While the woman appears harmless, she wears a vibrant shade of red in order to distract trainees, triggering what's known as the "red dress effect" - a phenomenon where women wearing red are perceived to be more attractive and open to sexual advances than those in plain colors. On analyzing this particular scene in The Matrix, it becomes clear that the woman in red is a deliberate distraction, a simulated character who is a part of the Agent training program. RELATED: The Matrix 4: How Agent Smith Can Return In The Sequel This prompts Morpheus to ask, “ Were you listening to me, Neo? Or were you looking at the woman in the red dress?” As Neo falters, he is held at gunpoint by Agent Smith. While Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne) guides him through the programmed maze of the matrix, Neo gets distracted by a stunning woman in red. This is a rude awakening for Neo, but a necessary one. It becomes clear that the majority of the human race has been reduced to an unwitting simulacrum to serve the machines, reminiscent of Plato’s Allegory of the Cave - an illusion that can only be dispelled by the emergence of ‘ the One’. On taking the red pill, Neo (Keanu Reeves) is able to see the world’s true construct, becoming hyper-aware of the reality of the human race, most of which is in deep slumber and blind to the truth. In order to better understand the woman in the red dress, one must understand the scene’s contextual eminence. What does the woman in the red dress really mean in the Wachowskis' 1999 sci-fi classic, The Matrix? Loosely based on Jean Baudrillard’s 1981 philosophical treatise, Simulacra and Simulation, which dwells on the nature of the real and the hyperreal, The Matrix is akin to a thematic and visual lexicon - rife with layers and symbolism as intricate as the film’s virtual world itself.