The Bourne Supremacy (2004)

(Originally published in Rocky Mountain Bullhorn)

Jason Bourne, Robert Ludlum’s amnesiac CIA assassin embodied with a cold, humorless grimness by Matt Damon, may not remember who he is, but The Bourne Supremacy – the sequel to 2002’s economical and exhilarating The Bourne Identity – certainly confirms this series’ polished, efficient, espionage-oriented identity. Thrillingly compact and focused on creating excitement through character and tight plotting, it’s one of the summer’s sleekest adventures and yet more proof that all the CGI madness in the world can’t compete with gritty, realistic, old-fashioned action.

Bourne has spent the past two years living on a tranquil African beach with girlfriend Marie (Franka Potente), but when an assassin (Karl Urban) kills the only thing he loves, the trained killer goes on a revenge rampage against the CIA chiefs he believes have orchestrated the attack (and who, simultaneously, believe Bourne has murdered two agents investigating a Russian oil conspiracy). It would take too long to recount any more of the labyrinth story, but director Paul Greengrass gives his sequel the same bleak gray sheen and visceral, hand-held cinematography of Doug Liman’s predecessor, culminating in a crunching car chase through Moscow’s teeming streets that thrillingly outdoes the impressive automobile acrobatics of the original. Joan Allen and Brian Cox lend some authoritative classiness as bickering CIA chiefs, but the film stands on the shoulders of Damon, who submerges his natural conviviality to give the psychologically fractured Bourne a tortured, chameleon-like mysteriousness that, unfortunately for him – but thankfully for us – won’t be fully deciphered without at least one more movie.