The computer hacker, Neo, is played by Keanu Reeves and lives a double life as a seemingly ordinary office worker by day and hacker by night. He begins to notice strange things happening around him and meets Trinity, played by Carrie-Anne Moss, who leads him to Morpheus, played by Laurence Fishburne. Morpheus offers Neo the chance to see the truth about the world he lives in and offers him a choice between taking the blue pill and continuing to live in ignorance or taking the red pill and joining Morpheus' rebel team.
Neo chooses the red pill and is unplugged from the Matrix, a simulated reality created by the machines to keep humans controlled and subdued. He learns that he is The One, a prophesized figure who will bring about the end of the Matrix and free humanity from their enslavement. Along with Trinity and Morpheus, Neo battles against the machines and their agents, led by the enigmatic Agent Smith, played by Hugo Weaving.
The Matrix is a groundbreaking film that revolutionized the action genre and popularized new techniques of filmmaking, such as bullet time and wire-fu. It was praised for its philosophical themes and its exploration of the nature of reality, identity, and freedom. The film was followed by two sequels, The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions, as well as spin-off media, video games and animated shorts.