The Bourne Identity? Bouring.

Rating: 4/10 (7 November 2010)

I will admit up front that I watched this movie expecting an action flick. There, I said it. So complain all you want about how people these days have ridiculously short attention spans - yes, I am not beyond turning my brain off for an hour or two in order to enjoy a movie.
However, I also enjoy watching movies that are original, or thought provoking, or character driven, or plot-centered. While the Bourne Identity was plot-centered, it certainly wasn't the other three. It was a failure as both a "deep" movie AND a brainless action flick.
There were no exciting special effects, few explosions, and few fight sequences - all of which could be forgiven (easily!) if the characters were even remotely interesting. I've never seen a Matt Damon movie before, and his performance here didn't make me want to go out and see more of him. Because we know basically from the beginning what happened to him (based on the scenes with the CIA agents), I didn't care at all about his character, either. Franka Potente was all right I suppose, but Marie wasn't written in a way that made me care about her, either. I rolled my eyes at the obligatory "kissss meeee" scene; I knew it was going to happen eventually, but it was so drawn out and lacking in chemistry.
And also - just when it starts to get interesting, when he finds out he's a government project or whatever - it just ends. After all that pointless running around and hiding and "Marie, just go! This life isn't good for you!", we don't even delve into what probably would have been the most interesting aspect of the storyline. I suppose in the sequels we learn more about whatever it is they did to him to make him a superspy, but I don't care enough to find out. I only sat through this movie because I was watching it with other people; otherwise, I would have turned it off long before it reached its end.