The question when watching Salt is, how will it compare to Knight and Day. Why? Well Tom Cruise rejected Salt (then called Edward A Salt) in order to make his romantic spy blockbuster...and that didn't turn out to well for him. Then it was offered to Angelina Jolie, rewritten as Edwina A Salt, and put in the hands of Phillip Noyce, with whom Jolie had worked with before on The Bone Collector.
Well Noyce and Jolie have done a great job. It's pretty obvious that Salt is Columbia Pictures attempt to copy the Bourne franchise; non stop action thriller with minimal characterisation, including the hero, who has a mysterious identity. It's the movie's greatest strength and biggest downfall. It's strength because by following the Bourne movies as a premise you get a fast paced, action filled story that's treated as something for adults (not the MTV generation), that has real stunt work (not obvious CGI) and an intriguing central mystery. The downside is that character development and verbal drama is sacrificed for the sake of pace and action.
So what you get is a rollicking good action movie (Noyce was always a solid thriller director, but his action's never been better captured on screen) with proper actors (Chiwetel Ejiofor / Liev Schreiber) and a award winning, honest-to-God, movie star babe in the lead. With a plot this simple the central mystery of "Who is Salt?" is pretty obvious as the shallow plotting leaves it easy for an audience to make judgements about her loyalties (USA/USSR), so it's best just to strap yourself into the roller coaster for 90 mines and enjoy the ride.
As for whether this is better or not than Knight and Day...undoubtedly. I can see why Cruise passed...the persecuted agent is very similar to the first and third Mission Impossible films while the plot is flimsier than most star vehicles Cruse would normally choose for himself. However, if he had chosen this he'd at least have a well liked hit on his hands. Well done Angie.
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