It’s been awhile since I paid money to watch a movie a second time (hello, you knew it was LOTR) and this film is definitely worth it. Seeing it again I got to focus on more of the details and the acting and I appreciated them even more.
A good example of what I mean is the relationship between Bourne (Matt Damon) and Maria (Franka Potente). There’s no condescension or simple arrogance in the way he talks to her, even in moments when they’re in extreme peril such as sitting in the battered little car outside the Paris train station with two dozen cops about to descend. More: Bourne is no superhero, just amped up with advanced pharmacology and serious training, so although no one who goes up against him in a fight can beat him, he never resorts to cartoonish violence either. The two times he goes up against other Treadstone operatives show this. Okay, I would have used a little less volume on the sound effects reinforcing the punches. Very European feel, even apart from the fact that it’s set there, with the old, small car of Maria’s, the friend’s farmhouse, and the in-city car chase.
Doug Liman constantly foreshadows and refers back giving the film a holistic quality and keeps the plot driving forward, relentlessly, very little exposition (such as the scene when Jason and Maria stop for dinner on the drive from Zurich to Paris) and even minimizing the romance, just enough to show us that the two are forming an intense bond. I’m amazed that this is his first big budget film. Maybe this is where screenwriter Tony Gilroy’s experience on films such as Armageddon and Devil’s Advocate comes in.
The odd thing is that Robert Ludlam, who wrote the briliant novel on which this film is based, died in March, 2001, yet is credited as executive producer. Must have been one of those contractual things.
Best film released in the first six months of 2002
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