The Bourne Legacy

For the longest time I thought that in The Bourne Legacy Jeremy Renner simply replaced Matt Damon as Jason Bourne. Not so. This film covers the second generation of special operatives and/or trained assassins.

If I got all this straight, during the Treadstone Project they were called Assets, for the Blackfriar Project they were Outcomes and then there is also a new project (but very hush-hush) called LARX and the operatives are called, well, LARX.

What is covered here is the story of what happened after (or while) the New York Jason Bourne fiasco took place. The ultimate asset (Bourne) and LARX #3 are merely the bookends to the story, however. Here we concentrate on Outcome Aaron Cross. This is the Jeremy Renner role.

Behind the scenes of Blackfriar (up to a point) and LARX (hush!) is Edward Norton, who runs a detail and yells at people around him, one of which is played by Stacy Keach. So, we have established that Stacy Keach is still alive and still working. Has he been in anything else lately?

And yes, this is all a adrenaline rush again. But if you (and I) thought that The Bourne Ultimatum had an impressive cast, well, this one here is even more impressive (see above and add Oscar Isaac as one of the Outcomes, Rachel Weisz as the Damsel in Distress and Zeljko Ivanek as a scientist that goes coo-coo; also they put Corey Stoll in the background and threw him a few lines).

The big chase here is car/motorbike, initially, and then moves to motorbike/motorbike.

A tiny step down from the previous two but still a nail biter.

6/10

Inside Llewyn Davis

I love most of this film.

The one thing that annoys me, though, is the Carry Mulligan character, Jean. Whenever she is on screen she is very angry. And I am not sure what the point of this angry character is and why she does not seem to have any redeeming features other than being pretty (apparently everyone wants to fuck her, we are told frequently).

Other than that, things are pretty near perfect. Oscar Isaac is wonderful. He is also a great singer. I love folk music, especially the kind from the 1960's, so the music in the film is right down my alley. And the nod to Bob Dylan in the end is nice.

The story is that of the title character sort of drifting through life, here represented by showing 'a week in the life of'. He hops from couch to cough and does in fact not have a set address. Every now and again he will get a paying job, however ridiculous ('Please Mr. Kennedy'). On occasion he will take chances, like hitching a ride to Chicago which in the end comes to nothing.

There is a host of strange characters along the way, as are in most Coen Brothers films. My favorite is probably Roland Turner, played by John Goodman, who sits in the backseat during the drive to Chicago and shares life lessons Llewyn is not really interested in hearing.

Also, a cat.

And wonderful singing, especially by Oscar Isaac.

8/10