Rating: 
Summary: Matt Seeks his Own Identity
Review: Watching THE BOURNE IDENTITY brings to mind numerous previous spy films in which an agent may be a turncoat and has to be brought in from the cold. In order for this genre to resonate the audience has to empathise with the agent so that they can feel his concern and his peril. Car chases, explosions, and exotic locales ought to be used to further cement the relation between viewer and hero, rather than divert the former in accepting the derring-do of the latter. What director Doug Liman presents is a non-stop action thriller that tries so hard to thrill that credibility goes out the window early on.Matt Damon as Jason Bourne is a surprisingly youthful amnesia victim plucked from the ocean by Italian sailors. He has two bullets lodged in him, yet after only two weeks he is able to do heavy physical lifting. In a nutshell, these rapidly healed bullet wounds suggest the film's major weakness: the audience is asked to take Bourne's physical presence as reason enough to overlook some pretty big holes placed there by logical slugs. Bourne does not even know that he speaks Italian, Dutch, French, or German until he faces native speakers of those languages. His mastery of the martial arts is closer to the fighting of THE MATRIX than to any legitimate style. There is a scene in which Bourne and a local woman (Franka Potente) are interrupted in a moment of passion by a hired assassin who battles Bourne in a manner more than suggestive of Robert Redford in a like situation from THREE DAYS OF THE CONDOR, complete right down to a knife sticking out of the assassin's shoe. Further, the ongoing but futile attempts of the CIA to track what they deem as a turncoat agent seem a pale comparison to a similar hunt from DAY OF THE JACKAL. What all these logical gaffes suggest is that to create a spy thriller a director need not do more than have a youthful and handsome hero, an equally attractive female lead, numerous hand to hand clashes, and frequent use of exotic locale. The directors of THREE DAYS OF THE CONDOR and DAY OF THE JACKAL could offer Doug Liman some useful tips on how to do just that.
Rating: 
Summary: Action plus romance on the run
Review: Greek sailors find a man floating in the Med sea, take him in, and their doc finds a couple bullet holes in his back, as well as a laser capsule in his leg with a Swiss bank account number. The man recovers, but suffers from amnesia. Thus begins his quest to regain his identity. Only, when he opens the security box in Switzerland, he discovers passports from half a dozen countries, wads of cash in various currencies, loads of cool spy gear, and a gun.
Soon the chase is on, from Zurich to Paris, as our man Bourne enlists the help of the German gypsy Marie (charming Franka Potente) and eludes the operatives sent by his CIA superiors until a stunning conclusion when he returns to Paris.
What I liked:
Great setting details of Europe, especially Paris. There were a number of key action sequences, including a car chase involving a Mini taking on French police, and the wildest stairway descent I've ever seen on film. I also thought Matt Damon and Franka Potente had good screen chemistry. There was also a moving scene where Bourne confronts one the assassins on his trail, the professor, played by Clive Owen in a small part.
What needed work:
The hero with amnesia card has been played before, and I would have liked a little more development of Damon's character other than him realizing he had all these drilled in spy skills. We never do get a sense of his likes and dislikes. I liked the film ending over the alternate version, but both could have been better.
This is a movie I would watch again.
Rating: 
Summary: Bourne in name only!
Review: My first reaction was "Is this the right movie"? If you've read the book, or even seen the original "Bourne" movie, this is sure to disappoint! I liked a few elements of this movie,.... The action was okay, but the main character was too young to strike you as the ruthless and capable Jason Bourne. Also, to me, he kept whining all the way through the movie. By the end, I was hoping they'd shoot him! If you've watched the first movie, or if you've read the book... don't bother with this pale reflection... ...
Rating:
Summary: A refreshing change
Review: The Bourne Identity is a refreshing change is the Spy movies that are out now, why? Here is the reason, frist this movie dose not involve high tech devices, that can do almost anything and everything that a person can think of, a story plot that isn't over the top, and action schenes that don't require the used of skills rather than techonology. The best part of the movie is the car chase in which Matt didn't need to used of missles and machine guns. If you sick of seeing spys movies that used high tech devices and plots that involved world domnation, go and watch this one.
