Daily News from New York, New York • 149

aMx9 pDsjs Dote si Fqqdd SafleoD gsomnie THE MATRIX. Keanu Reeves, Laurence Rshbume, Joe Pantoliano. Carrie-Anne Moss, Hugo Weaving. Written and directed by Andy and Larry Wachowski. Area theaters.

Sci-fi violence. There must be more words spoken per special effect in the murky cyber-thriller "The Matrix" than in any science-fiction or fantasy movie ever made and there are a lot of special effects. Give brothers Andy and Larry Wachowski, whose previous picture was the lesbian crime melodrama "Bound," an A for effort and three A's for those effects. "The Matrix" which I think is about the Second Coming of Christ in a computer-run future is a daz- JACK MATHEWS i SHOWDOWN: Keanu Reeves and Hugo Weaving have it out in the futuristic action-thriller. zlingly original visual adventure.

"What is the Matrix?" is the question Keanu Reeves, as computer hacker Thomas Anderson, is driven to answer. Here's how Laurence Fishburne's enigmatic, long-winded Morpheus explains it to him early in the movie. The Matrix is a veil pulled over our eyes to keep us from learning the truth about reality. And the truth is, what we think is 1997 are downloaded into his brain. In this world, people are bred and fed in pods and pacified with artificial lives while their body heat is converted into power for their computer masters.

Morpheus, one of the escaped human rebels, is waiting for The One, the computer genius capable of mastering the Matrix and stopping the computer revolution. Convinced that Anderson, operating by night as a hacker named Neo, is The One, Morpheus recruits him to the cause. Once Neo is on the other side with Morpheus and his butt-kicking, leather- clad sidekick Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss), "The Matrix" becomes a classic escape-and-chase film but in overlapping worlds of reality and fiction where all rules, not to mention logic, are suspended. And that part of the film is great fun. With a sure-handedness that belies their inexperience, the Wachowskis play all this out like a video game guns and kung fu at hyper-speed.

But Reeves is as wooden as ever; a little virtual reality would do wonders for him. And Fishburne is burdened with enough policy speeches to put President Clinton to sleep. The film's best performance comes from Hugo Weaving as an agent chasing Neo through virtual New York. He's a sadist with a sense of humor, proving that even after the revolution, computers aren't all bad. real is not Anderson's world, which looks like today's Manhattan, is a software program the Matrix designed by the computers that took over the world sometime in the 21st century and turned the human race into a vast energy source.

Although the computer year is 1997, the actual year is around 2197. And Anderson, like most humans, is living inside an electronic cocoon where images and experiences from a virtual There's a ft Date Son 'Me' Dt ain't Shakespeare, as they say. Or even "Shakespeare in Love." But the latest movie to lift from the Bard ain't half-bad, forsooth. "10 Things I Hate About You," a romantic comedy JAMI BERNARD opening today, features a young cast known mostly to TV viewers. It's yet another movie about guys making bets on getting certain girls to the prom but this time, the plot has a pedigree.

It's basically "The Tam- bidding figure with poor people skills. The two work up quite a bit of extracurricular chemistry. Ledger is a Gen-X Crocodile Dundee, with wild hair, good looks and a growly Down Under accent. Stiles, another relative newcomer, has gasp theatrical training. Her baby cheeks, alabaster skin and pre-Raphaelite hair extensions don't hurt, either.

Plotwise, you don't need a degree in English Lit to know the drill. Boy bets he can get girl to prom, boy falls for girl, girl learns of bet, and the dust settles in all the right places. The difference here is that the characters are truly individual and refreshingly cast, with comic talent and offbeat looks. -Most amusing is David Krumholtz as a geeky enabler, followed by Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Andrew Kee-gan as Bianca's bipolar suitors. There's also Larry Miller as the senior Stratford, so overprotective 10 THINGS I HATE ABOUT YOU.

With Heath Ledger, Julia Stiles, Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Larisa Oleynik, David Krumholtz. At area theaters. Running time: 94 mins. Rated PG-13: Sex talk.

particularly clever) nods to the original Brooding outcast Patrick Verona (Australian hunk Heath Ledger) has been paid to woo the unattainable Katarina Stratford (Julia Stiles). It's imperative that Kat get hooked up because her sweeter younger sister, Bianca (Larisa Oleynik), isn't allowed to date until she does. When it comes to the younger Stratford, the line forms to the left. But Patrick is the only guy who'll rise to the challenge of dating Kat, a soccer champ who uses her kicking skills on the crotches of males who annoy her which means any guy who tries to talk to her. Kat and Pat have a lot in common, since Pat is also a rather for jy ing oi me snrew, "I Shakespeare's sexi-est story, in which a SWEET SISTER: Larisa Oleynik, Joseph Gordon-Levitt in "10 Things I Hate About You" he forces his daughter to try on a prosthetic pregnancy device so she'll understand the consequences of making out Allison Janney is fun as a guidance counselor who writes torrid prose in her spare time.

No, it ain't Shakespeare, but you've gotta love a movie that even attempts to present its climax in iambic pentameter. wildebeest and a wildcat find, after much clawing, that they're perfectly matched. This modern retelling is set at Padua High School; most of the proper names in the movie are (not Paris' subway serenaders A eye-opening and ear-pleasing documentary, "The Underground Orchestra" gets off to a deceptively relaxing start in the Paris Metro, THE UNDERGROUND ORCHESTRA. Documentary, primarily in French, with English subtitles. Directed by Heddy Honigmann.

At the Film Forum. Unrated: Some profanity. the crew talking with the musicians. His intention is to catch the immigrant buskers on the fly, and freeze-frame a Parisian subculture born from chaos elsewhere on the globe. "We're all exiles here," says one, an Iranian folk guitarist Honigmann's foray into this odd world seems almost leisurely, but his subjects stay with you long after they made their first impressions.

Nevertheless, the film's verite style gives you the sense that-you're discovering his characters and their secrets in real time. And in New York, where similar stories lurk behind street music, it's enough to separate you from your change. Jack Mathews where we're treated to the music of street performers working the subway for francs and centimes. Dutch film maker Heddy Honigmann's camera prowls the Metro for talent, or at least determination. Honigmann does all this invisibly.

When the police kick him out, he waits for the musicians to emerge from below, then interviews them talking his way into their homes and probing their lives. There's no narration and he doesn't appear on camera, although we occasionally hear members of.