by Ed Travis
Jason Bourne sees star Matt Damon and director Paul Greengrass reteam for another round of spy action for the first time since 2007. They should have directed their creative talents just about anywhere else.
This time, Bourne remembers everything. But his recall amounts to virtually nothing. Because, as it turns out, even though he remembers everything… there are still secrets he never knew about. This time the secrets involve his father. It had to be something personal enough to draw him back into the fray, I understand, but the father angle is as limp and lifeless as virtually every other creative decision in this film.
Greengrass assembles an exciting new cast with meteoric star Alicia Vikander playing a vital role as an analyst/tracker and Tommy Lee Jones playing her boss, the director of the CIA or somesuch. Riz Ahmed shows up playing Tim Cooke, and my man Vincent Cassell gets to square off against Matt Damon as an “asset” with a score to settle. It’s an exciting cast. And they’re all utterly wasted. There’s not a unique angle or breath of fresh air in the lot of them. Vikander and Jones hunt Bourne and play games. Cassell fights and shoots people to get to Bourne. Bourne walks around with a hat on to obscure his face from apparently everything and everyone. Ahmed would be the most interesting character if his arc wasn’t so ham-handedly ripped from the headlines of Apple’s dispute with Homeland Security about providing back doors to tech products.
There’s an ongoing thread about Bourne’s listlessness after having bested every government agency ever and exposing the programs he was a part of. Some seem to think he can be “brought in” and become part of the program again. People keep telling Jason Bourne that he doesn’t have to keep doing this, that he can put it all to an end. And as an audience member you can’t help but want to speak the very same message to Matt Damon himself. You pulled off a great trilogy, man. You left at the top of the game with a spy series that changed everything that came after it. You don’t have to keep doing this, Matt Damon.
Paul Greengrass brings his infamous shaky cam style back with Jason Bourne, to catastrophic results. His direction is a major part of what set the second two Bourne films apart and ushered in a whole new era of up close fight scenes and frenetic camera work. In small doses, and especially when used to capture breathtaking combat, it works. Sadly Jason Bourne offers no fight sequences or foot/car chases that even remotely compare to what’s come before in the series, and the directing style and editing now feel tired. The editing in particular is disorienting and confusing, with several cuts appearing as mere flashes which are so unappealing they almost feel like extra frames accidentally dropped in.
The progression of the story doesn’t fare much better. To call Jason Bourne formulaic is almost generous. Remember Treadstone, the program that turned Bourne into a mega-assassin and which he worked to bring down in the previous films? Well, there’s another program. This one’s even worse. Just trust us. And remember how Bourne’s need to fill in the gaps of his lost memory propelled him to fight? Well, now his daddy issues compel him to fight. Remember how tons of spies in situation rooms kept saying things like “enhance” or “sit rep” and watching images on fancy screens? Yeah, there’s a whole shit ton of that happening again this time too. It’s almost exhausting. A foot chase here, a hand-to-hand combat sequence there, a foiled assassination attempt sprinkled in for good measure… there’s just no urgency or investment to any of it. Every single aspect of Jason Bourne has been done before and been done better.
While there are worse films out there, the spy genre is stuffed to the gills right now. Mission: Impossible is firing on all cylinders. Man From UNCLE was a riot. Barring the stumble of Spectre, Bond’s been on a roll recently. Jason Bourne comes along attempting to stoke the fire which earlier films in the franchise helped to set. Instead it pours a big cold bucket of water on the flame and queues that damn Moby song as the closing credits roll just to leave no spark of innovation burning.
And I’m Out.