Fantastic acting breathes life into characters

Rating: 7/10 (21 January 2013)

I'm no expert on action films, so this review will not be as hypercritical or detailed as some others on this site.
I loved the Bourne films. "The Bourne Legacy" seeks to trade in on the Bourne name, without Matt Damon, and without Jason Bourne.
This is the fourth installment of the Bourne franchise and evolves around a new main protagonist, Aaron Cross (Jeremy Renner). The story continues on from the end of the third Bourne movie, and concerns itself with the result of Jason Bourne's exposure of the Blackbriar program.
In this plot, due to the scandal started by Jason Bourne, the government program called Outcome is eliminating their agents and shutting down the program. "Outcome" seems to be some sort of amalgamation of Treadstone and Blackbriar. However, their agents have had their chromosomes altered, giving them heightened powers of speed, brain, and brawn. This is done by giving them pills. They change the pills given the agents and, one by one, the agents die.
Rachel Weisz plays Dr. Marta Shearing, a scientist who manages to escape annihilation when there's a shootout in the lab. Cross helps her escape, and the two of them go on the run as they're both marked for death. But Cross needs his medication, or as he tells her, they won't make it. But Marta doesn't have the pills -- in fact, she's a scientist on a need to know basis. The pills are manufactured and stored in Manila. So that's where they go.
If it weren't for the wonderful characterizations developed by Jeremy Renner and Rachel Weisz, this wouldn't be much of a movie. And actually, I found myself concentrating on them rather than the story. Their chemistry is wonderful. The villains were pretty blah -- Stacy Keach and Edward Norton -- both of them a little too straightforward.
There was much discussion here on IMDb about the action sequences. I frankly loved the motorcycle chase - to me, it was breathtaking. As I say, I'm no expert.
What I most remember about the first Bourne film, which I saw in the theater, was the element of surprise -- the type of thing that makes the audience jump a bit off their seats. There wasn't any of that here. The Bourne Legacy was directed by Tony Gilroy, who has been successful in other ventures and certainly knows the Bourne franchise, having written the past scripts and this one. He's less successful here and one suspects the Bourne franchise is out of steam.
If Aaron Cross is going to continue, the stories have to be rethought. Hollywood does this kind of film very well - in this case, the script was a letdown.