The Bourne Ultimatum

[Archangel972]

I saw this movie the other day, I thought it was good but not quite as great as many reviewers have been saying. There was one review that said that the chase sequences in Bourne Ultimatum were better than the one featured in CR. I would beg to differ, one problem I have is with the shaky cam that Paul Greengrass uses. It was annoying in Bourne Supremacy and it was kind of annoying here too. Also, there isn't anything in the story that comes as a revelation. It seems kind of by the numbers if you ask me.

Overall, a good movie with one clever chase scene near the beginning, an action packed one in the middle, and another one near the end. The last one involves a ton of smashed up cars. Bourne Identity may have made Broccoli and Wilson re-think where they wanted the Bond franchise headed, but I don't think Ultimatum will have nearly the same effect.

[BeauButabi]

I'm not much of a Bourne fan, and this movie hasn't changed my opinion. I really think of them as the Seinfeld of spy thrillers (spy thrillers about nothing). Did it really have to take three freakin' films to tell the amount of plot these movies have? Jeepers. If you havent already, go out and buy The Bourne Identity book (stay away from the crap sequels, though). It's well worth the read.

To not be too much of a thread-crapper (too late?), I will say that I found the Supremacy movie to be pretty entertaining, on a superfical level of course, but entertaining none-the-less.

[Belledame]

*SPOILERS*:cool:

Well, I like the whole series, especially the first one. They're all basically about the people in charge fearing Bourne's gone rogue and trying to neutralize him, while Bourne is just trying to elude execution and find some peace.

The big revelation here was that half way through you realize that everything in this movie has been taking place within the timeframe of the last movie. Between dealing with the Russian assassin and calling Pam in NYC, the entire first hour of this movie occurred. That knocked me for a loop. And I thought the spy-vs.-spy fight was more brutal than the first one in Paris in IDENTITY. Jason vs. Desh was all out, it was less about moves and more about killing.

The parallel of Nikki as Marie with the streaky brown hair and then cutting and dyeing it dark brown was a bit heavy handed. Also, Julia Stiles looked terrible with that cut/color. Franka Potente looked edgy with it.

It left me wondering if Nikki was ever able to resurface. Also, do the Brits know our CIA can control their expensive surveillance system from New York? And I was really creeped to think they might be training supersoldiers in Manhattan. Was the first man Bourne killed alive when he shot him? Was he a criminal with a death sentence? Did they really all do that just to join Treadstone?

I loved it. Great flick!:popcorn:

[Archangel972]

The big revelation here was that half way through you realize that everything in this movie has been taking place within the timeframe of the last movie. Between dealing with the Russian assassin and calling Pam in NYC, the entire first hour of this movie occurred. That knocked me for a loop.

I personally didn't think it was a big revelation. I knew beforehand that the movie took place almost right after the events in the 2nd movie, not to mention that we see Bourne in Moscow at the beginning of Ultimatum. I'm pretty sure that was never meant to be some kind of plot twist.

(SPOILERS)

Also, this is probably the last Bourne movie and yet there is so much that we don't learn about David Webb. He finds out his real name, date of birth, and how he entered the program. It is hinted at that he and Nikki may have had some kind of relationship before his memory loss but we are never told what this is. We are also never told what Bourne was like before he joined Treadstone, what his family was like. I also would've liked to have seen how they pretty much brainwashed him, broke him down, and trained him to be such an elite agent.

[Belledame]

I said it was a revelation, not a plot twist. Not everyone knows beforehand that it's set within the last movie. SUPREMACY ended in New York when Pam told Bourne his real name. I expected the movie to pick up after that conversation, which is does not.

[Archangel972]

I said it was a revelation, not a plot twist. Not everyone knows beforehand that it's set within the last movie. SUPREMACY ended in New York when Pam told Bourne his real name. I expected the movie to pick up after that conversation, which is does not.

Well either way, I don't think it was much of a revelation. It certainly didn't enhance the movie IMO.

I don't know where I would rank this movie in the trilogy. I think story-wise, Bourne Identity was the best of the 3. Action wise, Bourne Ultimatum is the top movie.

[WhiteKnight]

If you havent already, go out and buy The Bourne Identity book (stay away from the crap sequels, though). It's well worth the read.

Actually I wasn't very impressed with the first novel. It took about 150 pages for anything of any interest to happen, and it continued to drag all the way through to a very anti-climactic last chapter. Frankly I think the films are an improvement. Didn't even bother with books two and three.

[Kara Milovy]

Tomorrow I'll have a review up on my blog (http://ultimatejamesbond.wordpress.com)and also comment on the Bourne vs. Bond crapfest.

