Film Review | The Bourne Legacy

It promises a lot, but this continuation of the Matt Damon spy saga - replacing the star with Jeremy Renner - collapses under its own weight.

Bourne anew: Jeremy Renner takes over from Matt Damon in this continuation of the Bourne franchise.
Bourne anew: Jeremy Renner takes over from Matt Damon in this continuation of the Bourne franchise.

The latest instalment in the Bourne series of gritty amnesiac-spy misadventures - culled from the bestselling Robert Ludlum novels and popularised by the Matt Damon-starring trilogy of films - scores a bit of an own goal from the very beginning.

Shrugging off the shadow of Damon (presumably, the star wanted to move on to greener, and less dangerous, pastures) and instating the rising star action hero Jeremy Renner (Avengers, Hurt Locker) in his place, it presents itself for all the world as if it were just another reboot - the kind we've been seeing a lot of lately, from Christopher Nolan's Batman franchise and beyond.

But instead, as Tony Gilroy's film gets rolling, we're rudely informed that nope! - this picks up right where The Bourne Ultimatum (2007) left off.

The corrupt Intelligence agency Treadstone - responsible for exploiting its agents through mind-control - has been exposed by Bourne (as detailed in the final part of 'the Damon trilogy') and in a desperate attempt to cover their tracks, they enlist the help Eric Byer (Edward Norton), a former Air Force colonel with experience of doing the CIA's less savoury jobs. Proudly referring to himself a 'sin eater' whose responsibility it is to make tough choices, Byer decides that the best way to minimise the damage would be to eliminate all remaining Outcome operatives.

However, one of Treadstone's new agents, the highly-powered and resourceful Aaron Cross (Renner), begins to chip away at his past and the agency's motives after an assignment in Alaska goes awry.

His quest for the truth begins with a search for drugs - specifically, the 'chems' that he needs in order to maintain his superhuman strength and fighting ability. The trail leads him to Dr Marta Shearing (Rachel Weisz), who had up this point been conducting research into the chems while remaining ignorant of their final destination.

Caught up in the conspiracy, the duo have no choice but to travel far and wide in an attempt to escape the expanding arm of the corrupt agency. 

Although the Bourne series was always sold to us as a grittier, more realistic version of James Bond, the Bond films have caught up. Which is why it's fortunate that Mr Renner bears more than a passing resemblance to our current Bond.

But what's worse is that really, we've seen it all before. It's disheartening that we get what we 'expected' from a franchise that grunts and struts about what an innovative little gem it is in the world of the espionage thriller, but now that it has extended its reach beyond a trilogy - always, I feel, the sign of some sacred rule of overachievement, of hubris, broken - the Bourne films too are starting to slot into formula.

Put the see-thru blueprint of Bourne 2 over one of Bourne 4 and you'll find that they align perfectly.

The ingredients are all there. Spy with amnesia? Check. Shady corrupt government officials overseeing everything? Check. Attempts to present said officials as 'just a bunch of guys doing their job' so as to make things more 'realistic'? Check.

Even the pharmaceutical angle - almost an innovative kink - is treated in the same way as the rest of the franchise's shady government organisations.

But how does our new man fare, and are the action scenes any good? I hear you ask. Well, yes and yes. Really, it could be that Legacy doesn't feel quite as exciting a ride as the previous Bournes is that this may just be a too-easy role for Mr Renner.

He's done tortured war veteran in The Hurt Locker already, and that film gave him a lot more harrowing complexity to play with. And though he's also proven himself as an action star, and though the sequences themselves are as bone-crunchingly satisfying as ever, long stretches of exposition with a character we can't be particularly committed to yet doesn't help to lure you back into this franchise with a new face.

And although Weisz does her darnest to squeeze some genuine humanity out of a put-upon victim character/weak love interest - in many ways this also a rehash: of her role in that other gritty spy drama, The Constant Gardener - the only worthy moments here belong to Norton.

His best lines are worth quoting in full.

'We are the sin eaters. It means that we take the moral excrement that we find in this equation and that we bury it down deep inside of us so that the rest of our cause can stay pure. That is the job. We are morally indefensible and absolutely necessary.'

Wow. Delivered with Norton's dependable degree of panache, the mini-speech is a corker.

Pity the rest of the confused, ambling film lacks such concentrated doses of awesome.