script were kept heavily guarded, of course. It was only till I actually watched Reloaded in the cinemas that I figured out I was part of the concluding movie, Matrix Revolutions, which had been shot simultaneously. Too bad, because that rave-in-a-cave orge-fest looked mighty fun. Do you want to know what happens in the last movie? Sorry can’t tell, they’re gonna kill me, er, delete my program.

I’m particularly endeared to the Matrix not because it was dazzlingly intelligent or original. We already knew Keanu uses all muscles except the one that is most important, and movies like Dark City, Truman Show, and Blade Runner had all dealt with those fake-reality themes, a concept that travels way back to Descartes and the demon of doubt on his shoulder, and across cultures as well, say with the famous Buddhist question "How do I know I am a man dreaming he was a butterfly, and not a butterfly dreaming he is a man?" I like the Matrix because it is infinitely watchable (and unfortunately, replicable. Enough hotdog and toothpaste and boyband ads with Matrix moves!) It’s littered with enough pop culture and pseudo-philosophical references to give fake intellectuals, stoned college hackers and ex-media students like me enough fodder for party posturing. How many other people have actually read Jean Baudrillard’s Simulations (the fake copy of a book Neo hides his disk copy of some coded info in, haha clever)?

I was, however, a bit disappointed with Reloaded. Sure all that bullet-time flash is always thrilling to watch and ponder over, but the Burly Brawl scene was ridiculously overlong and repetitive, like a skipping CD, like the unending many-mes generated by the wormy and viral Agent Smith. The Architect was as confusing as any fusty Philosophy 101 professor going the circular route down free will and determinism. I just got the overall feeling that Someone out there was playing some great big video game, where the hero-character is quested on a mission and required to complete certain tasks in order to reach the next level, to be able to move right of screen and unto new territories. Choice? There is only the illusion of it. Makes it more interesting. You were never really in control, only under command. Neo, at least, had six tries to save his loved one. Run Lola Run only had three.

And so the extras, along with the many other major and minor bits in the Matrix, all existed in the space under the command key. The sets created in the sound stages were amazing, but only a minuscule fraction in size of what they appeared to be on film. As with the citizens of Zion, the dimensions of the underground city itself were computer replicated to dizzying heights and impossible proportions, a Metropolis gone mad. I don’t know yet if I come out in Revolutions, but you may see me, a passing face in a crowded crowd scene, or you may see 12 of me.

We’ll never be able to prove if reality exists. So might as well live life like a video game – explore hidden corners, rack up your points, always keep moving. But also, don’t live it like a video game – don’t run people over, annihilate nations or throw away your magic mushrooms, because in this rental called life, there is no reset button.

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