4.5 stars. Rated PG-13, for intense action and violence, and brief profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 7.29.16
Wow.
Director Paul Greengrass certainly
hasn’t lost any of his juice. This newest installment in the Bourne franchise
is relentless: It hits the ground running, never lets up for two full hours,
and is bookended by a pair of spectacular action sequences.
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| After learning that Nicky (Julia Stiles) has obtained proof of CIA black-ops programs that relate to his past, Bourne (Matt Damon) arranges to meet her at an Athens plaza, where they hope to blend into a melee between rioting civilians and local police officers. Unfortunately, this chaos does nothing to stop the efforts of pursuing CIA teams. |
I wouldn’t have thought
Greengrass ever could top the mano a mano
melees in 2004’s Bourne Supremacy,
but he has ... and then some. Jason
Bourne is a taut, breathtaking experience, its giddy momentum the result of
equally fine work by editor Christopher Rouse, a longtime Greengrass colleague
(and Academy Award winner, for 2007’s The
Bourne Ultimatum).
Greengrass and Rouse also
collaborated on the timely, ripped-from-the-headlines script, which references
the “safety or security?” argument at the heart of the recent spat between
Apple Inc. and the FBI. The players have been altered to avoid lawsuits, but
there’s no question which side of the fence our filmmakers occupy. Having
navigated conspiracy-laden waters for more than a decade, Greengrass clearly
doesn’t trust government agencies to have their citizens’ best interests — or
privacy — at heart.
And with paranoia running rampant
these days, this film definitely captures the national zeitgeist.
When last seen, Bourne (Matt
Damon) had successfully back-tracked his actual identity, along with those responsible
for the CIA training that transformed him into a hardened assassin. The victory
was pyrrhic, as it left him without friends or a country. Convinced that the
CIA would have him “erased,” he simply vanished.
Having remained off the grid for
nearly a decade, Bourne has become a ragged, rootless shell, subsisting on meager
earnings from underground bare-knuckle boxing matches. Damon’s grim features
are weary and despondent during this introductory montage: the quiet despair of
a man lacking purpose.
Then, suddenly, a blast from the
past: He gets a message from former CIA colleague Nicky Parsons (Julia Stiles),
who — also long on the run — has joined a hacking collective with the goal of
exposing CIA dirty tricks. Her quest has borne fruit: 30 years’ worth of black
ops files that include Operation Treadstone — which “created” Bourne — and
something new called “Iron Hand.”
Even more damning, Nicky has
uncovered additional details pertaining to Bourne’s actual identity — David
Webb — along with the strong suggestion that his father, Richard (Gregg Henry),
was directly involved with Treadstone. This revelation lends context to another
of Bourne’s still fragmented memories: something having to do with a long-ago
lunchtime meeting with his father.
