The Bourne Identity wastes no time getting to the heart of its drama. As the film opens, we're out to sea in the middle of the night with an unknown man lying face down with bullet holes in his back. After being rescued by some Italian fishermen, he begins to learn who he is and why he got into this predicament in the first place. The only problem is that he's a remarkable man.
Assassins are after him and he soon finds himself on the run, running from the authorities while dealing with his troubled, unknown past.
Who is this amnesia sufferer?
As we soon find out, the man in the water is a guy named Jason Bourne. Bourne is an extremely competent undercover operative who suffers from amnesia after going rogue after a botched mission. But that's getting ahead of ourselves, we'll get back to that later!
For now, there are more pressing issues, particularly with Treadstone.
What is Treadstone?
Operation Treadstone is the code name for a black ops program. Known as Treadstone71 in the novels, it is a top secret black ops program kept secret by the CIA.
This program actually recruits US military personnel and turns them into almost superhuman killers. The methods here, which are highly controversial, involve behavior modification software to break morals and effectively create these living weapons. It's worth noting that we see more of this in The Bourne Ultimatum.
It would also explain the many headaches suffered by Bourne and his associates, later portrayed in the film by a sniper assassin who complains of the terrible headaches he suffers from.
How does Bourne escape Switzerland?
Eluding the Swiss police, Bourne offers 26-year-old German woman Marie Kruetz $20,000 to take him to Paris. Bourne knows that he has financial problems and that he is living unstable from place to place. According to CIA officers who later looked at it, it "looks right on the net."
Anyway, Marie agrees to help and the pair travel to Bourne's residence in Paris, where they learn more about his shady life. Unfortunately, he is not alone. An assassin comes in, but Bourne defeats him with a pen. How cruel. Anyway, he doesn't get much out of it, except for the wanted poster, and the man suddenly gets up and throws himself off the balcony to his death.
Now, while all this is going on, Treadstone's boss, Conklin, puts all his best agents to work to "bring Bourne in a body bag by sundown." He is under extreme pressure from Deputy Director Abbott, who has his own problems after a failed assassination attempt on an African dictator named Wombosi.
What happened to Wombosi? Why did Bourne fail his mission?
As the film progresses, fragments of the past begin to bleed through. After dispatching several different operatives, including the aforementioned sniper, Bourne manages to track down Conkley, who is with logistics technician Nicky Parsons. He raises both at gunpoint and demands the truth.
Conklin reveals that Bourne has been given the mission to kill Wombosi. He used the alias John Michael Kane to collect the information he needed to bring the fight to Wombosi. And he was inside. After choosing a focal point - a yacht at sea - Bourne remembers flashbacks in which Wombosi has weaponry.
However, Bourne lost his temper when he saw Wombosi surrounded by his children and running away, being shot in the back and falling into the sea. He chose this lonely, isolated location because instead of the CIA staging a hit, it looked like one of Wombosi's men had killed him.
Anyway, that takes us to the moments at the beginning of the movie, explaining what happened to bring Bourne to the water in the first place.
After learning the truth, Bourne decides to resign from Treadstone and warns Conkley not to follow him. After sending a bunch of grunts home, Bourne leaves, but there's one last twist ahead.
Who does Manheim kill? But why?
Throughout the film, we saw snippets of another operative lurking in the shadows, ready to pounce. Through some clever editing, we're led to believe that this man is going to kill Bourne, when in fact he gets out of his car, confronts Jonklin, and shoots him repeatedly with a silenced pistol.
He wasn't actually under Conklin's command, but instead was hired by Abbott, who decided to clean up this mess once and for all. Conklin wreaked havoc on the organization, using Treadstone, costing the company valuable resources and money, as well as leaving the entire operation in shambles. Killing him seems like the most logical way to solve this.
How does The Bourne Identity end?
Abbott shuts down Treadstone before presenting his new project, codenamed Operation: Blackbriar, to the committee. We'll see more of that in The Bourne Ultimatum.
Having previously let Marie go and deal with Treadstone on her own, Jason Bourne tracks Marie down and finds her at a scooter rental shop in Mykonos.
The two reunite on a Greek island and seemingly live happily ever after... but will that change in the sequel?
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