The Bourne Ultimatum (2007), dir Paul Greengrass,
starring Matt Damon

The first film, 'The Bourne Identity' was okay but
there was never enough meat in this franchise to spin
out 3 of 'em. Basically the 'The Bourne Ultimatum' is
saying that the CIA are a bunch of idiots. Okay, we
see evidence of that everyday in the news. What is
surprising is that another American is depicted as
being cleverer. This is hard to believe given the
present state of US foreign policy.

Even The Guardian newspaper manages to get in on the
act. The producer of the film probably realised that
the only newspaper on earth that has intellectuals
that might construct a plausible, legitimate critique
of this apparantly magnificent film is The Guardian
newspaper. The only answer, therefore, was to
incorporate the paper in some way into the film. Thus
a Manchester Guardian journalist joins Bourne at
Waterloo Station to rush around madly avoiding or
trampling underfoot every wino, beggar, down and out,
until he is (almost inevitably) shot dead. This scene
is presented in terms of live action and edited clips
from surveillance videos, a nice duality that
preserves the frenetic appeal of the movie and of any
kind of 'real time' (as the CIA chief dubs it) action.

Bourne then rushes through Madrid and Tangiers. There
is some romantic action as well, but it is never
developed, either plausibly, or what's more likely
given the track record of this franchise, implausibly.
In Tangiers Bourne is blown up. Most people would
simply lie there groaning and wait for the ambulance
but Bourne jumps up for a frantic but implausible
motorcycle chase through the city. Bourne then
sprints across some housetops, stepping on glass as he
runs, eventually finding and dispatching the bomber
with some ruthless violence that nevertheless pertains
to be both slick and sophisicated. Violence in 'real
time' is never so neat, witty or unperplexing.

Bourne somehow manages to phone the CIA chief from a
neighbouring office (yes he's now in New York). The
dumbfuck CIA chief and his staff get out of the
building, chasing Bourne to a location set up in
advance. But Bourne is meanwhile in the CIA building,
using his credit card as a swipecard, entering the CIA
chiefs office, opening his safe. He then faxes the top
secret documents found there to whomever he chooses.
As he does so he tells the CIA chief exactly where he
is in a phone message. Everyone again begins rushing
about in their differing but predictable directions.
Basically Jason Bourne cooly unpicks every lock.

In the final sequence he finds out the truth about his
'identity'. Basically he's a ham actor from
Hollywood, USA, transplanted into a film that is only
slightly beneath his acting and intellectual
abilities. Lastly he's in the water again, swimming
up to the light to begin the first film ('The Bourne
Identity') again, the only film in the franchise that
is indeed worth bothering with. There are some weird
scenes at the end between Jason Bourne and the Big CIA
Chief that are frankly either ridiculous or
embarrassing or both. Worse still, they are utterly
uninteresting, tangential to the rest of the plot.

Paul Murphy, Ealing Empire, London