My MATRIX IMAX 4DX-Perience

Recently I needed something to do and remembered that The Matrix was screening again, drumming up hype for the impending release of Resurrections. My plan was to catch a simple IMAX showing, but what I discovered instead was “Regal IMAX 4DX,” a multi-dimensional theater motion gimmick not unlike enduring a theme park ride for the entire duration of a feature film. What follows is my story, as a friend and I attempted to survive the most vulgar and confrontational experience in popular cinema history.

1:10 - It’s Wednesday the 15th, and I wanna go out for the evening. Hoping to find an IMAX presentation of The Matrix reissue, I poke around and discover one final 7:00 PM showing in “Regal IMAX 4DX,” which seems to be a mover-shaker-splasher-sniffer gimmick in the vein of Shrek 4-D and the like. This immediately strikes me as the worst possible way to view a film, so of course I have to see what it’s about. I do a cursory search and find articles describing the experience as “reductive,” “nauseous,” and “overwhelming.” One in particular warns not to purchase popcorn buckets or open-top drinks at the theater. Our night is all but locked in when I discover The Matrix 4DX tickets are $9, an absolute steal for watching a masterpiece movie in what seems like the most nightmarish setting ever conceived. My feelers go out to two friends, both of whom seem tentatively interested in getting their shit rumbled for two hours straight.

4:00 - With the movie three hours away, I confirm interest and saddle up our group. The first friend, who has seen one of the forgettable Terminator sequels in this format, bails for a less vibratory evening but assures that 4DX will kick our asses. My other friend, John, is locked in for the night, even though he reads the list of 4DX effects (“air shots… rain… back tickler… BOTTOM TICKLER…”) with mounting horror. At this point I'm practically shaking with anticipation over how nutty this is gonna be, so we make plans to grab food before the movie and steel ourselves for the evening’s physical and mental aggravation. Since I won't be driving I squirrel away an edible, fully prepared to sacrifice myself body and soul on the altar of Regal Cinemas.

5:15 - I get a ride with John and we head out to grab sushi. I'm excited for the food but already giggling at the prospect of whatever the hell “IMAX 4DX” will entail. Between the two of us we've preemptively decided that the gimmick will suck ass, but, being absolute gremlins we will almost certainly enjoy it anyway. Lots of hyperbolic jokes fly about the impending violence upon our bodies, both of us blissfully unprepared for how close these end up to the truth.

5:25 - Sushi time. The vibe is immediately weird, as they're playing The Mask on one TV and Fieri program “Guy’s Grocery Games” on the other. Of the four or five occupied tables, we’re the only ones paying attention as Jim Carrey launches into a muted rendition of “Cuban Pete.” The food is quite good actually but I'm gripped with what feels like a very valid fear that 4DX will upset the contents of my stomach. The most I manage to express this anxiety is dropping some lame and grotesque joke about timing motion sickness with the on-screen barf in some unremembered other movie. The rest of dinner passes without incident but I'm convinced that tonight’s screening will be exceedingly miserable. 

6:23 - I munch down half my edible in the car and immediately re-convince myself that this will be the funniest moviegoing experience of my entire life. At this point the concept’s stupidity alone really cracks me up, and I have to calm down lest I roll into the cinema yukking like Orin Scrivello, DDS. We consult a friend’s Letterboxd review of the new Ghostbusters for guidance, which describes 4DX as “punishment,” and “actively hostile.” I'm now more excited than ever.

6:32 - Upon arriving at the Regal, I realize it's the same place another friend and I snuck alcohol into for a late-night Cats (2019) showing. I start to believe this venue in particular might exert some strange spiritual power over my life. The check-in takes all of ten seconds, so I clock a bathroom break and have to de-aquify my hands with a blow-dryer inexplicably mounted at thigh level. Nothing about this evening feels mapped to a normal wavelength, especially when we discover a vending machine of poop emoji product parody stickers such as “McDood’s Hamturder” and “Fartnite.” When trying to enter our theater we realize it's still playing the ass-end of a 4:00 PM showing, so the two of us wander aimlessly for a bit. I take my picture with a giant cardboard standee for the new Scream movie and John buys a small box of candy, probably the safest and most contained choice to avoid snack jostling. 

6:54 - Six minutes before showtime we check again to find the prior screening has unceremoniously concluded and the theater, ostensibly, is open for seating. Immediately I notice the auditorium is suffused with the same rubber and fabric stink as an athletic shoe store. I have the instant fear of god put in me by the wall-mounted fans and lights, and also by the seating, which resembles Jigsaw-engineered gamer chairs. The absurdity of the setting has us laughing before we even sit down, and realizing that the seats are deeply uncomfortable on top of everything else convinces us this will be a truly special evening. When I glance at the cup holders and notice my armrest has a “WATER ON/WATER OFF” button, whatever control I thought I had over the situation fully flees into the deepest corners of my subconscious. I decide then to simply be an effervescent, empty-headed receptacle for the Regal-Pepsi-Google IMAX 4DX Ball-Shaker Spine-Breaker Immersive Motion Mindfukk Entertainment X-Perience, because any attempt to resist will have me leaving this film a fully broken person.

