Keanu Reeves gets choked up over The Matrix’s 25th anniversary

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Keanu Reeves got emotional when he was reminded that his blockbuster 1999 movie The Matrix just celebrated its 25th anniversary.

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During an appearance on The Late Show, host Stephen Colbert brought up the film’s recent birthday saying to Reeves: “OK, this year, huge anniversaries for you. This year, Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure (turned) 35 just last week. Point Break (is) 33. Speed, 30. The Matrix, 25. And John Wick, 10.”

Colbert proceeded to name the films and asked Reeves to share his fondest memory of the titles. 

For Bill & Ted, Reeves said it was “friendship and working with Alex Winter.” When Colbert listed off Point Break, the actor praised director Kathryn Bigelow and his late co-star Patrick Swayze. The mention of Speed brought back his memories of working with Sandra Bullock and filmmaker Jan de Bont.  

But when Colbert brought up The Matrix, Reeves went silent for almost 20 seconds.

“The Matrix changed my life,” Reeves said haltingly. “And then, over these years, it’s changed so many other people’s lives in really positive and great ways.” 

He continued, “As an artist, you hope for that when you get to do a film or tell a story. And so when you say these years, and the amount of people I’ve met who have said to me and been touched by The Matrix in such a positive way … it’s the best.”

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On YouTube, the segment has racked up over 292,000 views, with one commenter writing, “Keanu’s response to The Matrix question was so profound and heartfelt that Colbert didn’t need to proceed with a John Wick question. Wrapped it up right then and there. Great moment.”

“That really got me. So moving,” another person wrote. “As for the movie itself, to this day The Matrix is still the most mind-blowing experience I’ve ever had in a theatre!”

A third viewer likened his emotional response to another appearance on Colbert’s show when the late-night host asked Reeves after we die. “I still remember the last time Keanu made me cry by responding to one of Stephen’s questions. It was when Stephen asked, ‘What happens to us when we die?’ And, after taking a breath, Keanu said, ‘We will be missed by those who loved us the most.’ This guy takes ‘sincerity’ to a higher level. Props to Keanu. Live long and prosper in good health, dude.”

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In The Matrix, Reeves’ role as Neo, a messianic figure who learns that humankind is being kept in a dream state to fuel hungry machines, turned him into a pop culture superstar, leading to video game spinoffs, comic books and reams of pages in philosophy textbooks. It’s a part he reprised in three sequels: 2003’s The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions, and 2021’s The Matrix Resurrections.

Talking to Postmedia back in 2021, Reeves recalled his elation when he was offered the chance to return as Neo after an 18-year layaway. “(When the director) called me and told me they were interested in embarking on another Matrix story. I said, ‘That’s amazing, but my character’s dead’ and they were like, ‘Are you?’ Hence the title Resurrections.“

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But Reeves said playing Neo was a “life-changing experience artistically and personally.”

“He’s really up there,” Reeves said of his fondness for the role, adding that over the years strangers have told him how much the movie means to them.

“That’s a message and interaction I’ve had over the years with a lot of people when they say, ‘Wow, that movie changed my life,’ or ‘That movie changed how I see the world,’ or ‘Those movies changed who I was,’ or ‘I was never able to see the world the same after that movie.’ So that’s been extraordinary,” he said.

Reeves also said that over the years he’d come to think of The Matrix films as a “tool you can use to view the world.”

“I think the films can speak more to how our world has changed, in our interactions with technology and social media and all of our computer-generated interactions,” Reeves said.

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