Director: Doug Liman
Writers: Tony Gilroy, W. Black Herron
Starring: Matt Damon, Franka Potenta, Chris Cooper
Amnesia is the focus of many films and generally, those
films end up being either entertaining or fantastic. Memento is one of the best
films I have ever seen and let’s be honest, if he didn’t have amnesia in that;
it would have been pretty boring. Before I Go To Sleep came out just last year
and from what I have seen heard and read about it, it is certainly not a bad
movie. I feel that it’s safe to say that it is a subject matter with huge
cinematic potential. Aided by the amnesiac premise, The Bourne Identity
succeeds at blending the expected unravelling mystery with engaging action
scenes.
The film opens with a living man being hauled onto a fishing boat. The man wakes up finds that he has been shot twice and is understandably agitated. The opening of the film is brilliantly suspenseful acting as the wind that sends the character boulders tumbling down plot mountain. The reason the scene stands out so much to me is that it refrains from just yelling information at you. Every time a film opens with a voiceover from the main character, I fill with rage and proceed to hate that character for the rest of time. The amount that you know at different points in the film is the exact same as Jason Bourne (that’s the name of the guy who got shot by the way). Memento also did this very well but decided it wanted to go one step further and do everything backwards, making you feel even more like an amnesiac.
I have heard a lot of praise for the fight scenes in this series as a whole but that portion of the action never particularly blew me away. When I was re-watching this, and a fight broke out, I struggled to keep the groans in when some of the worst sound effects I have ever heard reveal themselves. If you want me to not take your clearly serious fight scene seriously, using these sound effects is a quick to get there. They really did not support the praise bestowed upon the scenes.
The parts of the action that I loved the film were the cool, quick-thinking spy moments. Jason Bourne is a spy. It would be quite hard not to notice that considering he is holding a gun and looking cool on all the posters and the DVD cover. As a spy, he knows what to do in every situation and he is going to be enjoyable to watch when he’s doing it. The content in these scenes is excellent. He can escape from group of SWAT operatives just by walking up and down some stairs for a bit and he can even outsmart a fellow agent… two times. It’s great to see him being put into increasingly dire circumstances and muscling his way out.
As an amplifier to the quality of these scenes, no music plays! That never happens in movies. It is obvious that a good score can make an OK film fantastic. What is less obvious is that having no music at all can make scenes far more tense and suspenseful. Top-notch idea, lads!
While this film is a cracking beginning to one of the best action series in film history I feel that it doesn’t reach the levels or stakes of Supremacy or Ultimatum and Legacy is just its own thing that honestly doesn’t deserve to be called a Bourne film.
This being said, there is not a person I could not recommend this movie to. Suspense and tension are utilised incredibly well and everyone loves a bit of suspense and tension. The Bourne Identity is a big player in the amnesia category of film and for good reason.
The Bourne Identity receives an: 8/10
The film opens with a living man being hauled onto a fishing boat. The man wakes up finds that he has been shot twice and is understandably agitated. The opening of the film is brilliantly suspenseful acting as the wind that sends the character boulders tumbling down plot mountain. The reason the scene stands out so much to me is that it refrains from just yelling information at you. Every time a film opens with a voiceover from the main character, I fill with rage and proceed to hate that character for the rest of time. The amount that you know at different points in the film is the exact same as Jason Bourne (that’s the name of the guy who got shot by the way). Memento also did this very well but decided it wanted to go one step further and do everything backwards, making you feel even more like an amnesiac.
I have heard a lot of praise for the fight scenes in this series as a whole but that portion of the action never particularly blew me away. When I was re-watching this, and a fight broke out, I struggled to keep the groans in when some of the worst sound effects I have ever heard reveal themselves. If you want me to not take your clearly serious fight scene seriously, using these sound effects is a quick to get there. They really did not support the praise bestowed upon the scenes.
The parts of the action that I loved the film were the cool, quick-thinking spy moments. Jason Bourne is a spy. It would be quite hard not to notice that considering he is holding a gun and looking cool on all the posters and the DVD cover. As a spy, he knows what to do in every situation and he is going to be enjoyable to watch when he’s doing it. The content in these scenes is excellent. He can escape from group of SWAT operatives just by walking up and down some stairs for a bit and he can even outsmart a fellow agent… two times. It’s great to see him being put into increasingly dire circumstances and muscling his way out.
As an amplifier to the quality of these scenes, no music plays! That never happens in movies. It is obvious that a good score can make an OK film fantastic. What is less obvious is that having no music at all can make scenes far more tense and suspenseful. Top-notch idea, lads!
While this film is a cracking beginning to one of the best action series in film history I feel that it doesn’t reach the levels or stakes of Supremacy or Ultimatum and Legacy is just its own thing that honestly doesn’t deserve to be called a Bourne film.
This being said, there is not a person I could not recommend this movie to. Suspense and tension are utilised incredibly well and everyone loves a bit of suspense and tension. The Bourne Identity is a big player in the amnesia category of film and for good reason.
The Bourne Identity receives an: 8/10
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