Rating: 
Summary: Very cool
Review: Excellent movie--very well cast and tautly directed. Zurich, Hamburg, Paris, Barcelona, Rome. Franka Potente is alluring as hell. Matt Damon is impressively tough and multi-faceted. The story is interesting. Not perfect, but it certainly restores my faith in major movie productions, which typically pale in comparison to this. What modern James Bond films could be but never are, and never were. Clive Owen is a cold-blooded killer. Julia Stiles, sitting pretty. What a cool movie.
Rating:
Summary: A New Star is Bourne
Review: Keep you eyes peeled for young Matt Damon. He played the intrepid Bourne, but don't get the idea that he was playing around!! This was all for real. Imagine waking up on a boat not knowing who you were or why you were there. Now imagine that the only thing you remember is karate. Now imagine international intrigue and a beautiful girl. You've imagined the life of Mr. Bourne, played by the fantastic Matt Damon. A little reminiscent of The Long Kiss Goodnight starring Gina Davis and Sam Jackson, but riveting still! Buy this on DVD or VHS.
Rating:
Summary: Loved it!
Review: Basically, if you like action movies, this is for you. I don't really spend a lot of time analyzing whether what happens on screen is realistic, I just enjoy the show, and this was great. Fast paced, but not in a way that leaves you going 'huh?' or 'But what about so-and-so?'. I loved it.
Rating:
Summary: What happened to the rest of the story?
Review: If you want a more faithful adaptation (and I use the term lightly), you will have to suffer through the old mini-series starring Richard Chamberlain. Although, Damon is definately a cut about Chamberlain as an actor, the screenplay for this version of the Bourne Identity takes too much license with original plot. Important incidents are glossed over in favor of action scenes. And it seems the screenwriter only read two thirds of the novel because the last 80 or so pages are completely missing from this film. Dissappointing.
Rating:
Summary: another spy movie
Review: I have a high expectation with spy films. James Bond and Mission Impossible films have raised the bar so much that good films like The Bourne Identity struggle to remain in the minds of the theater patrons (i.e. avid movie goers). This is a good action movie, and the plot is difficult enough to pass the test. But as I said previously, other spy films are just so good they make it hard for others to compete. As a result, it makes all other movies seem not so hot. I only gave Bourne Identity three stars because I have seen so many other superior spy films as well as action films. Next time Doug Limon will have to step it up a notch. Okay action earns 3 stars.
Rating:
Summary: The Bored Identity Crisis
Review: Well, now, Matt's really intimidating, and we all can be coerced by this tough-guy image that The State Department puts across, I just have to say that the film does make some positive non-violent statements, the gun issue, when there isn't serious carnage breaking loose, the hero character chooses to avoid carrying a weapon and uses his matial arts and thinking on his feet, except when he has to take out a spoiled lime in that field with a shotgun. This is all mute of course while we dwell in a time where "The sky is falling.", i.e. 9-11; and like other fictitious super heros the film industry falsely reassures us with, nothing can save Gotham, but the people who have to live there, instead of those jet set havens and hideaways. I do think the bullet wounds were unrealistic, in the frogman's back, maybe he is a man of steel. I guess its all operative conditioning at the Daisy Hill Puppy farm somewhere, sort of like "The Center" that tv's pretender Jared comes from. That black budget short-shrift thing at the end was comical as well. The bored identity of the all powerful and mighty Big Bother, is that, within the parameters of The Paradox of Omnipotence, it has at last found the problem of knowledge versus power. Maybe abundant diversity of communities on earth, was a design specification modeled on the rain forrests, and we ought not go and try to pillage and plunder humanity for scumbag porkorations. Let's hope so. Then again, makeover propogandizement movie "The Core", will have us all convinced the wrath of God is to blame for the wholesale mismanagement and over militarization of the planet.
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