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Bourne Again Action
By bukkhead | August 5, 2007
FILM REVIEW: ‘THE BOURNE SUPREMACY’
Written by Tony Gilroy. Based on the novel by Robert Ludlum
Directed by Paul Greengrass
Rated PG-13
108 mins.
There’s one thing I don’t like about The Bourne Supremacy, and only one, and I’m going to go ahead and tell you what it is, even though it’s a bit of a spoiler. But it happens early enough in the movie, and there’s probably trailers out there that reveal as much. I don’t like that Franke Potente is only in the first few minutes of the movie.
I admit, though, that it’s not because she is an amazing, powerful actress. She is these things, but not in the Bourne movies. She’s beautiful, which is enough for me, but the role doesn’t really require any kind of deep digging. It does require more than just a pretty face though, so I and the world are glad that they didn’t stick the flavor-of-the-month in there. Then we would have been glad she leaves this second film so early. Instead, the audience feels a bit of the anguish and loss that Jason Bourne feels through the rest of the movie. It makes us think, “Yeah, Jason, take it to ‘em, the bastards deserve it.”
In this sequel to The Bourne Identity, Jason makes good on his promise that if anyone tries to interfere with his new life, he would have to respond with dire consequences. A plot to frame him in the death of CIA operatives brings Jason back to the spy game, complicated still by his fractured memory. What is Treadstone?
But whereas Jason was both awed and somewhat disgusted with the bag of tricks he finds he possesses in the first movie, in Supremacy, he reaches into the bag without abandon, and in this way comes even closer to re-discovering himself. So the theme from the first movie, where he had to allow himself to be placed in pressure situations in order to see what he was made of, remains here in the second. But this time, Jason is calling the shots. More or less. Because on the other side of the wall separating the organic man from the bureaucratic conspiracies that made him in the first place, things are falling apart. Call it lucky that mistakes are made by the various CIA operatives trying to find him, but luck is just another word for fate.
In terms of straight-up action, Supremacy has everything we so thoroughly enjoyed from the first film: the car chases, the close-up fight scenes, the closing credits with music by Moby. But a new director has added a new vision, with hand-held cameras to add to the frenetic feel of the movie. It’s a faster, more intense, and necessarily more angry Jason Bourne that we see. Instead of chasing ephemeral memories, he’s focused on a tangible goal: punish the ones who tried to undo him.
The message is clear: the structures these officials have lied and cheated to build were destined to fall apart. If Jason is a Frankenstein’s monster, it is not only fitting, but inevitable, that the monster will have to destroy its creator.
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