It didn’t take long for recent Oscar-winning director Edward Berger to jump into franchise filmmaking. Berger directed “All Quiet on the Western Front” and, last November, Deadline reported that he was going to helm the next Jason Bourne movie.
Matt Damon was a guest in Colbert’s Late Show and spoke for the first time about this new ‘Bourne’ being in development. It sure sounds like Damon is going to be back as the titular character.
There is a great director named Edward Berger,” Damon said. “[‘All Quiet on the Western Front’] is a fantastic film, and he’s wonderful and he said he had an idea [for Bourne]. I would love to work with him, so he’s working on it. Look, I’m as anxious as you are to see if this thing [happens] — I hope it’s great and that we can do it.
There have been five Jason Bourne movies, so far, with the first three being, far and away, the best ones — they are Doug Liman’s “The Bourne Identity,” and Paul Greengrass’ “The Bourne Supremacy” and “The Bourne Ultimatum.”
The last two Jason Bourne movies — 2012’s “The Bourne Legacy” and 2016’s “Jason Bourne” — have not been remembered well. I wouldn’t be able to tell you what they were about or what the stakes were. They’ve been completely forgotten. Did we need a sixth movie in the franchise? Of course not.
As much as I loved the Greengrass-directed movies, I’m such a sucker for the less showy original, 2002’s "The Bourne Identity," which introduced movie-goers to a new type of action hero and a new, more modern, style of action.
That movie was big gamechanger for the action genre. Gone were the big-budget, explosion-laden, slick, special effects extravaganzas; in was a grittier template, filled with more naturalistic action sequences. Our hero was no longer the cocky muscle-bound Arnold-type that dominated action in the ‘80s and ‘90s. He wasn’t trying to save the world, but rather, he was trying to save himself and find out who he was.
Whatever you think of those first three ‘Bourne’ movies, you can't deny the impact they’ve had on this century’s action movies. Heck, even James Bond has been dubbed "James Bourne" by many.
Liam Neeson was basically Jason Bourne in the "Taken" movies, and that template continued on with Keanu Reeves in "John Wick", Tom Cruise in "Jack Reacher," etc.
Snyder has mentioned in the past how “Sucker Punch “never really got finished correctly,” and that it was “not really the correct cut.” The extra footage is actually already shot.