Solid story, solid actors, HORRIBLE DIRECTING

Rating: 4/10 (6 September 2004)

It seems to be that these days the most difficult thing in Hollywood is to produce a movie based on a decent script. This movie had the script, it had the actors, it had the franchise to sell it. Doug Liman (who directed The Bourne Identity) turned down the opportunity to helm this picture (and somehow earned an Executive Producer credit instead) and it wound up in the hands of Paul Greengrass. Let me be frank: Mr. Greengrass created possibly the most poorly-directed action movie I've seen in my life (and I see a lot of movies).
Mr. Greengrass is incapable of showing us action. What he does instead is instruct the DP shake the camera horribly whenever there is any high-speed movement being captured. This technique has been used extensively in a minimalist way by other filmmakers to convey the force of an impact; I've never been a big fan of it, but it isn't overly distracting either. Usually. In this case, think "The Bourne Supremacy, photographed by the crew that brought us The Blair Witch Project."
I'm not kidding about this. Bourne runs, the image jumps all over the place - not the usually hand-held camera that is sometimes used to convey the sensation of running, but a hand-held camera held by a crack addict with a severe inner-ear problem. Bourne swings his fist, and the camera swings wildly everywhere. Bourne actually hits something, and you might as well close your eyes or find someplace convenient to vomit (my girlfriend actually was getting motion sickness after awhile).
About 30 or 40 minutes into the film, we were completely sick (figuratively and literally) of this. Basically what is happening is that Mr. Greengrass couldn't cleanly capture an action scene (fistfight, car chase, foot chase, etc) if his life depended on it. The thought process must have been along the lines of "I can't choreograph a fight, so... look like you're fighting, I'll tackle the cameraman, and hopefully the audience will see something other than the ceiling."
Too bad; this movie had everything else going for it. The plot was decent (we figured it out a bit before we were supposed to, but it was still enjoyable), the dialogue credible, and the acting above-average. In the hands of a competent director, this movie could have been a 7 or an 8, but in the shaky hands of Mr. Greengrass and crew, I give it a very annoying 4/10.