Erase, rewind

The Lookout (Scott Frank, 2007)

I can remember Joseph Gordon-Levitt as that sweet kid who'd frequent in teenybopper movies whether playing as some hotshot or just another kid around the block that you'd thought he would be stuck with such rubbish forever. But Joe is also one of those kids who grew up to become a worthy actor given the right vehicle. In Scott Frank's directorial debut The Lookout you'd realize he's just around the corner waiting for that overdue break. (He also gave an incendiary performance in Rian Johnson's debut film Brick.)

Joe plays a psychologically-damaged teenager Chris Pratt once a big-shot hockey star player until one night of disaster ruined it all. Now he is forced to shy away from his rich life and confine himself to the daily rigors of memory retention. The car crash affected his short term memory that even finding the correct sequence to simple tasks like opening a can of tomato sauce seems a chore to do. He has to dig deep in his mind the steps to accomplish such task rendering him helpless and impatient at times. To be able to properly remember these routinary sequence, he writes the steps down in his little notebook or put post-its in conspicuous places (reminiscent of Guy Pearce's character in Memento).

This day-to-day, almost routinary coping with the rigors demanded by his deficiency would take another dangerous turn when he meets up with a group of bank robbers. What seemed to be a nonchalant friendly encounter with a charming thug Gary Spargo (Matthew Goode, he played Scarlett Johansson's fiancee in Woody Allen's Match Point) will play out as a deliberate attempt to coax him into being the lookout in the group's carefully-plotted heist of the small-town bank where Chris works as the night-time attendee-janitor (makes you wonder how small can this small-town bank be). To lure him into the devil's lair, he is seduced by Luvlee Lemons (Isla Fisher) whose character would take an interesting turn in the latter part. Also in Spargo's gang is the the wordless Bone, menacing and undoubtedly cold-hearted.

Frank who wrote Get Shorty and Out of Sight, is purposeful and efficient in his directing as is his writing. Clearly, we know where it is headed and he doesn't jazz up the ante by concocting some cocky twist along the way. This is the kind of project that the writer-directors are meant to do. The mood is upped thanks to the equally brilliant cinematography of Alar Kivilo (Fargo, A Simple Plan). The breathtaking panorama of the snowy background is a perfect contrast to Chris's claustrophobic and bland workplace and apartment. The quick-cut editing during scenes where frustrated Chris does a chore easily distinguishes his character. What is also amazing is the sense of bewilderment on the dreamlike character of Chris' girlfriend (after the crash) appearing everytime he watches the skiers. The film does not end happily enough though but we can deal with it no matter how much we would want life to be better for Chris.

From what I've seen so far, Jeff Daniels portrays one of the year's best supporting performances. His portrayal of Lewis, Chris' blind caretaker, is nuanced and touching and Daniels plays it out so effortlessly (I think he was really terrific in The Squid and the Whale). In one particular scene where Chris tells him his going to move, we feel his hurt despite his sunglass-covered eyes. But outstanding of them all is Joe, who gets into such a complex character, whose emotions and difficulty appear most to the audience than the people around him. His confusion, frustration is in stares of his eyes - when he looks at the screen before it freezes, it's both pitiful and haunting.

Bourne to kill.

The Bourne Ultimatum (Paul Greengrass, 2007)

After watching The Bourne Identity, the third installment to the Jason Bourne trilogy based on the Robert Ludlum’s antihero, you would want to finish off that icy cold drink that has remained untouched after the 10-15 minute explosive intro. The Bourne Ultimatum is fast and exhilarating – it’s as if you have been taken by Bourne himself in the adventure. It’s ultra-hip without logic flying out of the window no matter how fast the bullet rips right through the would-be target.

It would be difficult to compare it with its predecessors especially because admittedly I haven’t seen them (I rented Supremacy but due date came with it unscratched), much more contain the energy that has filled Ludlum’s novels back in the 80s. And perhaps, that is what makes this a great action movie. The plot is familiar and the often-trodden genre can be a disaster if it weren’t for a great filmmaker at its helm. Paul Greengrass, fresh from United 93 praise, directs for the second time the third and supposedly last franchise that had critics say the best of the trilogy.

Here, Greengrass shows why he is the master of mobility. For an action movie, Bourne doesn’t just move, it spins and kicks its way around, like a wonderfully orchestrated kung fu action sequence only this time it feels much closer that you can almost feel the punches and thrashing as rhythm. Greengrass clearly displays this in the first 10 to 15 minutes of the film – spanning 5 cities around the globe – it is that fast. Camerawork is mostly handheld and most scenes are near five-second long, some even shorter. The frenetic style pulsates with so much energy that is sustained throughout the film – from the opening sequences to the car chases to the up-close and brutal fight scenes.

Matt Damon reprises his role as the amnesiac Jason Bourne, a CIA-labeled spy who remembers the faces of the persons he killed but never the motivation. We see flashbacks of the time when his girlfriend was killed (in the second movie) and this time he confesses to his erstwhile colleague Nikki Parsons (Julia Stiles) this particular memory. The film ultimately leads to Bourne reliving it all back from the time he was recruited in the Blackbriar program – referred to by the CIA bigwig played by David Strathairn (Edward L. Murrow in Good Night and Good Luck) as “sharp end of the stick” – and of course making the bad guys pay.

Damon is pitch-perfect as Bourne. He has that wonderfully serene look that does not pull too much emotional strings yet we still feel for the troubled hero persona. What is good about Damon here, and I believe in any of his performances, is that he manages to sink into the character, but he never overdoes it to the point that you can’t tell him apart when you see him playing another character. He was excellent in The Good Shepherd and he absorbs you into the character despite the film’s excruciatingly long chronicle and I hoped for the day I would see a film written by him again, though not necessarily with his buddy Ben Affleck.

Damon is surrounded by top-caliber actors who need not flinch a muscle to stamp their presence. Aside from Strathairn and Stiles, Joan Allen plays the sympathetic CIA agent Pamela Landy and Albert Finney whose evilness lie in the menacing quiet of his stares. Because the film pulsates with energy, it definitely has the heart. And while we are quickly enraptured by the sensation that all the action in the screen has created, at the core of the movie is a look at the horrors of the structures and systems we have created. Jason Bourne is a hero yet he is also a reminder, a clear representation of what society has spawned, and he needs to be saved as well.