A Killer? Abandon the Fixed Idea

A former CIA agent, Jason Bourne (played by Matt Damon), suffers from amnesia. He is plagued by nightmares every night while he runs away with his girlfriend, Maria, (played by Franka Potente) without knowing why he is being chased and by whom. He finds himself being involved in a murder scene in his repeating, splintered nightmares. Facing the murder of Maria, Bourne takes a journey of revenge by retracing the ring that has tormented him. While finding clues and evidence, he finds out that he is related to the death of Russian representatives Mr. Neski and his wife.

The movie “The Bourne Supremacy” is the sequel to the movie “The Bourne Identity,” which came out in 2002. This picture puts two factors at the forefront: one is its action thriller genre, the other is the issue of a killer’s identity as he wonders “who am I?”

This movie challenges with a little variation, following its predecessor’s style. The highlight of this movie is the combination of Matt Damon, who plays in the sequel again, and director Paul Greengrass. The director was renowned for his half-documentary movie “Bloody Sunday” (2002), which chronicled Northern Ireland’s violent rally to protest the British Government in 1972.

Greengrass seems to make great efforts to avoid the typical action thriller’s trail as well as trying not to lose basic entertaining features of commercial movies. His efficacious resource was Matt Damon, who is considered as one of the good and smart young men in Hollywood, and his face that seems just a bit too naïve to be a killer’s. Damon acting in this film is different from typical action roles, like those starring in the “007” series that share the sleazy and charismatic Bond style or other exaggerated, stylish killers in some other movies. The audience gets to have the illusion that they are watching a real story, not a created killer for the screen, due to his ordinary features, which do not make up a typical killer’s face.

The graphic sequences filmed using “hand-held” (shooting while holding a camera in-hand) techniques and beat-based, simple music that sounds like heart vibrations, contribute greatly to heightening the reality of the movie.

However, the movie does not fully satisfy the audience in the quality aspect of the action thriller genre. It opens its “secret key” too early and easily at the end, compared to the graphic action and brain puzzles that push viewers to the edge of their seats almost one hour into the film. One CIA executive member murders his staff and the plot is revealed: the murder being connected with an embezzlement case. The tension of the movie sharply plunges at its peak.

This might be due to Greengrass’s self-respect as a documentary filmmaker, even though he is making a commercial movie here. Retrieving his lost memories, Bourne visits and confesses to the daughter of Representative Neski.

“It was not your mother that killed your father. I killed them both. Now, does the world looks different to you?”

The movie opens on August 20 and is rated for audiences over the age of 15.

Gab-Sik Kim dunanworld@donga.com