The Bourne Ultimatum

Review by Loc

Jason Bourne, the badass with no memories. With a less skillful presentation, these Bourne flicks might need to resort to a stupid catchphrase like that. Lucky for us, these movies bring it without inhibitions and leave you mesmerized by the sheer badassery of Mr. Bourne. Quick hit: the third flick does excels in new ways to deliver badassery.

In the first two films, we’ve been treated to Matt Damon’s amnesia-suffering super spy in all his flawed glory. The first film dealt with his immediate withdrawal from the spygame world. How do you catch a man trained to disappear? Apparently you don’t, but you may get beat down by a pen if you try. In the second, Bourne has happily disappeared, only to be hunted down in an attempt to tie up conspiratorial cover-ups. How do you take down a trained killer? Again, you don’t, but you do get a mouthful of newspaper if you try.

With The Bourne Ultimatum, the story shifts gears thematically. Bourne’s not running anymore, he’s taking the fight right to the agencies as he tries to unravel his sorted past. It’s only a shift thematically because Bourne still finds himself in similar chase-and-escape scenarios that have haunted his entire film career. However, with such a specific, simple goal in sight, this film drives hard through the 111-minute running time and delivers to sweet, sweet action.

There’s also some great spy-vs-spy sequences that reveal detailed, complex covert operations in a fascinating and disturbing manner. In the age of the Patriot Act, it’s not too hard to believe your Big Brother agency can scan your phone calls, can watch every single security camera in the world, and can activate “assets” at a moments notice. What’s an asset, it’s your ticket to die by the sniper rifle being held by the assassin they just sent after you. The early sequence at the London subway station where Bourne and a journalist navigate their way through a swarm of agents is grin-inducing satisfaction.

Close-quarters combat is a specialty in the Bourne series, and this flick introduces the various uses of a hardcover book. Spectacular beatdowns are always a gas with Bourne, and there’s something about the visceral, grunt-and-groan type of fighting that makes it more appetizing than campy one-liner Bond style killing.

However, too much unsteady-cam can make these scene go blah. The one major drawback in the film is the increased, very distracting use of the blurry-cam. We understand they’re fighting in a shower, it’s close and tight, they move fast, yes, that’s great. But not being able to see anything that’s going on, and instead, getting nauseous from the constant shaky-cam gets annoying. Let me see Bourne smack that, that’s what I want!

Overall, The Bourne Ultimatum is a very good summer flick. It’s not necessarily a “smart” flick, this film does deliver a good 20-mins-action-to-4-mins-talking ratio. However, it’s “smart” enough to not insult the audience’s intelligence. Bourne is on the run, he’s struggling to survive and find answers, but none of his questions just get magically answered. He does seem to have a lot of money and can move around the world pretty easily, but I guess we can accept that cause he’s the uber-spy that’s done the same thing for the last two films. Out of 20 asset activations, The Bourne Ultimatum completes 16 asset missions. If you really want to get jazzed about this flick, watch the second film right before you go see this one. The Bourne Ultimatum literally opens in Russia, after the big climax from The Bourne Supremacy. Enjoy.