So, I’ve never been a particularly huge fan of the Bourne franchise. I mean, I don’t hate the trilogy or anything, but I’ve never actually connected to it, either. Still, despite some less-than-stellar reviews, Mek and I figured we’d give The Bourne Legacy a shot.
Ultimately, it was kind of a fail. But it could have been so good.
1. I’m categorizing this review as a blasphemy, and here’s why: I actually like Jeremy Renner in this movie more than I ever liked Matt Damon.
It’s not that Damon’s bad. I like Matt Damon. But when I say I’ve never connected to the Bourne franchise, I mean that I don’t really care that much about Jason Bourne, and I don’t find his story particularly entertaining or intriguing. (Especially not The Bourne Ultimatum with its whole Wolverine twist. Yawn.) I get that the action sequences are well done, and obviously that’s important, but I find Jason Bourne himself to be a little on the bland side.
Aaron Cross, on the other hand, is much more interesting, and Jeremy Renner, of course, is magnetic as hell.
2. Unfortunately, while Aaron Cross’s storyline has all kinds of potential, the movie never actually bothers to act on any of it. Without getting into spoilers too much, The Bourne Legacy offers up some really unique consequences if Aaron and Marta (Rachel Weisz) can’t accomplish this plot-related thing in time . . . but then completely fails to capitalize on the drama inherent in the situation. The pacing of the film is so awkward that almost all of the tension is lost — they take forever setting up pointless scenes and don’t spend nearly enough time on the things that actually matter. At 135 minutes, this movie is needlessly long and disjointed as all hell, which is ultimately what kills it.
3. Which is really two bad because Jeremy Renner and Rachel Weisz are both excellent in The Bourne Legacy, acting the hell out of what is otherwise a very mediocre movie. They have great chemistry with one another, and I would actually really enjoy watching the continuing adventures of Aaron and Marta.
Just, you know, hopefully better ones. With preferably a different director at the helm.
MVP:
Jeremy Renner
TENTATIVE GRADE:
C
MORAL:
Shit. I can’t really think of a good one. Um. I’ll just use this spot to bitch about something else: don’t you hate it when movies cut something that you saw in the trailer? The one thing I remember about The Bourne Legacy trailer is this line: “Do you wanna live? Cause I wanna live.” Which I really liked — and then it wasn’t even in the movie. Pisses. Me. Off. Every single time.
My Geek Blasphemy 
Wolverine twist? I mean, asides from Bourne Legacy I’ve seen all the Bourne movies. I don’t ever remember a twist. Like ANY twist. Seriously, the people he used to work for are trying to kill him and he finds out they’ve got dirt on them. Wow, big surprise. And he’s an elite spy and he discovers he had extra-special elite training. That’s not a twist, is it?
SPOILERS? Maybe?
It’s been a while since I’ve seen Ultimatum, but when they reveal that Jason had signed up for the program voluntarily, that he hadn’t been taken or coerced or anything, I seem to remember that being a dum-dum-DUM moment. Not necessarily a Shyamalan twist but definitely a Big Reveal. And I was like, yawn.
I thought the big thing was that he’d finally found where they trained him, who had been involved in training him and that he was beginning to REMEMBER how it happened. It’s that he could finally remember it that I think was the big reveal. But yeah, still not exactly a twist.
What a twist!
Heh. I didn’t even have to click on the link. ROBOT CHICKEN!!!!
I find Matt Damon a little boring.
Also, I hate when they cut things from the trailer because then I spend the entire movie waiting for it. In The Candidate there is a scene in the movie where a guy gets shot in the leg with a crossbow in the trailer, but a gun in the movie. I missed 15 seconds of dialogue thinking, “wasn’t that a crossbow?”
I like Matt Damon in a lot of stuff. I just don’t care about Jason Bourne.
I’ll often forget about the trailer while watching a movie until I hit a certain piece of dialogue that stuck out. Like in Live Free Or Die Hard, there’s a line in the trailer where McClane says, “I’m gonna kill this guy and get my daughter, or I’m gonna get my daughter and kill this guy.” When the scene came up in the movie, I was like, Oh yeah, cool, I like this line coming up, and then they completely changed the line! To something worse! Drives me nuts.
And ha, crossbows and guns. Those are totally the same thing, right? 🙂
They actually changed a lot from the trailer in that movie. I think partly it was to keep the surprise of the jokes, so as not to lessen their impact. And with the actors involved I’m guessing there was a lot of adlibbing. But that change was just confusing and took me out of the movie.
I liked this one mostly, but it’s getting too much into science fiction. Bourne was possible. This guy? Probably not. I like science fiction, btw, but this franchise is supposed to take place in the real world (more or less).
I find Jason Bourne himself to be a little on the bland side.
Me too, but wasn’t that the point? They went into more detail about this in the book, I guess, saying about he’d even had plastic surgery to make his features more average, make him blend more into the background. Average height, build, brown hair, unmemorable features (not too good looking, not ugly). Some of the guys who played Bond would be way too good looking and too tall (even if they didn’t tell everyone all the time who they really are).
I guess the speculative elements didn’t bother me. You mean the drugs, right? I can see what you mean, but I generally liked that storyline. The concept of it, anyway, if not the execution.
As far as Bourne being on the bland side, I meant more in personality than physicality.
Yeah, I know, but all-round blandness – like he’s just a boring, bland guy doing what most of the time is a boring job. The movies mix realism with fantasy, so we have what is probably in reality a boring job, but they throw in some action.