I greatly enjoyed the first film, and I\'ve watched it many times on DVD. This one was also good, but in a different way. I think I may grow to like it more, and I suppose I\'m glad they didn\'t just do a remake of the first film, as we so often see in sequels.
[sp]What is different of course is that Marie dies early in the story. That sort of took the heart out of it for me, but I\'m trying to look past that. I really like Franka Potente, and I liked her character in the first film. Looking at it in hindsight, the story relates something of a moral challenge for the Bourne character. He awakes with amnesia in the first film, and sets about trying to stay alive and learn who he was. The more he learns about who he was, the more he realizes he doesn\'t like the person he used to be. Marie\'s influence helps him to change his ways. Now she\'s dead, and he faces a choice. Abandon his soul and return to his old life of remorseless killing, or retain the compassion and mercy he learned. If you saw the film, you know which he chooses.
I do think there were a few missed opportunities. I was hoping Bourne would find an ally, at least temporarily, in the other Treadstone assassin he tracks down. You will recall that the man called "The Professor" (Clive Owen) in the first film spoke to him in a helpful manner just before his death... Also I\'m disappointed that they used that Moby song at the end once again. I never liked it the first time, and I don\'t like to see them get into the habit of using the same music, same title sequence, and so forth, over and over.[/sp]
Apart from those minor complaints, I thought it was a quality piece of work. These movies are growing in an alternate direction from the books. I read the first Ludlum novel, and it was entirely different from the first movie. I do feel it was an improvement though. By paring away some of the needless complexity, they gave the first film better focus.
