Jason Bourne was a bad man. He could
run, jump, punch, shoot, and roundhouse kick with the best of
them. But what I didn't know, and this is where this new
Bourne movie comes in, 'The Bourne Legacy', was some of that
stuff that Bourne was pulling off might've been with the
assistance of a Performance Enhancing Drug (PED) or two.
Where Jason Bourne might be when this movie starts… heaven
only knows… but all that mayhem he was causing in the first
three movies is about to come to roost as the clean up and the
cover up is in full effect.
This cleanup / cover up mission will be spearheaded by Col.
Eric Byer (Edward Norton). Who he is he and who does he
work for… again… heaven only knows… but he's one of those
shady operator characters in movies that's extremely
connected, pulls strings, kills people by remote control
indiscriminately, seems to operate completely outside the law
and has way more power than the President of the United
States. In fact I wouldn't be surprised if the President
called this guy boss.
So it turns out the whole Bourne thing was some kind of Super
Soldier program that consisted of physical enhancements
combined with intelligence boosting and it looks like some
stuff has leaked out to the point that this program needs to
be terminated. Immediately. Rudely. With
extreme prejudice. And we mean everything related to
this program. The field operatives who by all accounts
have been doing bang up work, reporters who may or may not
know anything about this program, and scientist who are on the
program must all be put to sleep.
We know already Jason Bourne won't be
showing up to save the day, but we do have Aaron Cross (Jeremy
Renner) who we meet in the middle of the world's most
ridiculous training mission. Aaron has showed up smack
dab in the middle of the
cleaning process but that boy is a quick
thinker to go along with his sharp reflexes and he makes it
out. Problem being that he needs his meds because unlike
Jason Bourne who was pretty sharp before he entered this
mysterious program, Aaron Cross was not. To say the
least.
Aaron figures the pretty doctor who used to administer his
treatments might have the stuff he needs to stay on his game,
she being Marta Shearing (Rachel Weisz) who barely survived
her own close murder shave. Aaron picks her up, with
some difficulty of course as the cleanup process is still
going on strong, as these two fugitives basically travel
around the world to avoid detection, subsequent death, and get
Aaron his desperately needed PED's. This cat is a
crackhead for this stuff, for real. And he's gonna need
that stuff because the walls are closing in and death is
around every corner. Even though we, personally
speaking, think it to be all a bit unnecessary.
On one hand we here are pleased to see the Bourne narrative go
into a new direction. Matt Damon was in three of these
movies, all three excellent films to varying degrees, but how
much neck snapping and fleeing for one's life can one man do
before it gets a little stale? So this time around they
turn the directing reins over to Tony Gilroy, and one would
imagine they are in safe hands considering he did write or
co-write the first three films, and they turned him
loose.
What we got this time around was a movie that was crisp and
certainly not more of the same, but also one that felt a
little long and over-plotted considering how many elements
were going on at the same time. But yet… despite the
wealth of characters, all of them talking a lot about an awful
lot of stuff, with the eyes in the skies, and the information
overload that was being delivered to us… I'm not sure this
complex over plotted script ever told me what exactly was
going on in this movie.
Now the basics are as plain as day. The pretty girl and
the strapping hero must survive or die. But after the
third long, drawn out chase sequence we found ourselves asking
ourselves 'why do they have to die?' I get it, the
program is danger of being exposed, despite the fact they
already put a bullet in the head of the one guy they thought
might know something, but the people they are eliminating are
some of the most loyal, hardworking folks ever who just want
to murder in the name of freedom for their country.
Assassinating people like this, who will do anything you tell
them to do, including our strapping hero until they tried to
blow him up, is kind of dumb and counterproductive when you
think about it. One of our characters from the previous
films is about to spill her beans in front of congress, but
they're not worried about her. Jason Bourne is still
running around out there causing a ruckus but they don't seem
to be worried about him either. Apparently there's
another Super Soldier program out there that they use to try
to get rid our badass hero and the pretty doctor, but they're
not worried about him either. There's a whole disconnect
there, at least from where I was sitting, about who deserves
to get a government sponsored bullet in the head.
It's possible that this disconnect might've been in the
previous films, but they moved so fast, especially 'The Bourne
Ultimatum', that it was hard to focus on
inconsistencies. 'The Bourne Legacy' was so talky and
spent so much time in backroom boardrooms that you had no
choice but to focus on the narrative, and it comes up short.
Regardless, the action was good when there was action, I
really enjoyed the backstory given for Jeremy Renner's
character, obviously Renner and Weisz are excellent actors and
had no problem carrying this movie around, with other actors
such as Norton, Stacy Keach, Scott Glenn, Albert Finney and
more providing excellent support… but this talkative Spy
Procedural either needed less talk and more action, or better
talk and more action. One or the another I'm
thinking.
