The Matrix Resurrections director Lana Wachowski has confirmed why her sister Lilly did not co-direct the film. The fourth Matrix film, The Matrix Resurrections, looks like it will be about new versions of classic characters Neo and Trinity who have no memory of the events of the original trilogy. However, they certainly won't be locked away from their previous powers forever. The film, coming to theaters and HBO Max on December 22, stars Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Anne Moss, Jada Pinkett Smith, Jonathan Groff, Neil Patrick Harris, Priyanka Chopra Jonas, and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II as Young Morpheus.
The Wachowski sisters have been directing together since the very beginning, with the Jennifer Tilly and Gina Gershon crime thriller Bound in 1996. The two rose to prominence with the mind-bending sci-fi thrills of the Matrix trilogy, which originally ended in 2003. They have directed together through thick and thin, only separating for individual episodes of television (Lana directed 14 episodes of Netflix's Sense8, which they co-produced, and Lilly directed an episode of Work in Progress, a show which she also wrote on and produced).
At the Berlin International Literature Festival, Lana Wachowski spoke at a panel on the Art of Scriptwriting. She explained how she came to direct The Matrix 4 without her sister, the first feature film she has made that doesn't have both of them at the helm. She explained that she was going through a sustained period of grief following the death of her parents and a close friend, and bringing back these characters who meant so much to her (both Neo and Trinity died in the third Matrix film) was a great comfort to her. She found that she could channel those feelings into her art, but Lana preferred to "process her grief differently," so she didn't step up to the project. Read the full quote here:
And then I asked Lilly if she wanted to do this, and she wanted to process her grief differently. And she was in art school and she was on a different path and she didn’t want to go this way to process her grief. But, you know the story evolved and I told my wife the story and she said, “Oh my god you have to make it,” and I was like, “Ugh Matrix, can’t go back there.” And I asked my friends, and my friends were really the sort of decision-making process that helped me say, “OK yeah let’s do this,” because these people are really the reason we went back and did it again.
This quote certainly provides a lot of context, both for the existence of The Matrix Resurrections in the first place, and the behind-the-scenes discussions around who would take the director's chair. Lana is embarking on a huge new challenge, and it is surely a boon to have her sister behind her, even if it's in a vastly different capacity. This wasn't a dramatic fight over the decision, but rather an amicable difference of opinion not related to the film itself.
It's very generous of Lilly to let Lana have space to process her grief in this unique way, which is a path only the directors could have taken. The Matrix Resurrections will hopefully channel those feelings in a way that gives the story and all of the returning characters from the original Matrix trilogy further emotional depth. Regardless of the reason, it will be interesting to see how the director's skills will manifest without her sister by her side.
Source: Berlin International Literature Festival
