32. "At the time of that trailer I thought it would be Total Recall with" In response to In response to 30
better special effects. Which ended up being kinda accurate, but the story was much, much better than I'd anticipated.
1999 was a crazy time for films...special effects were hitting the borderline phase where as a viewer we knew anything was possible (which could take away a bit of the amazement), but you still had films doing things that hadn't been done before so that amazement would still be there in the theater.
On top of that the Matrix was one of the first big films I remember going all in with the internet based marketing campaign (along with Blair Witch), with the website having all kinds of background lore before the film was out.