For the devoted fanbase of the prestigious “Bourne” franchise I have good news, the latest action-packed sequel (entitled now “Jason Bourne”) has all the correct ingredients that made the originals successful (save for the Jeremey Renner substitute “Bourne Legacy”). Now, for everyone else, and those of us who still hope to have a meaningful two hours of popcorn blockbuster action, will be, not so enlightened by the prospects of another film. Even taking a nine-year hiatus between “Ultimatum” longtime collaborators Paul Greengrass (who directed the stellar “Captain Phillips”) and lead star Matt Damon seemed to have pulled all their punches. Literally.
Not to say that Greengrass can’t shoot a car chase - (which, by law, has to be in a “Bourne” movie) - or propel a story driven piece into uncharted waters. He proved that to me with his last offerings of arthouse fare. Here, the man returns to his niche, which is to blankly shoot action sequences at all angles, from any location, right in our faces. Good thing it’s Damon throwing the slugs, or else the gopro style shooting would become quite repetitive. Oh, wait..it already is.
The problems with “Jason Bourne” stem from the not-so-inspired narrative. As it borrows from the exact same formula as before. The movie starts with some sort of conspiracy theory that paints the CIA as a bad-guy (which it is) trying to cover up some elite program before it goes public. In “The Bourne Identity” it was a program called Treadstone, “Ultimatum” it was Blackbriar and now it’s Ironhand. There also, is always a “director” of some sorts that is in cahoots with higher forces doing illegal activity - which in this case is a Mark Zuckerberg type wannabe Aaron Kalloor (Riz Ahmed) with his revolutionary new camera system - I could list all the names and draw all the parallels of bad guys from before, but for the sake of time I’ll just say this instance it’s Robert Lee Dewey (Tommy Lee Jones) who just so happens to be the CIA director. Dewey is, of course, after Jason Bourne (Damon) because, the plot demands it. Never mind any real central logic, we just need to kill him at all costs. Nobody ever stops to ask the appropriate question of “why?”
Bourne has been tipped from long-time character favorite Nicky Parsons (Julia Stiles) about Ironhand, which was a program that links Jason Bourne’s (whose real name is David Webb) own father to the creation of Treadstone, thus completing the never-ending cycle.
Can’t they just leave this guy alone?
Of course, what’s a Jason Bourne movie without an “asset” being activated to hunt down and kill him. Only thing is, Bourne, as usual, is always ten steps ahead of everyone, including the audience.
Those are just a few instances that further prove how routine this flick is. Yes, the backstory involving Bourne’s father and a Snowden level breach of security all prove to be interesting fodder to help fill out the quick, breezy 120 minutes. Even, Alicia Vikander as an optimistic CIA analyst is good, and she can carry many of her scenes. Granted, that’s not hard to due as Matt Damon only speaks about half a dozen times throughout the entire movie. In fact, I don’t think he says more than a few words at a time, and never in full sentences (you can quote me on that). Vincent Cassel serves as the “asset” hired to hunt down Bourne through the entire movie, but Cassel fails when others have succeeded. I enjoyed the climatic beatdown (hardly a spoiler to say the bad guy and good guy have a tussle at the end), as these scenes are crucial to what Greengrass does best. Still, you should know that Cassell lacked much of the grit that made his predecessors so versatile, and he was boring.
I guess what it boils down to is that “Jason Bourne” serves as a by-the-books re-hashing of much better, smarter, made films in the series. You wonder how a group of top CIA operatives can never track or catch this guy, as it feels like, for every one of these films, a group of about thirty people are always sifting through camera footage trying to find him, while a double agent big-baffoon CIA director is saying things like “Get me Jason Bourne” or “I want him at all costs.” We’ve seen it all before, and the gimmick is starting to wear thin. Towards the end, I almost started to warm up to the picture, because it looked like the series was headed in a much different direction as far as tone was concerned. Those hopes were quickly dashed as the film then again, sinks back into the same pattern. As the old saying goes “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”, a slogan, I’m afraid, this sequel took too seriously. C
