The Matrix (The Wachowski Brothers, 1999)

How is the main character constructed? What filmic tools are used to accentuate and highlight that construction? What are the objectives, desires and challenges s/he faces?

Thomas. A. Anderson or "Neo" as he is referred to in the virtual world, is the main protagonist of The Matrix. When we are first introduced to him, he is portrayed as a ordinary computer hacker, who goes unnoticed throughout his everyday life, as effectively, he brings no significance to it. This is undeniably visible within the scene with his boss at work, when he puts it into perspective that Thomas is “just another pawn in someone else's much bigger game”. Throughout the film Neo is faced with many challenges, one of the earliest being whether or not to trust his subconscious quest for knowledge and enlightenment, by following the character Morpheus' directions to safety, or surrender like many of his other subordinates would have. The scene where Neo has to attempt to escape his Pursuers from the office is when he must face his own fears of challenging the unknown. Yet at first he doubts himself and his abilities, which leads him to being captured by the agents. When he wakes from what is believed to be a dream, of which he is being interrogated by ‘Agent Smith’ who then implants a bug into him, he is then shocked by the terrifying realisation that it in fact did happen. Once Neo and Morpheus finally meet, Neo is proposed with another challenge... Take the Blue Pill and his quest for knowledge will end and his life will go back to normal... or Take the Red Pill and he will "stay in wonderland" and be shown "how deep the rabbit hole goes". Neo almost instantly choses to learn more and ultimately take the red pill, then, this is when both Neo and the audience are introduced to ‘The Matrix’ for the first time. The Matrix is a virtual reality designed to house the minds of all humanity disguising our world to look how it is ‘supposed to look’, but in reality, the real world is very much in ruins and chaos, run by machines and artificial intelligence with only one human alliance left.
 
What we knew of Thomas Anderson, a lonely and cowardly man with little significance in the world, was all left behind when he left ‘ The Matrix' as he then took on his virtual alias of ‘Neo’. Upon leaving The Matrix he is forced to abandon all beliefs he has of the 'artificial' life he once knew as home, and he now must accept that it was not real but just a programme designed to house humanities perception of the world. This was an extremely tough challenge for Neo to overcome, as he had to leave behind everything he once knew and was effectively becoming a new man. Morpheus informs Neo that he is ‘the chosen one’, and that he must follow the prophecy to save all of mankind and defeat the machines. (‘Neo’ is also an anagram for ‘One’ which also gives us a foreboding sense of what is to come of his character). We can start to notice this in the training programmes when Morpheus lets Neo know how the laws of The Matrix can be bent or broken, which is proven within their fighting sequence. This then excites the rest of the crew as this is the first time Neo has shows potential to fulfil this prophecy. As the film progresses Neo grows as a character and becomes much more than he was, he is no longer the lazy slob we saw in his opening scene, as he is now starting to believe in his own abilities and his confidence within those abilities. The audience can see this throughout the film, even after being told he is not the one by a character names ‘The Oracle’.
 
By the closing scenes of the film Neo proves his true abilities by fighting Agent Smith and surviving, being chased to his unsuspected death then in fact being reborn as he comes back to life. This rebirth could be paralleled to the rebirth of ‘Christ’, as this icon usually portrays a being that can give or impart something to humanity that it needed or lacked, such as knowledge, healing or most significantly in this film, hope and salvation. We also notice Neo’s omniscience and also omnipotence by how he now views The Matrix, as its rawest form, which is, the code that makes it up. It is here that we truly witness the true power of Neo or the 'Chosen One' as he then enters Agent Smith’s body and blows him apart, something that has said to never have been done before.
 
   
I believe the director chosen to portray the character in this sort of way to prove, not only how somebody can lead to separate lives, their front self, and their virtual being, but also to prove how somebody who on the outside can seem so insignificant and weak, can have such a huge impact on society.