The Bourne Supremacy
I[ftn] did something last weekend that I was going to write about. Hmm, what was it? It was … no, it’s gone. I’ve forgotten.
Wait, it’s coming back. I was at a movie theatre. There were people there. I had a gun. No, not a gun; I had popcorn. I was running late. Maybe if I go back to the theatre I will remember the rest.
[sometime later]
It all came back. I saw The Bourne Supremacy. There were no memorable moments to the film; much like season 7 of Buffy. This film felt like one long attempt at tying off the loose ends from the first film and in the process, ruining it. The first film ended with couple of unresolved issues and a happy ending. A good way to end a film in my opinion. You can’t resolve everything without bloating the movie and dragging out the ending. A bit of mystery ends a film nicely.
The Bourne Supremacy has little in the way of a structured plot, limping from one section to the next. The CIA spend their time trying to find Bourne and whinging to each other, until the bad guy amongst them gives in. Bourne spends his time just wandering around remembering fragments from his assassin days and trying to clear his conscience[ftn] until the credits suddenly roll. Throw in some Russians and there’s your plot. Comprehensively ruining both the sequel and the first movie, the likes of which has not been seen since Reloaded.
The camera work didn’t help. It was very shaky during the action scenes which I liked in the beginning until it made me feel sick. And the person next to me. There was a whole bunch of us feeling crook. It made the fight scenes confusing with the camera moving so much. Maybe I should drink less before going out. Maybe I missed something vital in the first ten minutes which I didn’t see as I was running late. But I doubt it.
And the end. There seemed to be no obvious ending to the film. We wouldn’t have known we were supposed to leave the cinema if it wasn’t for the credits rolling. After a car chase or two in the middle, the film wandered without a climax until it stopped. It felt like a tv episode in that respect. To be continued in the next episode because we’ve run out of time today. It just kept going and going and then ended like an essay in the middle of paragraph.
Just when you thought it would end there would be another bit.[ftn] It was like … no I’ve forgotten again.
Footnotes
- Two can play the footnote game Tom.
- Hello little girl. I hope I didn’t surprise you by waiting for you in your apartment in the dark. I killed your father and mother and I’d like to apologise for that. Anyway, I must be going now. Have a good day.
- And then a little bit more.
Tom
September 6th, 2004 at 4:56 pm
I agree — Julia Stiles is gorgeous. I know you didn’t say that in your review but it was implied in the picture.
If only I had had the chance to meet her…
Andy
September 6th, 2004 at 10:02 pm
The only good part about the film. She wasn’t in it much.
Tom
September 6th, 2004 at 10:19 pm
Not nearly enough. Would I be correct in thinking that your picture of her isn’t actually from the film?
I think I liked the film more than you did. But I agree with you completely about the action. If it had had good, watchable action I might have liked it — as it is I’m just neutral.
Andy
September 6th, 2004 at 11:28 pm
I just googled for some pics. Her pic is from this link . Looking at the page now, I doubt it would be from the movie.
Jack
September 7th, 2004 at 4:15 am
I actually thought the first part has reasonably well focused (i.e. Up until he tracked down the location of the CIA people). After that though it did feel rather aimless, I agree. As Matt was saying, the character kind of lost control of the situation and just ended up running away from people.
Andy
September 7th, 2004 at 5:29 am
And I was told they never make mistakes.
Tom
September 7th, 2004 at 7:53 pm
They never make mistakes, no, but that doesn’t preclude them from being aimless. We’ve all been there. You’ve got something important to do, but you’d rather surf the net, or get shot and have a brutal car chase, or something.
Shannon
September 9th, 2004 at 9:33 pm
How come this review doesnt come up in the ‘film’ section but only on the main page? Think I found a glitch in your system Tom…
Or possibly its just all Andrews fault. I like those odds.
Tom
September 10th, 2004 at 12:01 am
You must be looking at a different ‘film’ section to me then.
I suspect you should try looking under the letter ‘T’.
Shannon
September 10th, 2004 at 3:32 am
Ooooooo.. alphabetical order, puuuurrty. But so much less convenient that arranged-by-date. Anyhoo now I’m just being antagonistic.
Tom
September 10th, 2004 at 3:41 am
Really? So if you’re coming along to this site for the first time, and you want to find Die Another Day, you’ll work it out by somehow guessing what date we reviewed it? :)
Shannon
September 10th, 2004 at 8:51 pm
Oh, I’m sorry. I didnt realise you were expecting walk-by’s… Give me the stats then, is it not just ‘the usuals’ after all?
Tom
September 10th, 2004 at 11:34 pm
Every now and then, someone does a search and ends up here. I doubt they stay. But someone might some time. I live in hope.
There is of course the far far more obvious case that one of us might make a new friend who’s really into pop culture and show them the site.
Besides, Jackson’s always railing against date-based archiving. As far as I can see, even if the only people that read it are the 15 or so I can think of, you’re the only one with a weird desire for date-based archiving. :)
Shannon
September 11th, 2004 at 5:01 am
I’m just trying to rile you up, sorry. I’ll stop now. Yay for alphabetical order and such.