The Bourne Ultimatum Review

by Homer Yen (homer_yen AT yahoo DOT com)
August 7th, 2007
"Bourne" to Succeed
by Homer Yen
(c) 2007

In 2002, the first of the Bourne trilogy came out
(The Bourne Identity). We discovered that Jason
Bourne (Matt Damon) is a special kind of assassin
for the US government. His mind short-circuited
during one of his special ops missions. Now,
afflicted with amnesia, he furiously tries to
discover his true identity while being pursued by
government officials who deem him too dangerous
to be alive. All of the "Bourne" films are
fun-to-watch, crisp action-thrillers. And this
last one nicely wraps up all of the loose ends,
while still providing an opportunity for
additional sequels.

"The Bourne Ultimatum" just crackles with energy.
It's like putting a handful of Pop Rocks on your
tongue. And it provides a tightly wound tapestry
of suspense and cloak-and-dagger thrills.
Bourne, after two movies that showcased a
non-stop search that has taken him around the
world, is finally closing in on the CIA
puppetmasters who turned him into a lethal asset.
His next stop is London, England where he hopes
to connect with a reporter who seems to possess
knowledge about Bourne's past. With government
agents closing in on him, the first of several
cleverly suspenseful sequences unfolds as Bourne
orchestrates an improbable escape through
London's busy Waterloo station as he dodges
surveillance cameras, roving agents, and gunmen.

With bread crumbs that he can follow, he
continues globetrotting to Italy, Morocco, and
Spain before finally making his way to NYC. He
encounters familiar faces from the previous
films, including CIA personnel Pamela Landy (Joan
Allen) and Nicky Parsons (Julia Stiles) who
develop a kind of sympathy for Bourne's plight.
But he also encounters plenty of resistance in
the form of agents and assassins that are
assigned to kill him. Of greater impact this
time around are the hand-to-hand combat scenes.
The choreography is deft and you can see that the
actors have trained hard to master their
movements. It's all very nicely crafted. The
denouement is somewhat marred by a
longer-than-necessary explanation as Bourne
finally regains his identity. And I still think
that Julia Stiles is deserving of a meatier role.
But, that's more a criticism of the book rather
than the film, because this movie is
white-knuckle fun.

I also liked the directorial style of Paul
Greengrass. When it comes to the action
sequences, he allows us to see enough of the
action so that we are not so far back that we
feel disconnected from the scene and that we're
not so close as to make the scene feel cluttered.
And when it comes to scenes that feature
conversations, the object that we want to focus
on is always obscured by something in the
foreground. It makes you want to take closer
notice. The purposely shaky camerawork took some
getting used to. But it gave us a sense that we
were peeking in at close range. It was
especially appropriate at the end of a tense
chase through NYC as the camera shook at the
conclusion of a horrific collision.

The summer of 2007 started weakly. But, in
recent weeks, films like "Transformers",
"Ratatouille", and now this, have helped to save
what could've been a season of lackluster
quality. The summer is Bourne again.

Grade: B+

S: 0 out of 3
L: 0 out of 3
V: 2 out of 3

   
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