Name: Bourne Identity (2002)
IMDb: link to Bourne Identity page
Genres: Action Country of origin: USA.
Cast:
Matt Damon as Jason Bourne, Franka Potente as Marie Helena Kreutz, Chris Cooper as Alexander Conklin, Brian Cox as Ward Abbott, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje as Wombasi, Julia Stiles as Nicky Parsons, Clive Owen as The Professor, Gabriel Mann as Danny Zorn.
Directed by: Doug Limon. Written by: Tony Gilroy, W. Blake Herron (screenplay), Robert Ludlum (book).
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| Outside Embassy |
The initial tableaux:
On a rainy night after a card game, Italian fishermen spot a man's body floating in the Mediterranean Sea. They reel him in, attend to his medical needs, and take him to Marseilles. He has amnesia. He also has clues: two bullet holes in his back, and an implant that tells him he has an account at a bank in Switzerland.
His safe deposit box proves helpful. He has passports from various countries under a host of names, lots of currency of different countries, a modern pistol and other odds and ends.
His opening the safe deposit box triggers all sorts of reactions. His going to the US Embassy does not help, since the Marines and the CIA are now after him, as well as the local police.
Delineation of conflicts:
The CIA wants Jason Bourne (at first just a name on one of his passports) to be dead, or to come in peacefully to their deadly embrace. The CIA wants him silenced and covered up quickly and completely.
Jason needs to figure out who he is. Marie is drawn into helping him after he pays her handsomely just to give him a ride to Paris, where one of his aliases lived.
The CIA, lead by Conklin, Jason's former boss, continues to hunt Jason. Jason continues to unravel his past and evade capture. Jason wants to know much more.
Resolution: The CIA manages to bury much of the project that Jason was involved in. Jason figures out why he got shot and why he was floating in the Mediterranean.
One line summary: Best of the Matt Damon versions of Bourne.
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| Jason and Marie |
Statistics:
Cinematography: 8/10 Mostly well done, but with some shades of shaky cam.
Sound: 7/10 I could hear the dialog. Music was a minor asset; the best part was the music over the end credits.
Acting: 7/10 I liked the performances of Franka Potente, Clive Owen, Chris Cooper, Brian Cox, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, and Julia Stiles. Matt Damon was a mixed bag, which is much better than usual.
Screenplay: 7/10 Amnesia has been done to death, but this was a well-written take on it. Bourne discovers all sorts of things about himself due to external situations triggering muscle memories, which was a well used but nice touch. The scenes where Bourne confronts the people he trusted, the people who tortured him, the people who bamboozled him were discouragingly bad. This would continue into the next two films unfortunately. The good parts of the film, which seemed fresh and interesting in 2002, were just copied over in 2004 and 2007. Those parts (fighting choreography, chase scenes, evasion) were a bit stale in 2004 and off the cliff bad in 2007. The writing about Bourne's dealings with those who screwed him over were bad at the start (film 1, 2002) and got worse.
Final Rating: 7/10 I watched it again this past week and still liked it.
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