Matt Damon was born to play Jason Bourne!

Rating: 9/10 (24 August 2007)

Matt Damon was born to play Jason Bourne! His is not a pretty boy mug but it's likable and interesting enough, intelligence, earnestness and determination is alive in his eyes, and he has a bod that seems developed by actual fights and not by some cushy gym, all of which comprise a winning combination that makes him believable as Hollywood's fave spy of the season.
Julia Stiles reprises her role as CIA Nicky Parsons. She finally has a meatier role in this installment of the Bourne series, and she proves she is built of equally strong stuff, not necessarily physically, as she holds her own screen presence with Damon. The tension and mystery is sustained (are they ex-lovers? Siblings? Partners?) and her wordless expressions are just as raw and powerful as Damon's adrenaline-pumping fight scenes.
Director Paul Greengrass (United 93, Bourne Supremacy) really made the most of the singular, tying-it-all-together plot, despite it having a not exactly neat ending. The supporting cast is just as solid: Albert Finney as the mysterious Dr. Albert Hirsch who recurs in Bourne's flashbacks, Joan Allen as Pamela Landy, the most powerful woman in the CIA who knows how Bourne operates best, and David Strathairn as CIA Deputy Director Noah Vosen is so hateful you could imagine him to probably be the kid everyone picked on in school.
The action sequences and the spartan storyline is refreshingly old school and you don't feel manipulated in a way that the effects are out to wow you. You just feel for Bourne as he tries to discover who he really is, even if it means ending everything he's known for the past three years that he's lost his identity.
The series are just based on the Bourne books by Robert Ludlum, so don't bother comparing the two because they are not identical (i.e. Nicky is said to not be in any of the books); appreciate them separately.