The Bourne Identity - Trivia, Questions and Fun Facts

[discussimdb]

Fan of The Bourne Identity or just want to share your movie knowledge? This topic is dedicated to all trivia and questions related to The Bourne Identity

[mathew]

Matt Damon went through hundreds of hours of gun training so he'd look comfortable holding a weapon.

[kenzi]

Brad Pitt was offered the role of Jason Bourne, but turned it down to do Spy Game (2001).

[tom]

Director of Photography Oliver Wood credits director Doug Liman with coming up with the shooting style for the scene where Bourne is pursued by the Professor into the field of reeds. The crew was trying to figure out ways to make the sequence exciting, and Liman suggested shooting everything from a waist-height angle.

[cameron]

The Bourne Identity was released on the same day as Scooby-Doo (2002), and Windtalkers (2002).

[ella]

Doug Liman would visit composer John Powell's home recording studio for six-hour listening sessions.

[albert]

The same year as this, Brian Cox and Chris Cooper were both in Adaptation. (2002).

[chris]

Doug Liman thought that Franka Potente was right for the part of Marie based on her breakout role in Run Lola Run (1998).

[harry]

Body count: 8.

[morris]

During production, Universal constantly sent memos to the director Doug Liman after viewing dailies. One such memo urged Liman to consider using a montage, accompanied by suitable wrap up music, to introduce the final act "like Tony Scott shoots". Liman sent the studio a message back, letting them know that if that's the ending they wanted, maybe they should hire Tony Scott to film it.

[kristina]

The movie was shot in seven European nations, but mostly in the cities of Paris and Prague.

[javier]

When Bourne initially docks with the fishermen who find him, he gets off and walks across the street. As he crosses a small motor buggie begins toward him in the opposite direction. Right as the two are about to intersect two pedestrians cross the foreground, momentarily obstructing the view. After they move, Bourne has disappeared. If you watch closely you can see Bourne's (Matt Damon's) feet underneath the motor buggie running behind with it to stay concealed. Once it has gotten to the right side of the screen you see his body come up from ducking behind the buggie.

[terry]

On the Region 2 Special Edition DVD, the title "The Bourne Identity" does not appear anywhere within either the theatrical or alternate versions presented on the disc. With the exception of the Universal logo, all the credits appear at the end, but still no title card.

[liam]

As of 2014, this is the only film in the Bourne series with any resemblance to the plot of the book on which it's purportedly based, and it's a very loose adaptation. All other movies in the series are original screenplays that use only the titles of novels by Robert Ludlum and/or Eric Van Lustbader.

[jessica]

Doug Liman's directorial method was often hands-on. Many times he operated the camera himself in order to create what he believed was a more intimate relationship between himself, the material, and the actors. He felt that this connection was lost if he simply observed the recording on a monitor. This was a mindset he developed from his background as a small-scale indie film maker.

[victoria]

The red bag that Bourne uses in the consulate is now owned by Adam Savage of MythBusters (2003) and contains all the props that Jason pours onto the desk in his house in Paris.

[melinda]

Matt Damon trained in the Filipino martial art Kali for the movie. Kali involves using the aggressor's energy against him and conserving your own energy.

[chad]

From the onset of filming, difficulties with the studio slowed the film's development and caused a rift between the director and Universal Pictures, as executives were unhappy with the film's pacing, emphasis on small scale action sequences, and the general relationship between themselves and Doug Liman, who was suspicious of direct studio involvement. A number of reshoots and rewrites late in development and scheduling problems delayed the film from its original release target date of September 2001 to June 2002 and took it $8,000,000 over budget from the initial budget of $60 million; screenwriter Tony Gilroy faxed elements of screenplay rewrites almost throughout the entire duration of filming. A particular point of contention with regard to the original Gilroy script were the scenes set in the farmhouse near the film's conclusion. Liman and Matt Damon fought to keep the scenes in the film after they were excised in a third-act rewrite that was insisted upon by the studio. Liman and Damon argued that, though the scenes were low key, they were integral to the audience's understanding of the Bourne character and the film's central themes. The farmhouse sequence consequently went through many rewrites from its original incarnation before its inclusion in the final product.