a surprisingly lousy movie

Rating: Null/10 (8 July 2002)

WARNING! This movie contains *no spoilers*; I don't think it wants to let you know what it's about!
I was very disappointed in The Bourne Identity; though maybe I shouldn't have been. Perhaps it's only a matter of time before someone will enlist top acting talent and the best equipment and action directing for a flop.
Was it just me, or did the emperor have no clothes? Was this movie like certain rock concerts, where you have to have already heard the CDs in order to have any idea what they're doing onstage? Having not read the book, I didn't see what was going on beside the obvious, though I did get a vague impression there was some kind of ingenious fillip at the end involving the main character's amnesia perhaps being an integral part of his programmed agent role.
Lacking that bit, or even not, this movie is sort of like opera; a thread of a plot, supposedly raised to the level of high art by dint of its glorious trappings. The only problem here is that, whereas opera has going for it a genuine kernel of human drama and passion, all this movie has is yet-another tweak to the rather worn and cheap spook/paranoid fantasy "thriller" theme. This theme screams alienation so loud that the love interest is inaudible (read: gratuitous). These fantasies perhaps only really serve to remind us in that coy, clever, underhanded, and (these days) maddingly prevailing way that democracy really *is* dead in this country. So just GIVE UP. Why do we shell out sheckles for this? Why do we pay to be told what we *really* think?
Interesting side note. Walking out of the dark theatre into the hallway, a theatre worker was handing out *free* suckers to the exiting patrons. I declined. But I had a couple of afterthoughts. One was that I should have taken the sucker so I'd have gotten *something* for my $7.50. The other was a strange wondering if there was a subconscious message being delivered; they were acknowledging we were suckers for going to that movie. Life is but a dream, wot?
Sad to see this movie right after "The Talented Mr. Ripley".... Or, for that matter, The Princess and the Warrior, or American Beauty, or... or...