Thursday, October 1, 2026
*** out of *****
Running time: 135 minutes
MPAA rating: PG-13 (for violence and action sequences)
The Bourne Legacy is an often exciting, if easily forgettable, action movie. It fulfills its quota of thrills and chases and features a compelling central performance by Jeremy Renner as Aaron Cross, an operative of a secret U.S. government assassination program — Operation Outcome.
Though he is never shown at work, Cross’ occupation is to kill people his employers feel represent a threat to the security of the United States. One of his fellow operatives, the central character of the previous three films, is Jason Bourne (Matt Damon). He became a target of his own agency because his continued existence compromised the future of one of Operation Outcome’s previous incarnations, Treadstone.
In the previous trilogy, Bourne (who never appears in the film except in photographs) has been attempting to expose and shut down the network of black operations programs of which Treadstone and Outcome are a part. Fearing exposure, the C.I.A. and their director of clandestine operations, Byer (Edward Norton), decide to eliminate not only all the field agents of these black ops programs, but to murder everyone else who has been associated with the program’s daily operations. This means even the associated medical staff, including Cross’ eventual partner in escape, Dr. Marta Shearing (Rachel Weisz).
That brief explanation of the plot is a distillation of the convoluted and often confusing back story of The Bourne Legacy. Don’t expect to find so simple an explanation on screen, however. For despite his best efforts, writer/director Tony Gilroy has failed in his attempt to create a clearly defined sequel/spinoff to the first three films in the trilogy. This is a surprise, as Gilroy is one our most talented screenwriters. He crafted the first three Bourne scripts, and his screenplays for his other two directing efforts, Michael Clayton and Duplicity, were marvels of intricate plot design.
