The Bourne Upchuck

My brother's friend -- who has an attention span so short he looks around the room and fidgets while watching the frickin' Simpsons -- had to step out into the hallway to catch his breath in the middle of Bourne III. I was actually rooting for the upchuck, preferably with a good amount of travel. Maybe it would have hit some annoying, text-messaging teen.

I guess this is the needle to the heart scene in "Pulp Fiction" all over again: heart attacks, yadda yadda yadda....

My first impression when I came out of this movie was that even though the camera work was intentionally shaky and the cutting quick, it was still coherent.

I'm not sure why you're all acting like a bunch of grandmas about it.

What a superficial, hence superfluous, discussion. Most commenters seem to take it as a given that the style in question is per se a gimmick and nothing more. But is it? That's the question serious film lovers should discuss.

If, like Tony Scott in his highly polished ad clip like movies, quick cuts, sideway moves etc. are used without reasons inherent in story or character it's a gimmick best to avoid. It is, as some point out, just an effect to deflect viewer's attention from plot holes, bad acting, abysmal dialogue.

Could it be more? For sure, and Peter Greengrass is one of those directors showing how and when. He uses his documentary film making experience and tone to infuse completely unbelievable, phantastic material like the Bourne drivel with realism.

First of all, the disorienting effects of his editing is a direct reflection of the totally disoriented main character, a character knowing almost nothing about his past, present or future. In a "classical" movie based upon this material we would get a painstaking, lame detective story [ask some people some inane questions, find exhibit A, move on to ask more people, happen upon more exhibits, move over Start and collect a bonus] with some high-octane action sequences [literal: exploding cars and such] to hold the attention. The first version of the first Bourne book made the mistake of leaving out the action, resulting in the lamest of all conspiracy movies.

Greengrass knows that running away, being in brawls, fighting it out in close combat is anything but clean-cut and well arranged; even onlookers often get confused. And that is the second level of emotion he conveys - one is the confusion and disorientation of the main character, the second is the incomprehensibility of violent action.

Most film makers, particularly those churning out typical studio fluff, use the camera as a mediator between what happens and the viewer, hence my claim that movies belong into the epical camp [together with novels], not the dramatic [= theatre] - we have a narrator telling us what's going on. Greengrass is one of the very few directors able to pull the trick of using a camera but taking it out of the equation, he lets the action spill into the audience without gimmicks like vibrator seats or sniff cards. We, the viewers, are really in the position of the main character, we identify non-analytical.

The problem of making the floor a vomitorium has much more to do with individual intake - it's called 'popcorn movie' for a reason -, personal neurological make-up - some always get seasick -, and the wrong medium - are Greengrass movies suited to an IMAX [the answer is no].

I'm susceptible to panic attacks. So while viewing Bourne III I thought I might be having one. I had to excuse myself and go to the bathroom to splash water on my face because I felt sick.

In part, I never really thought about how the camera technique was affecting me, because I wanted to enjoy the movie so much. I believe my proximity to the screen also had a lot to do with the way I felt. In hindsight, while viewing the movie. I was thinking to myself that Bourne II did not affect me in this way, and did not seem to have as much of the fast camera action.

Overall, I think the movie was great, but not as good as the original Bourne.

Greengrass is one of the very few directors...

I have to disagree. One of my main problem with this style is that it makes movies look like most television. There are two shots from this movie that stick in my mind, and they're the two concluding shots where Greengrass holds the camera steady and makes good use of his widescreen format.

Trying to infuse absurd material with realism is the job of any action movie director. But, as Roger has discussed in the past, such a movie has the choice of covering its fantastic nature with dead seriousness, or they can turn their silliness into fun. The first Bourne movie was done more in that style.

Rereading my above comment, I hasten to add that I liked Bourne III, and consider it an improvement over Bourne II (partly because it allowed itself some humor). And to be fair, the camerawork/editing didn't bother me any more than usual. But I assume these two discussions were about this kind of style in general.

To help further discussion, I'll bring up Kubrick's saying about how a movie can be all form and no content or all content and no form, and work either way. Given the choice, he said he preferred the latter, but that obviously the best movies have good form and content.

To quote another director, Sidney Lumet said that the best style is unseen style. It must simply be felt.

Back again, the link to Roger's most recent essay about this subject on the main page doesn't seem to be working.