Unsupreme Greengrass

Rating: Null/10 (23 September 2004)

Sorry, couldn't find the BOURNE2 thread, so please bear with me, hope this won't get locked. And if anyone has perhaps some final words on this movie; which I was kinda behind seeing.... please do say something. :)
Very goodly enough written by Tony Gilroy. Actually was impressed of how Tony managed to continue on from the Treadstone storyline; and to develop Conklin's character and even Bryan Cox's character. I saw a 360 arc for Cox's character, I saw I guess a 180 one for Landy.
One of my favorite scenes was when Bourne disarms the two guards who detained him. Really fast. As that is how action would happen in real life.
Gilroy leaves no lose ends? Or does he? Did he leave one untied knot to be tied up in ULTIMATUM: THE MOVIE? Well, Bourne apologized. He had a final exchange with Landy. So how can any nitpicker possibly feel cheated there?
Gilroy makes more extensive the use of scenes via flashbacks where Bourne picks up bits and pieces of his memory. Would seem that he set-up this way of telling the future Bourne movies in Identity as flashbacks have been used, but not as blatantly as it is in Supremacy.
The cast are all top notch. Hilarious how Gilroy drops a payoff of what a sly sniping assassin Bourne really is in the end "You look tired, Pam. Have a rest!"
Loved how they re-used "Extreme Ways" as the film's closing track. Hope they use it too in ULTIMATUM.
Despite the good cast and the tautly enough written screenplay, I thought Greengrass isn't really a good director. Or is the DP to blame? He couldn't put the camera in proper places that most of the time the action scenes were a waste! We couldn't understand. We couldn't really feel sucked in by the world of the story, and that's not a good thing. Bring back Liman; as he only cheats in the one-on-one action scenes, but when he does, we do understand the scenes, he cheats. But we couldn't tell. The "cheating" that Greengrass uses didn't amount to great effect.
As was the first one, has those generic action, but not overblown, which is good.
7/10 Grade C+