Paul Greengrass does it again...shaky camera movement and fast cuts don't make a thriller...

Rating: 5/10 (17 August 2007)

Not only is THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM snuffed by fast camera cuts that never allow the eye to focus on a single scene--evidently Paul Greengrass' idea of a film with fast pacing--but on top of that, we get the same shaky camera movement that he used all through UNITED 93 to give it the gritty look of a documentary.
It doesn't work this time. The pace is fast, sure, but the price to pay is that no scene is allowed to run more than a few seconds before the next cut. This must be the sort of thing that pleases the MTV generation of movie-goers who like their action fast and streamlined to the nth degree. But for a plot to hinge on nothing but fast camera cuts is fatiguing after the first hour and tedious after the second.
The story depicts the CIA as the model of efficiency, with everyone a crackerjack at breaking codes, flashing the latest movement of everyone they're spying on on their TV monitors, making one click of the computer the answer to everyone's detailed biography at an instant command. It's total hogwash. We should be so lucky that the agency is this savvy with their computer techniques and wire tapping. If it were, we could avoid something like 9/11 ever happening again.
Having said all this, it manages to hold the interest only because MATT DAMON is riveting as Jason Bourne, running through the paces like a true action hero should, never failing to connect the right punch to the right victim and then go on to the next rooftop chase. JULIA STILES makes a rather expressionless heroine opposite him.
But watching it, you have to suspend your disbelief that the CIA knows everything about everyone in a click of a computer key and that they can communicate with each other on a dime's notice. Hard to swallow. All of the action is pounded home excessively by background music that is anything but subtle in John Powell's explosive score.
Summing up: Would have been a decent thrill ride if Paul Greengrass hadn't decided to direct the whole thing as a shaky camera exercise in fast cuts that obliterate any awareness of what is actually happening on screen. As spy thrillers go, this one is only passable.
Needless to say, with all the hype the film has had, it's probably making big bucks at the box-office for no good reason.