7:05 - The trailer roll begins after ten minutes of Maria Menounos shills and app-based theater games. The previews run for fully half an hour and include a trailer for The 355, which might be the most generic movie advertisement I've ever seen. This caps off with a second play of the Matrix: Resurrections trailer and a special ad for the digital Matrix trilogy release, which spoils every good moment in the film we’re about to see. I begin to understand why people prefer watching movies at home. Seven more attendees filter in, a gangbuster crowd for this IMAX installation I'm sure costs upper six or even seven digits to install and maintain. After a full day of anticipation, I start believing I’m prepared for whatever 4DX can throw at me. “Lol,” I say in hindsight. “Lmao.”

7:35 - The movie begins. Right off the bat our seats roll to the left as the camera swoops and enters the digital field of green numbers, an absurd tactile movement which gets John and I reflexively cackling. We can barely compose ourselves before the film launches into the Trinity chase scene: an amped-up, gripping introduction magnified exponentially to monolithic sensory obliteration by the 4DX experience. Without warning we catapult into a sustained series of abrupt swooping motions, seat shakes, tilts, jerks, angles, and air puffs so fast-paced and jarring that my brain shuts down in self-defense. Though synchronized to the film's action and ostensibly meant to enhance it, the confrontational physicality of 4DX immediately renders me incapable of processing anything other than the crazed motion and bursts of wind around my head. In spare moments between being shaken like an Arizona iced tea can, I find myself overwhelmed, terrified, and disbelieving that something this unhinged is allowed to exist. The onslaught feels like sixteen minutes but is probably closer to six; John, myself, and the only other guy in our row are reduced to helpless, uncontrolled sob-laughing by the time Neo finally appears. Our laughter eventually stops. The 4DX, however, does not.

This all-points assault establishes the tone for our next two hours and fifteen minutes. Every punch, kick, impact, camera motion, bullet firing, shattered window, door knock, heavy step, or remotely emphasized action is punctuated by some attention-breaking movement from the 4DX bag of tricks. Unless a character or even the frame itself stands perfectly still, seat jiggling is all but guaranteed. On top of this are the lights (lamely flashing in electricity-heavy scenes), the wind, and of course, the water, which is the worst and also funniest of these three. Every rain scene is accompanied by half a second of frigid piss trickle from the seats in front of us, outdone only when Agent Smith smashes a watermelon to release a full-on, glasses-wiper blast. Though certainly at its worst during action sequences, I think the 4DX hack-job peaks when our seats roll several degrees during “there is no spoon,” tilting to match the utensil’s warped motion. Imagine seats vibrating at The Godfather’s car bomb, or a spray of water at Regan’s Exorcist spew. The multi-dimensional possibilities are limitless, stupid, and ludicrously funny.

“Ludicrously funny” sums the night quite well, actually. Despite completely neutering your ability to process a movie, 4DX is hands-down the most hysterical possible way to approach a film. Trying to clock narrative beats while shaken in the fist of a large mechanical toddler? It’s a singular breed of bug-brain sensory overload, which spoils the intent of cinema in such an aggressive and specific manner that the whole thing loops around to become obscenely, bleakly hilarious. In no moment, literally no moment is the emotion of The Matrix ever enhanced by 4DX; only subverted and perverted by it. The lobby shootout alone ascends as some nascent nightmare maximalist vision of 21st century entertainment, in which slavering gunlust transforms into a physically violent experience  where every movement is punctuated by a pitch and roll and kidney thump and eight thousand air puffs around your head and legs to represent bullets. In a word? Deranged.

What I manage to comprehend of the film is good, of course - it’s The Matrix, and in my altered state I appreciate some elements which never clicked for me in the past. However, these revelations are undercut by their occurrence during a thunderous cinematic shakedown; contending with my overriding thought of “lord jesus whichever coke-huffing Hollywood exec dreamed this up sprung from the devil himself.” It eventually reaches a point where I refuse to take a bathroom break, out of fear the seat will buck me like a mechanical bull when I return. I’m also certain I would be hopelessly lost had I not seen the film prior, a sentiment later echoed when John claims to understand less about the movie than he did before. It is, essentially, a disaster. While 4DX is successful in literally shaking up the movie mold, it feels like we've been shoved in a box and pushed down a hill by the time credits roll. When the lights come up, it’s as though the nine of us attending have survived a plane crash.

9:50 - We leave the theater and get about fifteen feet from the door before completely breaking down. John is pissed as hell and I crack up so bad I start crying again. We can barely put what we've just experienced into words - John can only call it “insane,” while I'm convinced it's one of the best nights I've ever had at the movies. I'm still losing my shit when we get back to the car; John takes a second to process before deeming 4DX “perverse” and “against every possible moral.” Though I agree on both counts, I can't deny that first contact was a real laugh riot.

Under no circumstances could I legitimately recommend this experience to another human being. It is, as expected, the worst imaginable way to watch a film, and thus it is also outrageously entertaining. As the logical endpoint of movies as thrill rides, Regal IMAX 4DX brings you face-to-face with the horrible consequences of capitalism on art, and you must endure this revelation while getting jostled about as if kicked by the Jolly Green Giant. The concept is absurd, bone-headed, and patently unpleasant. It is actively detrimental to the film being shown, and by all accounts an affront to the essential foundations of cinema. I can't wait until I have a chance to do it again.