Bourne is back!
Jason Bourne is an entirely unnecessary movie sequel. It’s not that his return isn’t welcome. The CIA operative-turned-amnesiac-turned-rogue-agent-out-for-revenge is a great character; the ultimate anti-hero who – thanks to some superb scripts and the casting of Matt Damon – became so much more than your average celluloid spy.
The problem is that he’s at the centre of a perfect movie trilogy (we’ll ignore that Jeremy Renner spin-off, as the filmmakers certainly have). Bournes Identity, Supremacy and Ultimatum gave his story a seamless arc as Jason uncovered the dark secrets of his past and eventually punished those responsible in the present.
The films were even book-ended by the image of Bourne floating on the water, and while that might not have been planned from the off, it was nevertheless a fitting way to say farewell to the character at Ultimatum’s end.
But now Damon and writer-director Paul Greengrass – who helmed the previous two pictures – are returning to the fray nearly a decade on to re-invigorate the franchise and maybe make a few bucks in the process. In doing so, they run the risk of potentially ruining their own Bourne legacy however.
And while the resulting feature doesn’t quite do the latter, it also fails to fully achieve the former, with this belated sequel an entertaining action film that's nevertheless somewhat inferior to its predecessors.
Following a brief re-cap in which we witness David Webb volunteering for that special ops program, becoming Bourne, losing his memory, and then embarking on a one-man crusade as that memory returns, we are re-introduced to the man himself, and he cuts a forlorn figure.
Exposing his corrupt employers doesn’t seem to have brought Bourne any peace – does it ever in these circumstances? – and he’s still living off the grid; channelling his anger and rage into work as a very efficient bare-knuckle boxer.
Sometime ally Nicky Parsons (Julia Styles) has also been in hiding, but working as a hacker in an effort to finish the work that Bourne started, and having ruffled the feathers of people in some very high places, she desperately needs his help.
The pair meet in Athens during protests outside the Greek Parliament, but they are being watched, prompting the film’s first action sequence – an exciting if somewhat overlong chase through the middle of a riot, filmed using the series’ trademark shaky-cam that lends authenticity to scenes while at the same time stirring nausea.
And so we’re back into classic Bourne territory, with our hero’s efforts to learn yet more about his past juxtaposed with the CIA’s struggle to once again either bring him in or take him out.
Key players in this operation include CIA Director Robert Dewey (Tommy Lee Jones), a gruff veteran who clearly knows more about Bourne’s past than he’s letting on, Heather Lee (Alicia Vikander) head of the Agency’s cyber division, who uses tech to counter her opponent’s smarts, and ‘The Asset’ (Vincent Cassel), an assassin as skilled as Bourne in the art of killing.
Tech billionaire Aaron Kalloor (Riz Ahmed) is another new addition; the Zuckerberg-like founder and CEO of social network Deep Dream Corporaion. He’s big on safety and security online, preaching that “privacy is freedom,” but there’s more to Deep Dream than meets the eye, and his story soon becomes inextricably linked with Bourne’s own.
This plot strain brings the series into the modern age, allowing Greengrass and co-screenwriter/long-time collaborator Christopher Rouse to question where we’re at in a post-Snowden, post-Wikileaks world. The Bourne films have always rallied against unchecked power, and this conspiracy concerns the kind of direct threat to civil liberties that’s frequently in the news these days.
But it’s just about all that’s new and fresh in Jason Bourne, with much of the film feeling all-too-familiar. The locations are exotic, from Berlin and Reykjavik to London and Las Vegas, but watching the title character dash through airports and train stations in those cities inspires a definite sense of déjà vu.
Tommy Lee Jones delivers the irate, no-nonsense performance that Tommy Lee Jones always delivers, barking lines like “We cut the head off this thing” in a way that only Tommy Lee Jones can. But his Dewey is really not all that different to the CIA suits that Brian Cox and Chris Cooper played in previous instalments.
And there are few more interesting actors that Vincent Cassel onscreen. But his ‘Asset’ barely distinguishes himself from the trained killers that Clive Owen, Karl Urban and Edgar Ramirez played in Bournes one, two and three.
Vikander’s Lee is the most interesting of the newcomers, her flat, unemotional delivery making it hard to get a read on the character. But she spends most of the movie staring at computer screens, explaining the information on them, and barking orders to others though an earpiece, only truly coming into her own at the movie’s end.
The action is good, with a car chase through the streets of Las Vegas a particular stand-out. But it’s certainly no better than the action that's gone before, a criticism that can be levelled at almost every aspect of the movie.
As for the man himself, Damon is reliable as ever in the role, and there are intriguing revelations about the his past; the kind that gives viewers a better understanding of who David Webb was and why he chose that catastrophic path. But at times it feels like the filmmakers are filling in blanks that don’t need to be filled; robbing the character of the mystery of his pre-amnesia days, when that ambiguity was part of his appeal.
It certainly ties in thematically with the previous films, and opens the door for what’s potentially to come. But do we really need more Jason Bourne? On this evidence the answer is probably no, with the first three movies tense, tight, taut thrillers as good as anything else in the genre, and this new instalment failing to fully hit those highs.
So while he’s still an appealing character, and there’s fun to be had watching Bourne think fast, break bones, and expose corruption, you can’t help but feel that we’ve seen it done before, and done better.
The Verdict
Jason Bourne has a passable plot and a couple of pulsating sequences, which already makes it better than the majority of action movies. But in the context of its predecessors, that isn’t good enough, the new movie never fully escaping the shadow of that previous trilogy, and making you question the wisdom of drawing Bourne back out of the shadows at all.
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