The Laws of Physics in an Animation Universe

Physics of “The Matrix”

“The Matrix” is a live action movie created in 1999 that heavily relies on computer animation. “The Matrix” is famous because it creates a world that bends and even breaks the rules of gravity and time in a creative way, while still maintaining a cohesive flow and story. In it’s time, it was revolutionary for its concept and execution of a deeply engrossing world. Today, “The Matrix” is a fantastic film that plays with the laws of physics that effect everything around us. In this paper, we will look at 2 aspects of the laws of physics that effect us everyday, and see how they work for the characters that are in the matrix within the film. We will explore how gravity effects certain characters within the film, and how it would act normally in our world. Also, we will see how the film plays with time, how it effects certain characters differently, and how it would normally act in our world. However, whether the characters can defy the laws of physics or not, “The Matrix” maintains a sense of believability by relying heavily on the principles of physics.
In “The Matrix”, the laws of physics apply to characters differently depending on how strongly they believe in the matrix or not. Those characters who believe that their life in the matrix is real will be constrained to the laws of physics that we are accustomed to in the real world. This includes all of the humans in the matrix that are not main characters of the movie. They are all enslaved by the matrix and thus follow normal laws of physics, particularly those of gravity and time.
In the first scene of the movie, Trinity must escape from police officers and agents. As the scene progresses, we see that Trinity and the agents have super human abilities. The police officers however, show normal human capabilities, albeit higher than the average person because of their training. They are unable to shoot Trinity even though there are multiple officers in the room aiming at her in close range. This is because the officers are acting in normal time while Trinity is able to increase her movements to superhuman speeds. When Trinity goes to the rooftop to escape the authorities, her first obstacle is a medium gap she must jump over. Trinity and the agents jump over the gap easily. Several of the police officers behind them jump over the gap, some clearing it easily and others barely making it. One officer comes up short and must grab onto the ledge so he doesn’t fall. This shows that the gap is not easy to jump across even for trained officers. The next obstacles are angled ramps which Trinity and the authorities must run up and down. Trinity and the agents run across the ramps without stumbling or slowing their pace. The officers behind them slow down, stumble, and trip to traverse the ramps. Fewer officers pass the ramps without slowing down. The last obstacle is a massive gap from one rooftop to another one across a city street. This gap is impossible for any human to jump across because of its distance. The police officers cannot do anything but watch as Trinity and the agent jump across to the other rooftop.
When Neo is being trained to overcome his limitations in the matrix, he takes a test where must jump from one rooftop to another. At this point in the film, Neo is not fully free from the matrix because he still has some belief in it. When he jumps, he falls similarly to how a normal human would fall in the real world. The timing of his jump to his apex is more realistic, and the arc of his jump is parabolic, as it would be for objects that are effected by gravity.
In the scene where Neo and Trinity go to save Morpheus, they fight a group of soldiers with assault rifles. Despite their vast numbers, the soldiers are unable to hit Trinity and Neo because they are operating at normal speeds. Trinity and Neo are able to slow down time so they can dodge and avoid bullets.
Characters in “The Matrix” that have freed their minds from matrix can bend and even break the laws of physics. One force of physics that is commonly manipulated is the force of gravity. Characters repeatedly defy gravity through out the movie.
In the opening scene, Trinity jumps from one rooftop to another to escape the agents and the police. The distance is too far for a normal human to jump but because she has freed her mind from the matrix, she is able to lighten the force of gravity on her. The motion of the jump itself seems to follow the normal arc of a jump, perhaps with more hang time around the apex of the arc.
In Neo’s training scene, he and Morpheus fight each other in a dojo. During this fight scene, they fly into the air several times. In each jump, they extend the time they are in the air by increasing the time they stay in the apex of the jump, and increasing the distance of the jump. As the fight progresses, Neo is able to bend the laws of gravity more and more.
In the scene where Neo visits the Oracle, he sees two girls making some wooden blocks float. The two girls are people who have freed themselves from the matrix and are potential candidates to be “the one”. They have the power to make other objects defy gravity, which breaks the laws of physics more than long jumps because in the jump, gravity still forces the person back to the ground.
In the last scene, Neo completely defies the laws of gravity by flying up into the sky. This is not a high jump, but actual flight through the air. In real life this would be impossible because a person would not only have to exert a force that counteracts the force of gravity, but he or she would have to exert a greater force in order to accelerate upward. But because this is the world of the matrix, Neo is able to defy gravity and take flight.
Even though the characters who have freed their minds from the matrix can defy the laws of gravity, in many cases, when they don’t choose to defy gravity they conform to it completely. For instance, when the characters are walking across a room, their walk cycles conform to a normal person under the constrains of gravity. When Trinity is running from the authorities in the first scene, her run is very similar to an athletic person’s run that is effected by gravity. She only bends the rules of gravity when she jumps across the large gap. Even then, gravity is still effecting her or she would never come down.
In addition to defying gravity, some of the characters in “The Matrix” can speed up, slow, or even stop time. In the real world, time passes at a constant, predictable rate which we have grown accustomed to. Some characters can slow time, which allows them to react to things like bullets and punches faster. This makes it appear as if they were moving at incredibly high speeds. Others can stop time entirely while they continue to move at a normal speed.
In the opening scene, Trinity fights some police officers in a room. At one part in the scene, Trinity jumps into the air and stops time to allow the camera to rotate around her before she kicks a police officer into a wall. This famous kick is the first indication to the audience that some characters can stop time.
When Morpheus is training Neo to fight in the matrix, they battle each other in a dojo. Near the end of the scene, Neo increases the speed of his attacks by decreasing the time of each attack. To the audience, Neo’s fists have lots of motion blur on them because of the speed at which they are moving.
In the famous scene where Neo and Trinity go to save Morpheus, Neo must dodge a round of bullets. Just before Neo must dodge the bullets, we see the agent dodge bullets in a similar fashion. To the audience’s perception, the agent moves incredible fast with lots of motion blur. This is because the audience perceives the action in normal time, which appears to be incredible fast. When Neo dodges the bullets, we see the action from his perception. The bullets appear to slow down to a speed at which they can be easily dodged. Neo continues moving at what would seem to be a normal speed, however he is actually moving at an incredible fast speed. So in this scene, Neo actually slowed down time to dodge the bullets, even though it would seem like he is moving incredible fast.
In the last scene of the film, Neo fully realizes his powers as “The One” and is able to stop a volley of bullets coming at him. In order to do this, he stops time completely, causing the bullets to stop in midair. The interesting dynamic about this scene is that once Neo returns time to normal, the bullets do not continue moving forward as they would if time had just stopped, but they instead fall straight down as if they had no forward motion at all. In order for this to happen in the real world, there would have to be a force on each bullet that is exactly opposite and equal to the horizontal force. This would cancel the forces out and cause them to fall straight down from gravity.
In a similar fashion to gravity, under most cases the characters in the matrix conform to the rules of time. The timing on most of their actions is what we could consider normal until they decide to speed or slow time. Their walk cycles, reactions, and runs all conform to the normal timing of a person taking those actions.
In conclusion, “The Matrix” sets up a world in which the laws of physics can be bent and broken based on its story and the characters in it. Whether the characters are jumping over large gaps, fighting, or dodging bullets, they can stretch and bend the laws of physics. However, even though the characters bend the laws of physics that we experience every day, all of it is still grounded in physics so that even the impossible seems believable.