Review of The Bourne Legacy (2012) by Joshua B — 11 Jul 2013

In many ways, The Bourne Legacy employs the tools and tricks of its earlier Matt Damon-led predecessors to a somewhat less effective degree. There is little here we haven't seen before and seen Jason Bourne to better.

But this fourth film, starring Jeremy Renner as Agent Aaron Cross, is so tonally consistent with the previous entries that it is easy to get lost in it. Tony Gilroy, the writer of the Bourne Trilogy, directs this time, and strikes something of a balance between the measured style of Doug Liman and the erratic style of Paul Greengrass.

There are some cool visual elements here, and some tense scenes that Gilroy is very skilled at staging. He interestingly has written this film not as a prequel or even a sequel to the Bourne trilogy, but rather as a parallel narrative that takes place largely during the events of The Bourne Ultimatum.

So while Jason Bourne himself never appears in the film (except in photographs), his fingerprints are all over it, an Legacy lives up to its title by expanding this universe and the depth of government secrets: it's "black ops all the way down.

" Aaron Cross' story feels smaller and less urgent than Bourne's, as it is largely just about his own survival, but I found Renner, and Rachael Weisz as a scientist whose help he enlists, compelling enough.