The Injury You Didn't Know Carrie Anne Moss Suffered In The Matrix

With "The Matrix Resurrections" set to launch in December, there's no better time to sit down and revisit the series that revitalized the action genre as we know it. "The Matrix" franchise is revered by critics and fans alike for the way it innovated and improved upon a stagnant genre by motivating its gunfights and martial art showdowns with a complex, compelling narrative. It also helps when said action sequences are utterly captivating and crafted by a master choreographer like Yuen Woo-Ping. Yuen's fight choreography spans several decades' worth of movies and includes action classics like "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," "Kill Bill," and of course all the movies in the original "Matrix" trilogy. Through the combined innovation of Yuen and the Wachowskis, the action sequences in "The Matrix" became iconic and heralded a brighter future for the genre as a whole.

That's not to say there weren't any hiccups along the way. In fact, actor Carrie-Anne Moss learned all too well that the kind of fights "The Matrix" wanted to present always included some sort of risk.

One of the most iconic fight sequences in the original "Matrix" is the scene in which Moss' character, Trinity, jumps into the air and kicks someone in slow motion. The camera spins around Trinity as she hangs in the air, and the force of her kick launches a police officer off his feet. It's one of the most memorable action moments in all of film history (and has even been parodied in a few other films). 

What many fans don't know is that Moss performed the stunt while battling through an ankle injury. She twisted her ankle early on during production but kept the injury a secret, worried that she would be recast if the studio found out. Moss toughed it out for the entire filming schedule and only revealed the injury once filming had wrapped. It's wild to think about when considering Trinity's signature fighting style involves a whole lot of kicking. 

While Moss was able to avoid being sidelined during the first film, she wasn't so lucky the second time around. She broke her leg during the first week of production on "The Matrix Reloaded," and it took 12 months for her to recover. Regardless, the next time you sit down to watch "The Matrix" and Trinity loads up one of her signature kicks, make sure you remember what was happening behind-the-scenes, and how impressive it is that she could fight like that at all.