Yesterday Kish and I decided to go see a movie. It’s been hot as blazes in Columbus recently, and humid, too, and the idea of sitting for a few hours in an air-conditioned movie theater watching an interesting film was very attractive.
We haven’t been to the movies in a while because, candidly, the array of films offered this summer hasn’t been very appealing. We have a narrow window of consensus — Kish can’t stand sci-fi and superhero movies, and I groan at the idea of sitting through some deep study of dysfunctional families — but we thought we’d give Jason Bourne a shot.
Several hours later, after we’d been assaulted by loud, chaotic, and grossly improbable non-stop action, we emerged with the realization that Hollywood apparently has run out of ideas. I think I may have seen part of an actual Jason Bourne movie in the past, but I’ve definitely seen this movie before — over and over and over again. The film is so trite and formulaic that it immediately seemed like I was watching a rerun. Even Matt Damon, who typically makes interesting films, couldn’t salvage it. If you’re considering going to watch it, save your money.
Take every car chase scene you’ve seen since The French Connection, Bullitt, and The Blues Brothers movie, make them louder and longer and more destructive, and move them to Athens and the Vegas strip. Input a rote, duplicitous bad guy with absolutely no redeeming qualities as the evil head of the the CIA and expect the audience to root for him to be killed. Take an ambitious female agent with ambiguous loyalties off the shelf. Add in an unbeatable hero with superhuman intellectual and physical capabilities and have him tracked by another apparently unstoppable cold-blooded killer who he has to fight at the climax. That’s the plot. Sound familiar?
The summer movie season used to feature inventive, different movies, like Jaws and Raiders of the Lost Ark and Star Wars and Forrest Gump. That’s no longer the case. Now we get sequels, remakes, and canned, tried-and-true formulaic crap. It’s no wonder that the box office receipts are down this summer. What we’re getting from Hollywood these days really sucks.
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