ABSTRACT
As this new century dawned, the North American film industry welcomed the arrival of the Matrix film trilogy. This groundbreaking work of the Wachowski brothers ushered in a new level of integration of technology into the craft of filmmaking, at the same time as drawing on a number of movie genres, ancient epics, and philosophical themes. What perhaps most captured the imagination of Matrix fans was the premise of the film – that there existed two worlds: a real world where life was rigidly controlled and an illusionary world that seemed to be free but was in fact easily manipulated. In fact, this premise was so intriguing that a group of well-known animators created nine short Japanese styled animation films (animé) to fill in aspects of the Matrix story. The Animatrix (2003) also presented provocative storylines that built on the central idea of a world in which people are for the most part unaware that they are asleep and under the control of a massively powerful machine. One of the more powerful of these short films was World Record. This is the story
of an athlete of African descent who prepares to run the race of his life – in fact, a race that will become his last race. Dan, as he is named, is a hundred-meter man, which means he is a sprinter involved in the highest profile event in track and field. As the race begins, several narrative interruptions inform us that Dan had already run a world record time that was nullified because he was accused of using performance-enhancing drugs. Now, with an excellent time in a qualifying heat, Dan is out to prove himself and break the world record again. The story thus far seems not unusual, presenting occurrences easily connected to stories of present-day athletes,
but the point that will shape the story will be its unfolding unreality, a falsehood hidden to this black runner. As the race ensues we see Dan straining every muscle in his body to push himself
as hard as he can. Then his worst fears are realized; Dan’s muscles begin to shatter. Yet his wounds are only the beginning of what will be his eventual revelation. As his muscles collapse, he senses he can still run and push himself even faster.
Little does he realize that he is beginning to awaken to the truth that he is in an unreal world, and that those who control the matrix are alarmed at his emerging awareness. The black athletes – Dan’s co-runners – turn into white agents of the matrix itself, charged to keep all continuously unaware that they live in a world of illusions. However, the agents themselves are not real people. They are programs created to carry out the policing actions of the machine itself through body simulations. This story provides a social analogy for thinking about race, theology, and the
perceptions of reality that flow out of each, and it situates us nicely inside the fundamental dynamic explored by black theologies of liberation. Black theologies of liberation seek to come to grips with the racial condition of
modernity. Much of Christian theology in the last several centuries has refused to enter into a clear reckoning of this condition, which we could characterize as an unreal world concealing a real world. In relation to Christian faith, the unreal world is not simply the world of race, but more precisely the world of Christian theology conditioned by the racial imagination.
