Movie Review - Bourne Legacy - 3 Stars

Bourne Legacy is both a sequel and a reboot of the popular spy series from the previous decade that was solely responsible for the revival of realistic action, although the producers won't call it the latter in hopes of getting the star of the series, Matt Damon, back on board for the next iteration.

Matt was absent from this one due to his insistence that he won't do another Bourne movie until previous director Paul Greengrass is on board again too, so, as a result, we see a new action hero, played by Jeremy Renner in a movie instead directed by the writer of the previous films, Tony Gilroy. Renner's character is similar to Bourne's in that he becomes a rogue spy outwitting his one time U.S. government employers, who, this time, try to include him on a massive assassination of all super-spies bred under their various Treadstone/Blackbriar/Outcome programs in a cover-up attempt necessitated in light of the Congressional investigations triggered by the actions of Damon's character in the previous films.

As a result, while we still get the fast-paced, tense, mutliple-locale storyline that Gilroy typically penned for the first three films, the generous kinetic action that we saw in the previous iterations is less present, although it does try here and there, especially with the now-token car chase scene included near the end as always. But while fans of the Bourne series may come away disappointed, it still, by itself, is one of the better action films to come out this year.

I was not disappointed at all, in fact I think it's well up to the best of it's predecessors and the best action movie of the Summer. The story is incredibly tight with inventive, highly detailed situations, including the virtual cat and mouse with the central controllers chasing them around the country and the world from their HQ back home. The only real negatives are the neutral music (until the credits) and the chase scene which had a couple of detractions,like the occasional shaky-cam and pushing the limits of credibility in a couple of places. The final element of the chase, however, had everybody gasping and wowing.

Jeremy Renner definitely has the charisma which showed here brilliantly throughout, at least equal to Damon, and he did most of his own stunts (I want to know if that includes the opening scene in the icy[?] Alaskan stream). And Edward Norton has played the bad guy before but never better than this. No really profound dialogue, but there were several good lines, with Rachael Weisz delivering the best one at the very end. If they can get Damon and Renner to do the next one it should be an absolute killer . I know this is but I really hate to use the word sequel with any of the Bourne films, and this one is no exception. 8/10

Yeah, I definitely liked it. I really do hope this film does well enough at the box office, too, to get Damon on board for the next one.

As I mentioned in another thread, Renner did the opening scene in the Canadian Rockies, near Calgary, in December. But he said the scariest scene was the motorcycle stuff in Manila with Rachael Weisz on the back seat, who said she was truly terrified, though she doesn't look it here:



We might finally have a replacement for Steve McQueen, who got his start in movies doing motorcycle scenes in The Great Escape, though not the barbed wire fence jumping stunt. Auto-stunts a la Bullit next? I do hope he doesn't get locked into the action stuff at the expense of more thoughtful films.

If this film had a lot more action like this in it, on par with the previous films of the series, I might have given it 4, maybe even 5 stars. But the action was too sparse in my opinion, but that's just comparing it to the high standard of the others, and you cannot fault Gilroy, as he didn't have Greengrass to help with that kind of direction this time. It was by itself still a very good and entertaining movie.

i happened to see the movie, i would give 3 stars, i like it. also, last week in article, found out the only reason matt damon didn't do this movie. because the director who directed the other 3 bourne movies, that matt was in, didn't directed this movie. so matt didn't want to do this movie. renner is a very good actor, he is most know for the movie, " the hurt locker " that beat "avatar" for best picture. one thing about this movie, if you never seen " the bourne series " before, it really doesn't ruin other 3 movies. if there is another ( most likely ) bourne movie, i would assume since i haven't read " the bourne series " of books that damon and renner's characters will join up and work as a team, that should be really good movie.

None of the movies follow any of their respective books. It is pretty much a completely different story line.

It's like the difference between football and soccer/baseball etc. The action is concentrated and then backs off because you can't sustain that level for any given period of time--heightening the levels of success or failure during those spikes in the action.

Which is why I still give it a thumbs up. I do agree that action isn't needed to be generous in amount to make a good action movie. It is just that I thought the previous series was better namely Supremecy

I shouldn't have clicked on this thread. Spoiler Alert should have been in the title.

Hey now, I didn't give away the ending, or any plot that isn't revealed in the beginning of the movie in fact.

The stuff I put up was from pre-release interviews with the actors, which didn't have spoiler alerts either--no different than the previews really, unless there's something else you're referring to.

I was just pulling your legs boys.

I havent seen the it yet...But the previews looked really good when i went and seen batman...Damon should come back to keep it more original.

I like the actor who replaced Damon. I remember him in The Town with Ben Affleck