2. The Bourne Supremacy (2004)

Victoria,

You touch on some worthwhile points in your review that I want to be sure to address in mine.  Before I get to that, though, I want to let you know that much of what I’m going to talk about is going to center on the difference between what I think Greengrass is trying to do, and what the movie actually is.  This might seem a bit unfair at first blush, but I don’t think so, because this movie fails the first test every single sequel in the history of filmdom has to pass: this film fails to justify its existence over and against its first episode (granted, most of Hollywood doesn’t play by this rule, but it should - it’s the one thing good sequels, like The Godfather Part II or The Empire Strikes Back or, heck, even Spiderman 2, have in common).  There isn’t really a good reason for The Bourne Supremacy to exist, narratively speaking, and so I can’t really qualify it as a “good” film per se, or talk substantively about the ideas that are actually present in the film.  I can talk about what I suspect Greengrass wanted to do, though, because if he had accomplished it, the film would’ve had enough muster to legitimate itself.

What I suspect Greengrass wanted to do in The Bourne Supremacy was to treat seriously the idea that violence, something that is commonplace and typically taken for granted in film (especially American film), has consequence in the lives of individuals.  I base this argument partially on the rest of Greengrass’ oeuvre, which has, in one way or another, dealt more transparently with this idea.  I think particularly about the scene at the conclusion of Captain Phillips, in which Tom Hanks’ character suffers physical shock from the violence and terror that has occurred around him over the course of the film.  This scene is powerful because it shows something film typically doesn’t - a character dealing with the aftermath of what is, in the grand scheme of film history, relatively minor violence.

There is a somewhat similar scene in the conclusion of Bourne 2.  Here, Damon’s Bourne apologizes for the assassination of a Russian politician and his wife to their orphaned daughter.  We watch her grieve over the deaths of characters that are, in light of the entire narrative of the Bourne films, more-or-less insignificant.  We, the viewers, are supposed to think seriously about the cost of death and carnage, and perhaps even the effect of our fetishization of it in film.

The problem is we don’t.  Instead, we think back to the obnoxiously long car chase we just endured, or the fist-fight in the chic European apartment, or the snipering of Marie, a character we do in fact care about but find it hard to believe Bourne does.  This is what happens when you situate an emotionally-potent scene in an otherwise standard-operation action film, which is ultimately what Bourne 2 is.  Greengrass thinks, I think, that the “shaky cam” changes this, and I see why he would think so.  The camera movements, particularly in the action scenes, are designed to make the viewer feel as if they are physically a part of what is happening on-screen.  The cinematography is definitely effective, but it doesn’t quite take the viewer where Greengrass intends.  The result is a movie that, as you point out, is nice to look at, but doesn’t, in execution, have anything new or interesting to say, especially when compared to its originating counterpart.

Hopefully “Bourne 3: Bourne Again, Again” succeeds where this one doesn’t.

Love,

Adam