‘Bourne’ returns to form in ripped-from-headlines thriller
Tribune News Service
After the misfire that was “The Bourne Legacy,” a misguided attempt to pass off the franchise to Jeremy Renner, Matt Damon and director Paul Greengrass, who helmed Bournes “Supremacy” and “Ultimatum,” ably right the ship.
“Jason Bourne” delivers everything that we expect from this franchise. We want Mr. Damon making swift, brutal work of his enemies, landing heavy punches and turning mundane household items into deadly weapons. We want CIA bigwigs, illuminated by the glow of computer screens, shouting “enhance!” at surveillance footage and exclaiming in awe: “It’s Bourne.” All of that is here, gloriously.
This time, the plot concerns a hacking. “It’s worse than Snowden,” Agent Jeffers (Ato Essandoh) barks at his boss, CIA director Dewey (Tommy Lee Jones). The missing files contain information about their Black Operations, including the recruitment program that turned David Webb into Jason Bourne, and Iron Hand, their plans for total, invasive national surveillance.
Dewey’s been making inroads in Silicon Valley to that end, particularly with social media company founder and tech rock star Aaron Kalloor (Riz Ahmed), who would like to keep his deals with the government secret. Everything is almost startlingly timely, in a rippedfrom-the-headlines way — from the debate over digital privacy, to the culminating showdown at a Vegas tech conference, where a rogue CIA asset (Vincent Cassel) seeking revenge on Bourne for his imprisonment in Syria plows a SWAT vehicle through traffic.
Julia Stiles returns as Nikki, Mr. Damon’s trusty gal Friday, although Heather (Alicia Vikander), a new cyber ops whiz kid at the CIA, is a deeply complicated character, neither ally nor enemy.