Movie review: “The Bourne Legacy”

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Partner and I finally saw “The Bourne Legacy” last weekend.

 

First of all, there was this Jeremy Renner fellow, who has interesting eyes and a nice face and a very neato body. He’s Aaron Cross, a supersoldier / agent who’s caught in an elaborate doublecross / triplecross scheme, and who fights back.

 

 

Like so many modern action/adventures, it’s an extended chase scene. It is, however, an exceptionally well-done extended chase scene. It has the usualparkour stuff, but also mopeds and motorcycles and cars. Never for a moment do you lose focus, or forget the goal.

 

 

The thing that surprised me, however, is the cinematography.

 

 

There are a couple of scenes, in among the frantic chases, that are beautifully dreamlike:

 

 

–         An opening sequence in the mountains of Alaska, including a scene with Renner diving (mostly naked) in a freezing river in front of a waterfall, like every Hawaiian idyll you’ve ever seen, but at forty degrees below;

–         A violent shootout in a remote abandoned house, all white wood and long staircase and peaceful autumn foliage outside, that feels like something out of “Inception”;

–         A panic in a Manila drug factory, with hundreds of workers in pink smocks and pink hairnets running for the exits;

–         Manila itself, a Third World dreamscape of alleyways and broken rooftops and smoggy skylines;

–         An Elysian archipelago of tropical islands, and a small boat running between them.

 

 

The supporting cast (Scott Glenn, Ed Norton, Joan Allen, Albert Finney, Stacy Keach) could have been replaced with nobodies, or cardboard cutouts. The movie’s all about Jeremy and his traveling companion / hostage / girlfriend, Rachel Weisz. You know it’s going to turn out okay for them (until the sequel, anyway).

 

 

Partner and I highly recommend this picture.

 

 

And we’re deeply committed to the sequel.

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New England light

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I am a New Englander by adoption, not by birth. I’ve only been here for 32 years, which means I’m still a newcomer, though I have been (grudgingly) accepted by a few of the locals.

 

 

But I love it here. I love the look of the place. I love the grubby grungy streets of Providence, and the tired little villages with churches and liquor stores side by side, and the worn-looking train tracks, and the birds chattering on the telephone wires.

 

 

And I am fascinated by the light.

 

 

I grew up in the Pacific Northwest, so I thought I knew the sky pretty well. But New England was a whole new experience for me. There’s a strange diffuse light that spreads across everything. Colors dampen and merge, like an overexposed Polaroid photograph. Bright red fades down into brick red. Bright green turns into a somber olive green.

 

 

Some moviemakers know this. I first noticed it in “Good Will Hunting”; Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, both local boys, got the look of Boston just right. There’s a wonderful final scene of Matt driving west on the Mass Pike, filmed from far overhead: his car disappears into the endless washed-out green of the trees around the highway.

 

 

Affleck did it again recently in “The Town.” It’s set mostly in Charlestown, and there’s that same washed-out look: run-down tenements, rutted asphalt, smoky light.

 

 

Even Martin Scorsese – Mr. New York! – has begun paying attention. He got it right in “The Departed,” which has some great camerawork and cinematography, and captured the look of downtown Boston very nicely. He tried again in “Shutter Island,” which was maybe too lurid and Gothic for its prosaic Boston Harbor setting, and which was not a wonderful movie, but which has a few good moments. But – what can I say? – he’s a New Yorker. And New York, as everyone knows, is black-and-white. Just ask Woody Allen.

 

 

Do I need to mention the Farrelly brothers? As cinematographers, they’re not great. But they know New England, and they get the people right. Maybe not so much the light. But I forgive them. Special mention: “Outside Providence” and “Stuck On You.”

 

 

And now, “The Fighter.” Set in Lowell, Massachusetts, where it was filmed. If you’ve never been there, see the movie, and you won’t need to go there. Trust me, that’s the way it looks: shabby, worn-out, working-class.

 

 

And that light.

 

 

Some other time I will tell you about the light in the Pacific Northwest. But for now, study that New England light.  It’s very interesting.

 

 

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