Lego Matrix

December 3, 2009
Stacey Mason

For the 10th anniversary of The Matrix , Trevor Boyd and Steve Ilett created “Trinity Help,” a 40-second shot-for-shot remake of the movie’s most famous scene, done totally with Legos and stop-motion. The project’s Web site shows how they did it and is full of humor and humility.

The juxtaposition of the computer-generated special effects of the original and the lego stop-motion special effects provokes questions about constraints and adaptations. Is a piece more impressive if it achieves a similar result, but must comply with difficult constraints to achieve that result? Should adaptations be compared across media given the constraints inherent in different forms? Are these fair comparisons?

And, hey, how cool is this?

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