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Created Jul 31, 2016 05:07PM PST • Edited Feb 08, 2021 07:47AM PST

1. Quality

2. Summary

   Barely OK 2.0

   The only smile triggered by Jason Bourne comes after the very long end credits, where the fine print under a “Green is Universal” logo brags about how this steroidal killfest used Sustainable Filming Practices. So let’s get this straight. After the private jets used by Matt Damon and his large company arrived on the Spanish island of Tenerife, “all organic matter was composted to prevent harmful methane gas from being released into the atmosphere.”¹ Nevermind that Paul Greengrass & Damon’s $120 million jetset movie is a profoundly nihilistic, intellectually bankrupt snoozefest. They composted.

   That pretty much encapsulates Jason Bourne’s raison d’être: as a guilty indulgence of the 1% Left.

   Dejection set into emotional stone defines Jason Bourne’s affect. Mighty moviestar Matt Damon uses his upside-down moviestar smile, flipped from the great grin he uses so often and that we all love. It works well given his granite head, heavyweight bod and expressive mouth. He’s an all-timer at carrying a movie.

   The problem is that his movie’s shtick becomes routine by the second reel and pretty tiresome by the third. Dudes around me were sleeping, for real. I stayed awake, but am uncertain it was worth it.

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   ¹ NBC Universal’s ‘Green Is Universal’ about Jason Bourne’s Sustainable Filming Practices. This credit comes some time after a listing of Matt Damon’s six assistants. They better be composting!

4. Acting

   Great 4.0

   Matt Damon returns as Jason Bourne in the latest Jason Bourne flick, creatively titled Jason Bourne. Jeremy Renner’s Aaron Cross is gone, banished to the dustbin of Bourne history. Damon has been a hall-of-fame moviestar for some time now and does nothing to diminish that rep with this performance here, which is Rocky-physical and Good Will Hunting smart. Pity that he screwed the pooch producing the movie.

   • Julia Stiles returns as Nicky Parsons, last seen going into hiding in The Bourne Ultimatum.
   • Tommy Lee Jones quickly becomes more acidic than any moviegoer should have to endure.
   • Alicia Vikander is somewhat more human as a CIA exec than she was as a cyborg in Ex Machina. Her American accent is perfectly serviceable. Let’s see lots more Alicia here in America soon.
   • Vincent Cassel kills lots of people.
   • Riz Ahmed plays a Silicon Valley social media tycoon as an Asian mashup of Jobs & Zuckerberg.
   • Ato Essandoh fulminates strenuously yet ineffectually as the CIA Director’s right-hand man.
   • Scott Shepherd disappoints as the Director of National Intelligence.
   • Vinzenz Kiefer as Christian Dassault, a hacker, whistleblower and leader of some privacy activists.
   • Gregg Henry as Jason Bourne’s father

5. Male Stars Perfect 5.0

6. Female Stars Very Good 3.5

7. Female Costars Very Good 3.5

8. Male Costars Very Good 3.5

10. Film

    Barely OK 2.0

    Hillary Clinton jumps to mind when one thinks of profoundly hypocritical creatures of the Left. Turns out, she ain’t got nothing on Jason Bourne. Paul Greengrass wrote and directed this iteration of the long-running Bourne Series, the abiding subject of which is pervasive mendacity in the U.S. Government.

    The first reel starts off better than any Bourne movie ever, but begins to wear during the second. As the third reel began with an entirely ridiculous crash into a Las Vegas casino, I found myself not caring anymore, more upset with the deathly antagonists’ hatred for each other than their expended entertainment value for me. Looking to my right, two dudes I’d met before the movie were both sound asleep. In fairness, there were several murmurs of life elsewhere in the audience, though the crowd’s lively energy from before the movie was almost completely bludgeoned into submission.

11. Direction Pretty Bad 1.5

12. Play Bad 1.0

    This is the third Bourne screenplay not from Ludlum and the first from Greengrass.

13. Music Good 3.0

14. Visuals Perfect 5.0
15. Content

16. Edge

    Risqué 2.4

    Savage violence on a massive scale is shown sans the bodies and gore that would accumulate in its wake. Thus is violence sold to a mass audience.

17. Sex Innocent 1.0

18. Violence Savage 4.0

19. Rudeness Salty 2.1

21. Reality

    Supernatural 3.2

    Supernatural circumstantial reality includes two hours of choreographed mayhem interwoven around countless handoffs and transitions. Indiana Jones would be envious.

    Movie phoniness aside, this Bourne Series episode deepens the tradition of using the CIA as a profoundly evil villain, prone to wanton killing on a massive scale with no qualms and even more volunteers. Such is cultural deviancy defined for a mass audience, leftwards if not necessarily downwards.

22. Circumstantial Supernatural 3.5

23. Biological Surreal 3.0

24. Physical Surreal 3.0