I am not 100% sure that this movie takes place within the other. I think Pam was repeating something she'd said before in order to convey coded info (the address) in a way he'd pay attention to.

[neglet]

I thought Matt Damon had some interesting thoughts on the whole Bond/Bourne thing in EW. He called the two characters "fundamentally different" and noted "James Bond is an imperialist, misogynist guy who slurps martinis and f*cking laughs and kills people and cracks jokes. Whereas Bourne is this tortured serial monogamist whose girlfriend is dead and [he] won't look at another woman and carries tremendous guilt and shame about the things he's done."

Of course, he admitted he hadn't seen the new Bond (CR), so he couldn't really compare on the supposed reboot.

[LeiterCIA]

I thought the film was spectacular! I was so glad they managed to keep the same feel as the first two, but also seemed to stretch a little and have more fun in certain scenes. Very well done.

[Belledame]

Oh, it definitely takes place within the last movie. It isn't just what Pam says, it's what Bourne says. He tells her to get some rest, she looks tired, Pam looks at the windows, then we Bourne on the street. All the same things happen here except we see Noah's reaction to Bourne's advice, Pam's decision to go outside, Bourne's decision to send Pam and her tail away so he can go crack Noah's safe and get that info.

The whole first half I was expecting him to take the David Weber info and follow that, which did not happen until we intersected with the previous movie. I couldn't even understand why he was abroad tracking down info on Treadstone/Blackbriar instead of in the states tracking down his David Weber origins until that conversation.

[Archangel972]

The whole first half I was expecting him to take the David Weber info and follow that, which did not happen until we intersected with the previous movie. I couldn't even understand why he was abroad tracking down info on Treadstone/Blackbriar instead of in the states tracking down his David Weber origins until that conversation.

Alright, I was a little confused (read: VERY confused) about what you originally posted within this thread. I didn't even realize this movie intersected with the last one, I just thought it picked up right after the 2nd one. I've only seen Bourne Supremacy once and didn't recall that it ended with Bourne in New York. The funny thing is that I don't think most viewers even realized this. As the movie was about to start up, I remember talking with my friends and we asked each other if we could even remember what happened plot wise in Bourne Identity and Supremacy. I remember Identity but very little about the 2nd movie.

With that said, even this revelation doesn't exactly enhance my opinion of Ultimatum. It was a solid movie, but nothing in the story surprised me or grabbed me.

[TrekSucksHard]

I saw this movie the other day, I thought it was good but not quite as great as many reviewers have been saying.

I completely agree- I am a huge Bourne movie fan simply because it kicks Bond out of the stratosphere (we realize that Bond was nothing more than a joke and a fantasy as to what a secret agent should be) and forced it into what it is now: CR. But this movie was the weakest among the three. I found that the action sequences were the same as the first two and the villains were not as fleshed out as before and they were basically the same variations that were already showcased before- I wish they had brought in new types of villains rather than the typical old corrupt CIA director and his robotic assassins- it was done already in the first two movies (although I thought Karl Urban and Clive Owen were awesome baddies in the first two movies but the last baddie in Ultimatum doesnt even say a word or do we even know what kind of a person he is till the final scene- he was pretty weak in terms of character). A good film but not as great as the first two.

As for the Ludlum books- they are dated and completely crap- I read the whole Bourne trilogy back in college and they were total snoozefests. The movies are way superior to the books (thank God they didn't do a literal adaptation like that Richard Chamberlain made-for-tv movie- totally silly).

And as they were tracking Bourne down using their satellites and computers and other advanced techies I had a sense of deja vu hit me as I remembered a scene from the Simpsons movie in which a bunch of government tech types were doing the exact same thing and one of them stood up and said, "I found something- all this billions of dollars spent on spy surveillance really works!!!" LOL. :lol:

[LeiterCIA]

Oh, it definitely takes place within the last movie. It isn't just what Pam says, it's what Bourne says. He tells her to get some rest, she looks tired, Pam looks at the windows, then we Bourne on the street. All the same things happen here except we see Noah's reaction to Bourne's advice, Pam's decision to go outside, Bourne's decision to send Pam and her tail away so he can go crack Noah's safe and get that info.

You know, I read that scene very differently. I may have to go back and watch them both to know for sure. I thought the scene was played very differently in this film, versus in Supremecy. I thought in Supremecy, the scene was completely authentic. But in Ultimatum, I thought they were intentionally, repeating the conversation verbatim (note the lack of thought or pauses) with the exception of course of the birthdate, which was a code to Bourne.