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Promotional Lines: "Who Am I?" "Bourne to survive."
"He was the perfect weapon until he became the target."
The story begins on a fishing boat, riding out
a storm on the Mediterranean Sea, about 60 miles south of Marseille,
France. During this rain storm, the crew are playing cards in
the ship's hull. Suddenly, a man on board spies a body of a diver,
floating in the drink. It takes a group effort to get the still
male form up on deck. Suddenly, the diver's hand moves, letting
all know that he is still alive!
The diver is quickly plopped on the card table
down below, and the ship's captain takes two small bullets out
of the diver's back, and a mysterious, small cylinder out of his
hip that has a message, which is beamed on the wall; a number
of a bank deposit box in a Zurich bank. The diver suddenly becomes
conscious, and doesn't know his name or anything about his life.
After regaining his strength, the fishermen drop
him off on shore two weeks later, with some money so he can go
to Zurich to see if there is anything in this bank deposit box
which will help him remember anything at all. He doesn't know
it yet, but he is about to land in a whole lot of trouble, and
endure a wild roller coaster ride, complete with car chases, cat
and mouse games with paid assassins, while following up on clues
as to who he is, what he does for a living, and why he was found
shot in the Mediterranean Sea. Through it all, he finds that previous
training, survival skills and his basic instincts serve him well
in surviving the attempts on his life, which were stemming from
the coordinated efforts of an unknown force which seems to know
a lot about him.
His first stop is at the Zurich Bank to check
out the safe deposit box. Is he in for a surprise! He finds a
lot of money, various passports with aliases, a gun and a U.S.
passport, with the name, Jason Bourne, which he feels is his name.
He finds out that he has an apartment in Paris.
At this point, the audience is let onto the fact
that the C.I.A. is alarmed that he isn't dead, but has resurfaced
alive, and has cleaned out his safe deposit box, suggesting that
he has snapped and is a free agent. It seems that Jason is part
of a secret C.I.A. project, known as Treadstone, which is made
up of sleeper assassins, highly trained and conditioned to kill
various targets assigned to them. Jason had been sent to kill
an exiled African dictator, but had failed in his mission for
some reason. This dictator is now trying to coerce the C.I.A.
to get him back into power, or he will expose their Treadstone
Project.
Then, we are taken back to Jason's storyline.
Next stop for Jason is the U.S Embassy, which he ducks into three
steps ahead of the police, who somehow know he was the one who
put two cops in the hospital the night before and others who are
interested in catching him/ killing him. When security men try
to arrest him as he waits in line at the U.S. Embassy, he fights
them off with martial arts skills he didn't know he had, and escapes
from the soldiers chasing him throughout the embassy building
by the skin of his teeth.
After scaling down the outside of the embassy
wall, James spies a young woman in the alley, standing by her
car, just outside the embassy, which is now locked down because
of his activities. This young German woman, Marie Kreutz (Franka
Potente), a gypsy of sorts, was at the embassy, in line ahead
of him, trying to get a visa to the United States. . He offers
her 10,000 dollars to drive him to Paris, and further offers her
another 10,000 dollars upon arriving at his Paris apartment. Badly
in need for cash, Marie Kreutz throws caution to the wind and
joins this wild, dangerous quest, not knowing what trouble she
had just volunteered for, that will change her life forever.
Because of the Embassy's outside cameras had caught
on tape Marie's car, her face and Jason getting into her car,
by the time Jason and Marie arrive in Paris, the local authorities
and a group of called up assassin agents have a lot of information
about them, due to some special talents of the C.I.A. It doesn't
look good for our team, at this point, but by now, the audience
is totally involved, forgetting any personal troubles they may
have had before viewing this exciting yarn. They are rooting for
Jason and Marie, to learn information that Jason needs to have
about himself, in order to stay alive, conquer foes, and hopefully
escape their rather scary, dangerous reality into a better way
of life.
This film is one of the best of its genre, as
it has a wonderful blend of action, suspense and quieter moments
when the plot is developed as Jason does his investigating, and
the C.I.A.Treadstone project leader, Conklin (Chris Cooper) and
his team make plans to end their problems, as they hunt down their
wayward agent, his accomplice and eventually deal with Wombosi,
who promises to be a royal embarrassing pain in the neck.
This flowing, suspenseful, action spy screenplay
was written by Tony Gilroy and William Blake Herron, based upon
Robert Ludlum's novel, who was also on board as an executive producer,
along with Frank Marshall, who also produced such films as the
INDIANA JONES adventure films, SIGNS, BACK TO THE FUTURE films
AND THE SIXTH SENSE, to name just a few.
The wonderful pacing, action sequences and great
cast performances were all under the fine direction of Doug Liman,
who is an up and coming talent, a graduate from USC film school.
Liman was also a producer on this film.
A favorite action / martial arts sequence of this
reviewer takes place in Bourne's Paris apartment between an assassin
agent from Rome, and our hero, Bourne, as they duke it out in
the living room, after the assassin makes a dramatic entry by
way of a glass window, shooting his machine gun.
There is also a great car chase sequence of scenes,
which takes place when Bourne and Marie are being chased in their
car by Parisian police around Paris streets, down stairs, against
one way traffic, through glass, and on the sidewalks.
Matt Damon is very convincing, and does a fabulous
job portraying Jason Bourne, as he calmly survives by his wits,
and puts two and two together just in time to defeat the hostile
forces, using his extensive training in martial arts, in combat
strategy, in driving, and still manages to fall in love in the
process of discovering who he is and how he got there.
All is revealed by the end of the story. Damon
was well prepared for the physical acting the part required. On
the DVD, Matt said that he spent 6 months learning martial arts
for this role.
Franka Potente does a great job portraying the
flighty Marie Kreutz who unwittingly is sucked up into Bournes'
life-threatening troubles, falls in love with Bourne and turns
her life around at the end from the experiences she manages to
live through with Bourne's help.
Chris Cooper does a good job playing the heavy
at the C.I.A., Conklin, who is truly in a pickle.
Adewale Akinnouye Agbaje is entertaining as the
annoyingly pompous, angry dictator, Wombosi, who was supposed
to be killed by Bourne. Agbaje is known for his sinister role
as a henchman who kidnaps the boy in RETURN OF THE MUMMY.
Rated PG-13 for violence and some language. Despite
the violent action scenes, where usually one or more people die,
or get injured, no blood or gore is shown, which is refreshing
for those who become easily ill. The film is done in the spirit
of RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK (Marshall). In the heat of the moment,
potty words do slip out. The film does give the C.I.A. a black
eye, which isn't anything new in spy yarns coming from Hollywood.
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