TRINITY: You came here because you wanted to know the answer to a hacker's question.
NEO: The Matrix. What is the Matrix?
TRINITY: Twelve years ago I met a man, a great man, who said that no one could be told the answer to that question. That they had to see it, to believe it. He told me that no one should look for the answer unless they have to because once you see it, everything changes. Your life and the world you live in will never be the same. It's as if you wake up one morning and the sky is falling. The truth is out there, Neo. It's looking for you and it will find you, if you want it to.
MORPHEUS: Do you want to know what it is, Neo? It's that feeling you have had all your life. That feeling that something was wrong with the world. You don't know what it is but it's there, like a splinter in your mind, driving you mad, driving you to me. But what is it? The Matrix is everywhere, it's all around us, here even in this room. You can see it out your window, or on your television. You feel it when you go to work, or go to church or pay your taxes. It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth.
NEO: What truth?
MORPHEUS: That you are a slave, Neo. That you, like everyone else, was born into bondage... kept inside a prison that you cannot smell, taste, or touch. A prison for your mind. Unfortunately, no one can be told what the Matrix is. You have to see it for yourself.
MORPHEUS: Remember that all I am offering is the truth. Nothing more.
NEO: This isn't real?
MORPHEUS: What is real? How do you define real? If you're talking about your senses, what you feel, taste, smell, or see, then all you're talking about are electrical signals interpreted by your brain.
MORPHEUS: It started early in the twenty- first century, with the birth of artificial intelligence, a singular consciousness that spawned an entire race of machines. At first all they wanted was to be treated as equals, entitled to the same human inalienable rights. Whatever they were given, it was not enough. We don't know who struck first. Us or them. But sometime at the end of the twenty-first century the battle was joined. The war raged for generations and turned the face of our planet from green and blue to black and red. It scorched and burned the sky. Without the sun, the machines sought out a new energy source to survive. They discovered a new form of fusion. All that was required to initiate the reaction was a small electric charge. Throughout human history we have been dependent on machines to survive. Fate, it seems, is not without a sense of irony. The human body generates more bio- electricity than a 120-volt battery and over 25,000 B.T.U.'s of body heat. We are, as an energy source, easily renewable and completely recyclable, the dead liquified and fed intravenously to the living. All they needed to control this new battery was something to occupy our mind. And so they built a prison out of our past, wired it to our brains and turned us into slaves.
NEO: No! I don't believe it! It's not possible!
MORPHEUS: I didn't say that it would be easy, Neo. I just said that it would be the truth.
MORPHEUS: How did I beat you?
NEO: You -- You're too fast.
MORPHEUS: Do you think my being faster, stronger has anything to do with my muscles in this place? Do you believe that's air you are breathing now?
MORPHEUS: You have to learn to let go of that anger. You must let go of everything.
MORPHEUS: You must empty yourself to free your mind.
NEO: I thought it wasn't real. If you are killed in the Matrix, you die here?
MORPHEUS: The body cannot live without the mind.
CYPHER: The real world. Ha, what a joke. You know what real is? I’ll tell you what real is. Real is just another four-letter word.
CYPHER: You know, I know that this steak doesn't exist. I know when I put it in my mouth, the Matrix is telling my brain that it is juicy and delicious. After nine years, do you know what I've realized? Ignorance is bliss.
TRINITY: There's no point in worrylng. Whatever is going to happen is going to happen.
[A skinny Boy holds a spoon which sways like a blade of grass as he bends it with his mind. Neo crosses to him, sits. The Boy smiles as Neo picks up a spoon and tries to imitate him. Despite his best efforts, Neo cannot make it bend.]
SPOON BOY: Your spoon does not bend because it is just that, a spoon. Mine bends because there is no spoon, just my mind. [Neo watches as it curls into a knot.] Link yourself to the spoon. Become the spoon and bend yourself. [Neo nods, again holding up his spoon.]
NEO: There is no spoon. Right.
[Agent Smith stands in the bedroon of the enormous suite, staring out the windows at the city, below, shimmering with brilliant sunlight.]
AGENT SMITH: Have you ever stood and stared at it, Morpheus? Marveled at its beauty. Its genius. Billions of people just living out their lives... oblivious. Did you know that the first Matrix was designed to be a perfect human world? Where none suffered, where everyone would be happy. It was a disaster. No one would accept the program. Entire crops were lost. Some believed we lacked the programming language to describe your perfect world. But I believe that, as a species, human beings define their reality through suffering and misery. The perfect world was a dream that your primitive cerebrum kept trying to wake up from. Which is why the Matrix was re-designed to this: the peak of your civilization. [He turns from the window]. I say 'your civilization' because as soon as we start thinking for you, it really becomes our civilization, which is, of course, what this is all about. Evolution, Morpheus. Evolution. Like the dinosaur. Look out that window. You had your time. The future is our world, Morpheus. The future is our time.
NEO: I may not be what Morpheus thinks I am, but if I don't try to help him, then I'm not even what I think I am.
TRINITY: What are you?
NEO: His friend.
AGENT SMITH: I'd like to share a revelation that I've had during my time here. It came to me when I tried to classify your species. I've realized that you are not actually mammals. Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment. But you humans do not. You move to an area and you multiply and multiply until every natural resource is consumed and the only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet. You are a plague. And we are... the cure.
MORPHEUS: Do you believe me now? He's the One! Who else could have done this?
NEO: Morpheus, I know you won't believe me but the Oracle told me I'm not the One.
MORPHEUS: It doesn't matter if I don't believe you. What matters is that you don't believe her.
[Agent Smith grabs Neo in a choke-hold, forcing him to look down the tracks, the train's headlight burning a hole in the darkness.]
AGENT SMITH: That is the sound of inevitability. [Neo sees it coming and he starts to fight.] It is the sound of your death.
[On a Computer Screen the cursor beating steadily, waiting. A Phone begins to ring. It is answered and the screen fills instantly with the trace program. After a long beat, we recognize Neo's voice. ]
NEO: Hi. It's me. I know you're out there. I know you're working as fast as you can to catch me. I thought I should call and let you know how things stand. I know you're real proud of this world you've built, the way it works, all the nice little rules and such, but I've got some bad news. I've decided to make a few changes.