JASON BOURNE review

Ohhhhh bitch yes, yes, yes, yes!!! *SQUEEEE*

Okay okay, putting my balls back between my legs. The Bourne franchise is probably one of my favorite spy movies of all time. Hell, I might even like them more than the Bond films. At least Bourne is consistently awesome and good despite only having three movies under its belt and one illegitimate one. Weird thing is, I’ve coined the phrase “The Bourne Effect” when it comes to these films: the act of seeing a movie, loving it, but then forgetting everything that happened in the movie a week later. I don’t know why this happens with these particular movies, but I still revisit them, so they’re obviously doing something right.

Quick reviews. IDENTITY. Loved it, turned me on to Matt Damon as an actor, as well as German actress Franka Potente (wish I’d seen more of her stuff). Bad-ass, mysterious, interesting, maybe not as flawless as I remember as a younger man, but watching it still gets me hungry for more… or, maybe I’m just saying that because I really am hungry as I’m writing this. Seriously, I haven’t eaten breakfast yet. And yes, this is important information that needs to be passed on to you readers regarding my opinion of this flick. My state of hunger is vital to my film-analysis.

SUPREMACY: Probably the least good of the Damon-Bourne films (we’ll get to LEGACY in a bit), but it still had a lot of memorable elements and officially brought on the mainstay director of the franchise, Paul Greengrass. SPOILERS if you haven’t seen it, but I’m officially writing these with the assumption that all of you won’t be seeing this latest installment without having seen the first three. Marie, Bourne’s romance interest in IDENTITY was killed off and Bourne seeks revenge against his enemies and Julia Stiles looked like she was really freaking out about having a gun pointed at her head… and I’m pretty sure this was her shortest role in the franchise. I guess she and Potente have that in common. Also: Karl Urban is a delicious hunk of antagonistic Russian bad-assery.

ULTIMATUM: Again, not quite as memorable as IDENTITY, but it has arguably some of the best action scenes in spy-film history. Plus, this really brought forth Joan Allen as a powerhouse actor and probably one of my favorite actresses in Hollywood.

LEGACY: The black sheep of the franchise. The moment the franchise decided to continue on without either Greengrass or Damon, and even nearly abandon its own genre as a spy movie and became sci-fi. I remember the movie tried to make Jeremy Renner’s character take pills to make him as good a fighter as Jason Bourne, but it just didn’t make for an interesting movie or an interesting character. I love me a good Renner performance, he’s a terrific and charismatic actor, but this is completely under the radar. Thank God for the Avengers and the latest Mission: Impossible films.

Both Damon and Greengrass return, which is a huge bonus for fans everywhere. To make matters even more interesting, it looks like Greengrass also co-wrote the script alongside Christopher Rouse, who’d written SUPREMACY and ULTIMATUM (what a testament to how failed LEGACY was that they couldn’t even get its writer back). The return of Stiles is also very welcomed and the inception of probably my favorite actress of last year, Alicia Vikander and her role in the story is only getting me more excited. Needless to say, this is the biggest movie for me of the week. Quite honestly, it’s the only movie I feel like is worth seeing. Been a huge fan of the franchise, so I have incredibly high expectations. Oh, and as of 7/27/2016, IMDb gave this movie a 9.0/10. The next day, it drastically dropped down to an 8.1/10. While I wasn’t expecting the movie to be that good, I’m still keeping my hopes way up high. Is this a welcomed return to the franchise, or was LEGACY the first red flag that this franchise should have ended? This is my honest opinion of JASON BOURNE.

(SUMMARY)

Jason Bourne (Matt Damon), formerly known as David Webb, gets called back into action. Nicky Parsons (Julia Stiles) hacks top secret files and manages to uncover files that Jason’s father, Richard Webb (Gregg Henry), might have had a direct hand in Jason’s initiation into Treadstone, the now debunked training program that made Jason the top assassin he now refuses to be. But the CIA knows that the files were taken and Director Robert Dewey (Tommy Lee Jones) with the help of the ambitious and talented Cyber Ops Head Heather Lee (Alicia Vikander), try and track down Nicky before she can expose her findings to the public.

(REVIEW)

Bourne is back, baby! Oh, how I missed this character and all his glory.

