paul greengrass' THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM (2007)

Greengrass is at this point responsible for two of the decade’s finest, most affecting films in Bloody Sunday and United 93, so it seems a little strange that he’s also behind a pair of its most breathless, rollicking action flicks, but it’s the gravity and apparent lack of polish that make The Bourne Supremacy and The Bourne Identity such essential, encouraging mainstream fare. in Ultimatum an impeccably beefy Matt Damon (nearly unrecognizable next to the bucktoothed smile in a few carefully recycled flashbacks) continues his reign of terror upon the people who so tragically made him into such a badass, and Greengrass once again drags the audience by the gut through a minefield of dense conspiracy and virtually nonstop action setpieces, his camera shimmying and shaking all the while in a verité whirlwind of combat best observed during a hand-to-hand fight to the death during which neither the musical score nor the audience dare make a sound. earlier this summer Live Free Or Die Hard scored points by looking amiably back at the whiz-bang of 90s action, but it’s nice to know that the Bourne films continue to grow in popularity by keeping their eyes fixed firmly forward.