"Jason Bourne" review

Because lofty self titled new beginnings are always winners, right?

“Jason Bourne” takes place several years after “The Bourne Ultimatum” in which Matt Damon played the titular amnesiac enhanced black ops agent racing to uncover a corrupt espionage conspiracy by uncovering the secrets of his past.

This time Damon returns as the titular amnesiac enhanced black ops agent racing to uncover a corrupt espionage conspiracy by uncovering his past in the fifth installment of the franchise that began by following him as an amnesiac enhanced black ops agent racing to uncover his past.

He does this by hiding in plain sight in crowds, going on ludicrous car chases, tracking down new female contacts, and facing off against an enhanced black ops agent not unlike himself, similarly to the previous 3 films starring him.

All joking of rehash aside, while the world at large seems to embrace the absurdity of the cinematic James Bond at the height of his popularity, I have always personally found the more grounded, gritty, and direct Jason Bourne to be more fascinating.

The amnesia angle gave his character an interesting separation from spies of similar conception but their ability to ground conspiracies of genuine political weight within a somewhat realistic context complete with a protagonist with skeletons in his closet that he isn’t fully aware of, antagonists with self serving agendas but not necessarily intentionally malicious, and a conflict that uses society and its institutions as both a political and action oriented chess board provided the spy genre with the reinvigoration that it desperately needed.

Additionally breaking the mold in that regard was Jason Bourne. This is a character that is explicitly stated to be nearly superhuman; he can take a beating more than a man of peak physical conditioning, stretch himself further in physical endurance than Olympic level athletes, and his mind is conditioned so tightly he’s already figured out how he needs to take his opponent down before throwing the first punch.

Despite being a living embodiment of a power fantasy however, the narrative elects instead to focus on his vulnerabilities and weaknesses as a means to drive the story forward, keeping him relatable, likable, and at his best, tragically sympathetic.

I address this upfront to make it well known that I love the “Bourne” series. The first three movies are one of the few perfect trilogies put to storytelling and despite its numerous problems, I even like “The Bourne Legacy.”

Of the problems regarding “The Bourne Legacy” are the general rehash of narrative concepts and structures utilized to actual effect in the previous films, despite lacking their context and failing to make usage of Jeremy Renner’s distinct characterization of new protagonist Aaron Cross.

Apparently Universal executives, in their short sighted pursuit of the mighty dollar, failed to catch that the biggest problem with the last entry was that it was too similar to previous films, opting instead to take their trusty bottle out to a lightning storm and take their chances with the situationally inapplicable mantra of “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”

Theoretically, “Jason Bourne” is the kind of franchise relaunch that serves as fandom comfort food. The beloved protagonist returns to action, portrayed by his iconic actor to go on an adventure revisiting the beats of previous films loved by viewers. They’ve even gone as far as to hire back “Bourne Supremacy” and “Bourne Ultimatum” director Paul Greengrass.

To Greengrass’ credit the major set pieces of the film are generally well coordinated and make an effective use of the series’ trademark shaky cam style where it matters, managing to sell even some of the more outlandish sequences of the film as vaguely possible. Unfortunately, his style and Damon’s presence can’t shake off that regardless of whatever intentional feelings of familiarity the movie aims to perpetuate, everything unfortunately feels inferior in execution this time around.

There’s just very little that exists here that hasn’t been done better in the previous films but the sad truth is that “Jason Bourne” is actually strongest when it tries to deviate from its formula, which is undercut by how underdeveloped those ideas are.

Tommy Lee Jones gives a strong performance as a corrupt CIA director that believes that he’s protecting his country’s best interest and frames his stake in the black ops programs as having an old world obsession with security fading into obsolescence by the development of a new time that he fails to connect with. Alicia Vikander’s portrayal of Heather Lee, the CIA operations lead tasked with stopping whatever Bourne has planned has an unhealthy obsession with bringing him in alive, which ultimately positions the franchise with a better sequel potential than it had before.

Even Bourne himself exhibits a desire for retirement, wanting to leave his enigmatic past and life of espionage, along with whatever uncovered secrets remain within it, behind.

By the end, none of it matters though, because the fast pace of the film is concerned more with going through the same tired motions rather than fleshing out the more fascinating characterizations that could have made this more than just another summer blockbuster action film.

I can’t imagine “Jason Bourne” will do much for anybody but the die-hard fans of the franchise but even then, its role just seems rather redundant. This is a type of relaunch typically reserved for franchises that have gone dark for a while or have long lost their way.

“Jurassic World” paid homage to iconography of the original film after said series produced two bad sequels, the last of which was almost a decade and a half old. “Star Trek” went back to basics and built itself from the ground up 7 years after the previous film starring the cast of a spinoff series underperformed under scrutiny of having sensibilities that were sadly out of date. Even “The Force Awakens,” despite being deserving of its criticism, was mostly forgiven for its excessive rehashing of previous cinematic beats for reminding the masses about what made “Star Wars” so cool after nearly two decades of quality inconsistency, mismanagement, and two of the worst prequels in cinematic history.

The “Bourne” franchise, cinematically speaking, is less than 15 years old, the last entry of which was released 4 years ago, and the series as a whole impacted the landscape of spy films so greatly that even “James Bond” had to take a note out of their book and adopt a more reserved tone.

I understand the need of this film to brand itself as a celebratory return to form in terms of what it aims to achieve but it’s hard to feel any sort of nostalgic glee for this series allegedly coming back when it never truly went away to begin with.

Hopefully, future installments yield more of the creativity that they appear to have set up by the end but for now, the greatest enemy of Jason Bourne, both in story and metatextually, is his own past, which doesn’t seem to want to let him go.

5 Very Non-Extreme Ways and Back out of 10