So let’s get to it, it’s been nearly a decade since Damon was Bourne (there’s a funny joke here, I just can’t think of it), but he hasn’t missed a beat. He’s still kicking ass left and right and beating his enemies down like a boss. It’s still too much fun to watch. The action may not be as amazing as ULTIMATUM, but it’s definitely still a Bourne action-fest. Jones as Dewey, yes and yes. There may be an argument that Dewey himself is just another enemy of Jason’s. “We got a new thing goin’ for us. Oh no, Jason’s here, we have to kill him!” But, like the Star Trek film franchise, despite the recycled bad guys, the actors portraying them are always memorable for their own reasons, even if it’s simply because they were in the movie. Vikander? She’s probably the most interesting new character. She’s basically the nega-Nicky of the movie. Smart, tech-savvy, and ruthless. In fact, she manages to thwart both Nicky and Jason on separate occasions, so this lady is bad-ass. Love her addition and hope she comes back in a future installment if Greengrass and Damon decide to return.

Now, let’s talk about Stiles. Like Damon, she don’t miss a beat. Nicky’s still smart, no-nonsense, and… wait just a gosh-darn cotton-pickin’ minute there, movie! Nicky’s also an asskicker?! You’re meaning to tell me that this woman picked up firearm training and learned to beat a bitch down? Hey, if Damon’s tired of Bourne, can we have a Nicky Parsons spin-off instead? Because I’d be so down for that.

***SPOILERS***

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Of course, if they did do a spin-off, it’d obviously have to be a prequel to this film because MOTHER FUCKING, FUCKIN’ SHIT, PIECE OF ROTTING DICK CHEESE, SONS OF WHORES HAD TO MOTHER FUCKING KILL OFF NICKY!!!

Greengrass… Rouse… why would you do this my poor Peruvian heart? I loved Nicky. She was the awesomest. But before anyone thinks that I hated this inclusion in the story… I did, but in the positive sort of way. Nicky’s death is a legit tragedy that certainly as fuck got me invested in Jason kicking the CIA’s collective asses. I wanted him to kill a bunch of mother fuckers and see justice done for Nicky. She’s been a mainstay in the franchise since the beginning and has always been a sympathetic or likable character. To see her become almost like a lady-Bourne was such an awesome concept, it really was heartbreaking to see her gunned down so mercilessly and cold-heartedly. After that, I really wanted to see Bourne fuck someone up and leave ’em screaming for their collective mommies. So it shares that similarity with SUPREMACY. It may not have been better than IDENTITY, but it made up for it by anteing up the emotional investment.

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***END SPOILERS***

Remorsefully, this may be the weakest of the franchise as the ultimate CIA plan is almost akin to the TERMINATOR: GENYSIS plan that Skynet had: make an app, take over the world. Well, sort of, this feels like a more likely version of that plan. This dude’s dream is creating a server that would make it impossible for the government to spy on everyone using it. Thing is, the government funded his project and that’s exactly what the government will do, despite knowing that himself and still selling it off like it’s the top private server on the market. A scumbag move, to be sure, but lets face it, it’s already a reality and most of us are aware of it. Not exactly a shock or a twist.

Also, I do feel like there was a lot of emphasis on Bourne’s dad that didn’t go amount to much. We aren’t really given a good connection between the two characters. In fact, that’s another kind of weird thing; the many conflicts of the story didn’t really connect. Jason’s out looking for answers about his father, CIA wants Jason dead as well as to spy on everyone through social media, Jason’s not invested in the whole social media thing, so it’s pointless to have that in there.

Unfortunately, I have to dock a point for a pointless plotline, and maybe there’s a couple too many drawn out chase scenes, but it’s easy to see that if the franchise is to continue with Damon and Greengrass in the lead, then this is a welcomed first step back into the fold after such a long hiatus, and definitely makes up for the failure that was LEGACY. If a sequel gets made, I’ll be first in line for sure. I’d love to see Vikander return, I’d love a revisit with Pamela Landy (Joan Allen) from SUPREMACY and ULTIMATUM, and it never hurts to just see Damon kick some major ass. Not flawless

My honest rating: 4/5

Upcoming review:

• TALLULAH (dramedy)
  • A homeless girl kidnaps a baby from a neglectful mother and seeks shelter with her boyfriend’s mother, passing the baby off as her own.
  • Stars: Ellen Page (FREEHELD, JUNO, and INCEPTION) and Allison Janney (MINIONS, JUNO, and TV show MOM)
  • Directed and Written by: Sian Heder (feature-length debut)
  • trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8WSz2s-Gemc

Possible upcoming reviews:

• BAD MOMS
  • trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iKCw-kqo3cs
•  EQUITY
  • trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xg2TSp5tJy4
•  INDIGNATION
  • trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ELKsrUssyQE
•  NERVE
  • trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AX1BTiHzq-I