Movie Review: Jason Bourne

Everyone knows Jason Bourne discovered the truth behind his identity at the end of The Bourne Ultimatum. What Jason Bourne presupposes is, maybe he didn’t?

The fifth instalment of the series comes after Matt Damon’s amnesiac assassin swam off into the sunset, only to be replaced in 2012’s doomed placeholder Bourne Legacy by a self-sacrificing Jeremy Renner, who kept the series warm as if he were a tauntaun to be torn open and slept in.

(They say every film is someone’s favourite film. That is not true of The Bourne Legacy. In it, Renner played another, more aggro operative named Aaron Cross; he isn’t mentioned once in Jason Bourne, despite this being the franchise that will mention any and every notable keyword from previous entries, no matter how baffling or inconsequential, like Treadstone, Blackbriar, Ironhand, et cetera.)

So, what brings back Damon and director Paul Greengrass (who stepped away after Ultimatum too)? Nothing particularly pressing, though Greengrass and Christopher Rouse’s script makes a big fuss over the new normal of surrendered personal privacy and security leaks in this post-Snowden age.

Nonetheless, these are requirements to precipitate a leadership summit, not necessarily an American action flick. But they went and made Jason Bourne anyway, so who are we to complain?

After his nine-year absence, we find Bourne bare-knuckle boxing in Greece and doing little else. His haunted existence is interrupted by long-time confidante Nicky (Julia Stiles), who tracks him down after hacking the CIA and recovering documents explaining why exactly he was recruited for their brain-melting, murderer-making program. She also unwittingly puts the CIA, led by director Dewey (an especially craggy Tommy Lee Jones) and plucky agent Lee (Alicia Vikander), on his tail.

Dewey, not wanting the public to learn of his all-access deal with social media wizard Aaron Kalloor (Riz Ahmed), tasks a hitman (Vincent Cassel) with taking Bourne out. Lee, however, tries bringing him in from the cold. Bourne mostly just stays quiet - Damon has about 25 lines of dialogue - simply beating up people with household items until they tell him who he really is. (No, really this time. With each sequel, he discovers new culprits and crinkles to the conspiracy of his recruitment. If they keep making these things, they’ll eventually tie him to Watergate.)

Jason Bourne – well, Paul Greengrass, anyway - has a mission, beyond entertaining us. The picture wants us to understand the gravity of living in a surveillance state, and get us to question the value of governments’ having unfettered access to its people (under the guise of protection). And yet, it’s hard to be fearful when our hero literally uses nifty gadgets such as tracking devices and satellite phones that record conversations from afar to prank and eventually undo his enemies.

Spy films will always struggle to properly convey the threat of technology, because they rely on its coolness. (The lesson we, as a society learned, from Minority Report? “Touch-screens seem fun!”)

Jason Bourne wants to be more, but can’t, perhaps like its existentially-trapped title character. The franchise has at least earned the right to be a paranoid elder statesman, thanks to its longevity and gritty, real-world aesthetic. It’s the kind of movie that can use a Greek protest as a backdrop to an action set piece and not need to explain its relevancy.

It’s also the kind of movie in which Alicia Vikander can look at blurry surveillance video, command her colleagues to “enhance”, and see a pristine photograph of Julia Stiles. Which is to say, it has no problem employing silly spy film contrivances in super serious fashion.

The proceedings here are all very familiar, from Damon’s glowering to Greengrass’ hand-held smash-zooms. Frequently, it feels like what’s come before, only at half-speed (there is a particularly lengthy stretch of inaction in the middle).

For a while, it even seemed that there would be no centrepiece moment in Jason Bourne, like Ultimatum’s breathtaking camera-jump, or the scene in Supremacy where he kills someone with a magazine.

Then, the third act arrives with a suitably absurd car chase through Las Vegas’ casino strip. Jason Bourne doesn’t really make you think, but it can still make you gasp.

3.5/5

In cinemas July 28. Rated M for mature themes and violence.