No way near as supreme as the first.

Rating: 7/10 (5 February 2005)

I never really expected much from "The Bourne Identity" when it came out in 2002 but when I watched it I was pleasantly surprised. It wasn't a good movie in the sense of the word but the style was awesome and the action amazing. When I watched "The Bourne Supremacy" I didn't recognized any of the things I liked in "The Bourne Identity" back into this movie.
Most disappointing thing was that the camera-work and editing didn't worked this time. The shaky camera-work and very fast editing throughout THE ENTIRE movie, only became irritating and tiring. I didn't expected to say this but it seems like Paul Greengrass was the wrong choice to direct this movie. Surprising because he seemed like the perfect choice after making "Bloody Sunday". It seems that he also already is attached to the third Bourne movie "The Bourne Ultimatum", needless to say that I'm not too keen on this. My suggestion would be to let Michael Mann direct but that is unlikely to happen though...
But of course it is not just the camera-work and editing that makes this movie 'worse' than the first. Also mainly it is the story that just is a bit too complicated and uninteresting plus it could have really used a love story again. The movie also lacks some true bad guys and the Russian Kirill is not nearly as cool as the treadstone assassins from the first movie. Karl Urban plays a too boring and stereotyped Russian assassin. The movie also had way less action sequences (especially compared to "The Bourne Identity") than I was expecting and hoping for.
Sure the movie has some good moments such as the car chase (even though the car chase from the first movie still is superior) and the movie has an overall 'cool' feeling. And it has Joan Allen playing a surprising and good role like you normally wouldn't expect from her in the first place.
I still have faith and look forward to the third movie, even when Greengrass is directing again. I just hope the spend some more time working on the story and change the camera-work and editing more back into the style from the first movie.
7/10
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