Picture This! Reviews The Bourne Supremacy

Reprinted from NotesFromHollywood.com

Jason Bourne is a man on the run. In The Bourne Supremacy, Matt Damon as Bourne literally hits the ground running and looks good doing it.

Our mystery man (at least to himself) is living in India with a girlfriend and suffers from nightmares and loss of memory. If you saw the first movie, The Bourne Identity, you already know that, but just in case, and with very little back story, viewers are brought up to speed. In a nutshell, Bourne is damn confused.

But he runs on the beach in India and is in terrific shape which bodes well for the events that are about to unfold in the next few days (or two hours of screen time). Without divulging any of the reasons for his last minute travel plans to Germany, suffice it to say that our main character is running from danger, running to the truth, running out of energy, and eventually, running out of gas as he is pursued by a plethora of well-intentioned custom officers and policemen.

Along the way, Bourne is tracked and trailed by high ranking intelligence agents Pamela Landy (Joan Allen) and Ward Abbott (Brian Cox). Mired in bureaucratic one “upmanship” (how could that be?). These two work together like our current CIA and FBI – in other words, not at all. Each has his/her own agenda, and while they’re playing politics, Bourne is running from, well, everyone.

Director Paul Greengrass keeps this adaptation of Robert Ludlum’s novel at a clipped pace and reasonably tense. The final chase screeches over, under, and around hundreds of curves and proves to be an insurance claims agent’s nightmare with countless crashes. While the final pursuit may be a tad over long, the editing of Richard Pearson and Christopher Rouse is impressive.

Rebecca Redshaw is the Arts& Entertainment Critic for www.NotesFromHollywood.com. She can be reached at r2redshaw@hotmail.com.