A key element of the Bourne franchise’s endurance is the thrill of watching amnesiac super-spy Jason Bourne run headfirst into his past with nothing more than his skills and a belief there is an answer somewhere in the darkness. The Bourne Ultimatum—the third film in what we can now safely say should have remained a trilogy—ended with an answer of sorts that was far from the one Bourne had hoped for, putting a poignant cap on this modern spy masterpiece. The filmmakers seemed to know where it was all heading while the hero didn’t, a crucial ingredient to any successful suspense story.
Since Ultimatum, Universal has neglected the franchise or (more appropriately) forgotten why the world wanted more Bourne films in the first place. First was the perplexing attempt to continue the franchise without its title character in The Bourne Legacy, with no involvement from star Matt Damon or director Paul Greengrass, an endeavor that wasn’t without merit, but had little reason to be despite a committed performance from Jeremy Renner.
Now Greengrass and Damon have returned for Jason Bourne, a movie that only seems to exist because the team behind the best entries in the series were disappointed they made their high-tech thrillers before the explosion of smartphones and social media. The story kicks off with a montage of the previous films that’s only missing a deep voice declaring “Previously, on Bourne,” before we find our hero living in anonymity in Greece on the illegal streetfighting circuit. Meanwhile, Nicky Parsons (Julia Stiles), who is also in hiding, hacks into the CIA and locates files on all of the mysterious and morally questionable programs involving Bourne, including details about his father. She tracks Bourne down—that’s right, the film starts with the two supposedly most difficult things to do in this universe—and is then pursued by CIA director Robert Dewey (Tommy Lee Jones) and Heather Lee (Alicia Vikander).
At the same time, tech giant Deep Dream founder Aaron Kalloor (Riz Ahmed) is ready to go public about a privacy flaw at the core of his massively popular social network that was included at the behest—and with the funds—of Dewey and the CIA. The two plots don’t actually have much to do with each other except to give all the characters a reason to be in the same place at a dramatic moment, and to take some stabs at social commentary, trademarks of both the series and the director (United 93, Green Zone, Captain Phillips). However, this rarely rises above namedropping Edward Snowden and suggesting that there might be a problem with privacy in the modern connected age, hardly a new message or one worthy of Greengrass or the Bourne movies.
One of the most appealing and enduring aspects of the series was the way it was able to channel decades of espionage tropes into a fresh story that feels rooted in the present day, but the waning inspiration in Jason Bourne is evident in everything from its lack of message to the title, which reveals no central theme worthy of its established naming convention. There are a few nifty spy shenanigans here and there, and the conclusion combines one of the most thrilling car chases since Fast & Furious 6 and possibly the most visceral hand-to-hand combat sequence since They Live, but that comes long after mountains of pointless setup, disposable characters, an insultingly simple death of a once-central character and an ending that is more interested in leaving room for sequels than concluding its own story. Jason Bourne is occasionally good, it’s just not Bourne good.
Jason Bourne / PG-13, 121 minutes
Violet Crown Cinema and Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
Playing this week z Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX The Shops at Stonefield, 244-3213 z Bad Moms, Central Intelligence, Finding Dory, Ghostbusters, Hillary’s America: The Secret History of the Democratic Party, Ice Age: Collision Course, The Legend of Tarzan, Lights Out, Nerve, The Secret Life of Pets, Star Trek Beyond z Violet Crown Cinema 200 W. Main St., Downtown Mall, 529-3000 z Absolutely Fabulous, Bad Moms, Café Society, Captain Fantastic, Dheepan, E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial, Ghostbusters, Ice Age: Collision Course, The Infiltrator, The Secret Life of Pets, Star Trek Beyond, Time to Choose
