Man, the official soundtrack is a legit disappointment. The music works well in context with the movie, but by itself it's meh. And they cut out the music used during the ending climax of the motorcycle chase - unforgivable. The only legit good tracks are the first few cues.

Saw this last night. I really enjoyed it and got teary-eyed for It was my first time seeing a Bourne film on the big screen and actually felt sick during the London scenes.

Upset the punch shot from the Superbowl ad wasn't in the final cut.


My rankings:
Identity
Ultimatum (a close 2nd)
Supremacy


Jason Bourne






Legacy

Recently rewatched Identity for the first time in years. Didn't know Walton Goggins was in that:

Universal: We want to make Jason Bourne movies until it's no longer physically possible.

After seeing Jason Bourne?


-Good luck with that.

Might be on the very bottom this year for me. The script was infantile, the reason for its existence and some retcons (or half baked post-it ideas) made me cringe throughout... not even the action is worth it and there's two major set pieces. Focus was simply on the wrong things; in Greece they just couldn't let go of the riot logistics and how well they pulled it off... Jason Bourne who? Oh, right, put a handheld on the dude and shake it off for extra motion sickness! And trust me I never complained about constant motion during the trilogy. What else is there? Music was lifeless, actors were lifeless (Tommy Lee especially), motivation was non-existent because all the players never really got the idea worth playing with. Halfway through the movie I realized Bourne franchise needed to just give up after that perfect ending in Ultimatum or, alternatively, completely re-invent itself. This was neither, a shadow of a shadow of its heights. I watched this right after Ghostbusters (second viewing, with a different group) and Ghostbusters were the highlight of this evening for me. Seriously, watch Kate McKinnon dance it off with flame throwers and try not to grin like a kid. That film is far from perfect but at least it was worth the price of admission. This on the other hand left a mark on Bourne being one of the few stainless series. I never counted Legacy but this you just have to - it's Damon and Greengrass, even Moby, whom I left right after few notes... just couldn't take the final punch in the gut.

2/5 or something like that.

M4's review is a bit harsh, but I mostly agree with him, it's extremely disappointing. It's a pointless addition to the franchise on a storytelling level but overall I think it's better than Legacy.

I think we may be biaised because we waited nine years for new Bourne and that's the best they come up with? It's a terrible script with dull and lifeless new characters. Also really pissed they I love Greengrass' directing style and he's still at his A-Game here mostly. I thought the Greece riot was as good as anything in the trilogy. A marvelous setpiece. The fights are mostly good, but the overlong Las Vegas climax is very un-Bourne.

Probably something like a 6.5/10 and it was my second most anticipated of the year

m4st4 wrote:

Universal: We want to make Jason Bourne movies until it's no longer physically possible.

After seeing Jason Bourne?


-Good luck with that.

Might be on the very bottom this year for me. The script was infantile, the reason for its existence and some retcons (or half baked post-it ideas) made me cringe throughout... not even the action is worth it and there's two major set pieces. Focus was simply on the wrong things; in Greece they just couldn't let go of the riot logistics and how well they pulled it off... Jason Bourne who? Oh, right, put a handheld on the dude and shake it off for extra motion sickness! And trust me I never complained about constant motion during the trilogy. What else is there? Music was lifeless, actors were lifeless (Tommy Lee especially), motivation was non-existent because all the players never really got the idea worth playing with. Halfway through the movie I realized Bourne franchise needed to just give up after that perfect ending in Ultimatum or, alternatively, completely re-invent itself. This was neither, a shadow of a shadow of its heights. I watched this right after Ghostbusters (second viewing, with a different group) and Ghostbusters were the highlight of this evening for me. Seriously, watch Kate McKinnon dance it off with flame throwers and try not to grin like a kid. That film is far from perfect but at least it was worth the price of admission. This on the other hand left a mark on Bourne being one of the few stainless series. I never counted Legacy but this you just have to - it's Damon and Greengrass, even Moby, whom I left right after few notes... just couldn't take the final punch in the gut.

2/5 or something like that.

If only Margot Robbie played Vikander's role you'd at least give it a 3/5.

They should have left this alone as a Trilogy. It was just fine that way with a very good ending. It's one of the few trilogies that didn't fall victim to the "Threquel curse" but they just had to make 2 terrible ones year later that nobody even really asked for.

There were so many sequences that were not just reminiscent of the past, more like boringly re-adapted here, again, like we wouldn't notice. It's not a matter of 'this has all happened before, and it will happen again' cycle of life and death in Jason's life, it's just blatantly lazy on filmmakers' part. Nobody from CIA camp learned a god damned thing about Jason Bourne's tactics after ten years and Jason, on the other hand, was painted with broader strokes than usual. Hearing about yet another layer of his past and his 'actual' motivation made me believe the scriptwriter used one of those 'Psychology for dummies' books as a guide. There's a moment where Vikander literally reads footnotes about Bourne in a redacted Blackbriar file (How many of these still exist anyway?) and they sound like something you'd take from the very first meeting about creating the excuse to shoot this movie, written on a napkin during a corporate lunch. We talked about this movie extensively on the way home and at the end everyone was naming their favorite scene from a movie. I honestly had no idea which one to pick, everything was already done so much better in the past.

The Bourne Redundancy

Wanted to do a write-up of this movie on my blog, but I decided I don't feel like wasting my time.


Basically ... I've already seen this movie four times.

Every major set piece or plot device is something that came from somewhere in the first few films. While I think "rehashed" is really overused by modern film reaction and reception, it feels fitting for this. The film is beat-by-beat a remix of other scenes in the series. I mean, it's come to a point now where it feels like a self-parody.

• Suited up people in dark rooms intensely working on computers? check
• Clearly nefarious intelligence exec pulling the strings behind everything? check
• new ominous black ops and secret government organizations with names that sound like they came from some internet name generator? check
• variations on "it's what you are, Jason! a killer!"? check
• USB drives with their contents clearly fucking written on them? check
• secret keys to secret lockers full of secret files on secret people? check
• Major! Crazy! Whoa! twist (that could be seen miles away) about Bourne's past that ultimately doesn't change much? check
• people being able to magically and unbelievably track and record and hack each other? check

It's definitely in keeping with the tropes of this franchise and the genre, perhaps, but it just feels redundant. It almost makes every character in the film seem stupid. Literally every time someone tries to go after Bourne, they fuck everything up even more, why the fuck are you doing it again? Why is Bourne himself that careless to allow himself to be found AGAIN, for like the THIRD TIME? Hell, I thought Legacy was better if only because it explored a different character in the "universe" a bit more.

Just ... why are we doing this again?

Maybe it kinda makes a commentary on itself, inadvertently. It's such a rehash of the previous films, that we're almost left feeling like Bourne himself; "why am I still doing this?" "what's the point?" "it always ends up the same anyway".

Fuck the ending too, because while the other films (even Legacy) ended on a slightly vague, but also pretty conclusive note that would have been satisfying even if it wasn't followed by a sequel, this one ends on the most noncommittal ending I've seen in a franchise film in recent memory.

Having said that, some of the actiony stuff was hard-hitting. The Vegas chase was almost cartoonish, but effective. Cassel v Damon was pretty intense too.


But I'm with Vader, it drained the cinematic energy out of this summer. I'm gonna go see Civil War now.

This year had so much potential.