I see movies sometimes. I review movies more often than sometimes. No spoilers.
This Week The Bourne Legacy came out, winning the Box Office bringing in an Estimated $40 million domestically, none of which were from me, but I did see the movie. I didn’t technically sneak in. I work at theaters, and in fact was doing work for Universal for this exact movie.
A little bit of back story, this is the 4th installment of the Bourne series, the first 3 starring Matt Damon and being based on the Robert Ludlum novels. The Bourne Legacy is the first in the series not based on the Ludlum novels. However there was a Bourne Legacy novel written by Eric Van Lustbader about the Jason Bourne character – I don’t know how someone else gets to write books about a character someone else created, but be prepared to buy my new book coming this fall, Harry Potter and the Vampires of Twilight go to the Shire. Matt Damon had agreed to be in The Bourne Legacy, but when director Paul Greengrass said he wouldn’t direct the film Matt Damon dropped out, and Tony Gilroy wrote and directed the film without Jason Bourne.
I never saw the first 3 Bourne movies, so I’m probably not the best person to review The Bourne Legacy, but I might read the books, so that’s something. I thought the trailers for the Bourne movies looked interesting, but they just couldn’t pull me in. I did however want to see The Bourne Legacy, even without wanting to see the first 3, but why?
Two words: Jeremy Renner.
Jeremy Renner showing how to properly not point a gun at the girl in the background
My nation wide poll data hasn’t come in yet, but it’s safe to say that everyone’s favorite character from the Avengers is Hawkeye. The people have demanded more Hawkeye! But Renner said, “No, that wouldn’t be fair to the Iron Mans and Thors of the world. I’ll let them have their little B-movies and hopefully America will learn to love them. Meanwhile I’ll spend my time suckling off the success Matt Damon already laid down in the Bourne series. Cha-ching!” That may not have been an actual Jeremy Renner quote. Nonetheless the decision was good for Renner and the movie studio. Renner is hot, both literally and figuratively. The Hurt Locker, The Town, Thor, Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol, The Avengers, all successes. And if his rugged good looks aren’t enough for you Rachel Weisz provides an elegant beauty. I liked her when I was a little boy when watching The Mummy movies and I like her even more now that I’m a grown up boy.
Before I even start my review of The Bourne Legacy I want to first review the reviews of the movie. As of writing this it has 53% on Rotten Tomatoes. My theory behind this is that critics like Matt Damon better than Jeremy Renner. Probably because they’re mad at Renner for not doing a Hawkeye movie, Renner stating, “I know the world wants three things, Peace, Love and Hawkeye movies, but unfortunately I can only provide two of those things.” (Not an actual quote.) The second reason critics might be biased towards not liking the movie is because it’s not very good.
I wanted to love this movie. Some say I wanted to make love to this movie. Going into it I was worried I might pull a Fred Willard. Another part of my anatomy not being pulled during this movie was my heart strings. The movie tried to force emotion into it, and they couldn’t pull it off successfully so they probably shouldn’t have done it at all. Not every movie needs an epic love story, like Romeo and Juliet, Harry and Sally, or Hawkeye and Black Widow…not that this movie tried for an epic love story, but they tried for more of a love story than the material provided.
The action in the movie is okay, but there’s probably not enough, and what could have easily been an amazing fight scene at the end of the movie turned out to be a big kick to the nuts and a, “to see how this concludes please wait two years and be prepared to shell out another $22.50 for a ticket, popcorn and soda pop.”
the girl from the background earlier
Let’s cut to the chase, do you have to see this movie? No, not literally. But I think it’s good enough to rent. If you liked the Bourne Series thus far and want to see where it goes you don’t necessarily have to see the movie because from what I gathered it didn’t have much to do with Jason Bourne other than as the ad says, “There was never just one.” There’s speculation that in the future they might make a movie with both Damon and Renner’s characters together. As alluded to they definitely ended this movie expecting to make another, and the movie didn’t do amazingly, but did good enough that there could be a sequel, or fifthquel I guess (fifthquel isn’t a word), and if Damon agrees to do it this movie could have bombed and they’d still make another considering The Bourne Ultimatum made over $200 million. But this movie didn’t do so well Critically, which I think Damon expected when Greengrass didn’t want to continue directing, so with this not being critically successful I don’t imagine a Renner Damon mash-up, unless Damon agrees to play the sidekick in the Hawkeye movie I’m writing for Warner Brothers – I know Paramount and Marvel own Hawkeye but they said they don’t want him, so they traded him to me for Discs 1 and 3 of Two and a Half Men season 6…disc 3 is scratched, they said it didn’t matter.
NERD SHOUT! 