Jason Bourne: Don't Start Nothin, Won't Be Nothin

As far as sequels and movie franchises go, it's hard to argue with the Bourne series. They're very good movies. Based on Robert Ludlum novels, they're fun espionage, action-packed, chase movies that bolster intelligent writing and good acting. It's one of the few times, or really the only time, that each movie progressively gets better, but none of them are bad. (Keeping in mind Jeremy Renner's Bourne Legacy trash doesn't count as a Bourne movie.) The one thing that they do, however, is they progress the story in a natural and organic way. In the first film, The Bourne Identity, Jason Bourne is just trying to figure out who the hell he is and who is chasing him.  The second film, The Bourne Supremacy, he's figured out pieces, but he's still trying to remember everything.  However, instead of figuring out who is chasing him, he's trying to figure out why. In the third film, The Bourne Ultimatum, he's figured almost everything out and he's out to put a end to it.  And he does. The Bourne Ultimatum essentially ties everything up from the series and gives a proper ending to the character in what is still the best film of the trilogy. Jason Bourne, while still as entertaining as the originals, feels like it's more of a forced extension of the previous three rather than a story that needed to be told.

Bourne is off the grid fighting dudes in desert circles and underground fight clubs (for some unexplained reason). Nicky (Julia Stiles from the previous films) has hacked into the CIA database and stolen their confidential files that contain all the information about Treadstone, Blackbriar, and even new missions the evil old white dudes at the CIA are cooking up. She tracks down Bourne and gives him the information.  However, she's killed (Bourne def cannot have a girlfriend, like, ever) and Bourne is tracked again by the CIA-- this time it's the Director Robert Dewey (Tommy Lee Jones) and another higher up leading the task force, Heather Lee (Alicia Vikander) after him. They awaken another "asset" (Vincent Cassel) to take him out.  Bourne continues to figure out the mystery behind his past as well as evade the CIA and outsmart them in their conquest for... evil stuff.

I liked this movie. I really did. It stayed true to the originals and had the same feeling to it, the same energy, and the same fun within the action sequences. Yet, I couldn't get over the fact that no matter what happened in the film, everything felt forced. While the previous movies were all serving a single purpose of finding out what happened to Bourne, how he got involved with Treadstone, why they needed to silence him, etc., this one didn't really carry on the story or the mythology.  In order to actually make the movie exist, new problems and a new mythology had to be created that, again, just felt a little forced. And while a lot of the action felt fresh, the story almost didn't. It's still Bourne losing someone, getting tracked down by an evil white guy who activates a specialized killer, and tracks Bourne all over the world until he, inevitably, outsmarts everyone. There was a lot of good in the movie, but the herd of elephants in the room really make this movie feel as though it didn't need to be made.

Matt Damon is, once again, very good as Jason Bourne.  And, staying in the evil old white dude tradition, Tommy Lee Jones is a welcome addition to the film.  Rising star Alicia Vikander, however, to me, felt like a wooden broomstick reading lines from a teleprompter.  Her voice never leaves the same octive.  Her facial expressions never change.  Her posture remains the same.  She's takes an interesting character and turns her into something hollow and questionable. Her arc is also something I'm still not entirely sure was convincing. The action sequences were very entertaining and clever, but Director Paul Greengrass, previously criticized for using too much of the handheld-shaky-cam action style, hasn't changed much over the past years. Most of the action is still very much shaky and nauseating... to a fault in a few places (come on dude, don't shake the camera like an asshole when you're trying to show us a text message Bourne is reading). But, it's pretty redeeming by the ending with a massive car chase through Las Vegas that would make the ending of Con Air proud.

Greengrass, directing his third movie in the series, really does know what a Bourne movie should feel like.  His directing style, while flawed at times, does make the movie a lot better than it should be.  He also took over the reigns of writer and, even though a lot of the dialogue is pretty cringe-worthy and a little too explain-y, he keeps the dialogue to a minimum.  It's a smart decision action-wise and suspense-wise because it seems when it comes to actual, believable, human dialogue he's walking the George Lucas tightrope. Overall, I walked out of the theater fulfilled.  I wanted a Jason Bourne movie and I got exactly what I wanted. It just wasn't a necessary Jason Bourne movie.

B-