The Bourne Trilogy (Blu-Ray)
Bourne Again?
Tags: The Bourne Conspiracy Categories: DVD/TV Reviews, Reviews
Posted by Jake McNeill on Feb 26th, 2009
For those who have yet to see them, the Bourne trilogy of films really are well worth watching. In an era when James Bond was increasingly looking excessive and silly, Robert Ludlum’s tale of a rogue ex-assassin looking to fill in the holes in his past brought a much-needed maturity to the genre that went hand-in-hand with some of the best action sequences in the last decade.
In The Bourne Identity, Jason Bourne (Matt Damon) found himself dragged out of the ocean with no memory, only to find himself the target of a massive manhunt, prompting him to search for clues to his… well, identity. In The Bourne Supremacy, Bourne has gone into hiding, but after an attempt on his life ends with the death of his girlfriend, he decides to go on the offensive and hunt down the hunters. Finally, in The Bourne Ultimatum, Bourne once again finds himself hunted when the search for answers about his past threatens to expose those he once worked for.
All three films feature solid acting both by Damon as well as a long list of supporting actors (including Chris Cooper, Brian Cox, David Strathairn, Joan Allen and Julia Stiles), and all three (particularly the third) are jam-packed with fantastic fight and chase sequences. What’s more, the story generally walks the tightrope of being both complex and easy-to-understand, as well as both high-concept yet still within the realm of believability.
Now that the three Bourne films have been out on DVD a good while (and were re-released in a trilogy box set late last year), Universal has packaged them together in a Blu-Ray set, a great idea considering that, while each film in itself plays out as a self-contained story, there’s definitely an arc that runs through and connects the three. This also makes an excellent choice of film(s) for the high-def format, as the films all have some excellent action sequences, beautiful real-world locales, and excellent cinematography.
All three discs in this set have undergone a similar treatment – each contains the extras included in the DVD releases of the film, as well as Universal’s U-Control feature (which displays various information while you watch the film), their My Scenes bookmarking feature, and a strategy card battle game which… well, isn’t any worse than other BD games, if that means anything. I suppose it’s not as extensive a makeover as one might expect from a Blu-Ray release, but on the other, it’s more than just a straight port of the DVD features.
The real problem with this package is the price – the Blu-Ray Version of the Bourne Trilogy has an MSRP of $119.98, clocking in at four times the price of the DVD version’s $29.99 price tag. At that price, this set is basically $40 per film, which is even higher than the average-priced Blu-Ray release. And while the added Blu-Ray features are nice, they simply don’t justify this massive price tag.
In the end, only the biggest fans of the series are going to want to get this set at its release price. Once the price drops to something a bit more reasonable – say, $60 or so, I’d probably recommend any action-loving Blu-Ray owner to buy it. But for now, the price tag is a nearly insurmountable barrier.
| What Works | Score |
|---|---|
| + Three great films that make great high-def showpieces | 2.0 |
| What Doesn't | |
|
- Nothing especially spectacular in the extras department - $120 price tag is just ridiculous |
|
| Under the Shrink-wrap | |
| Here's three great films that were seemingly meant for high-def, with a decent amount of Blu-Ray-specific features... but this package is sunk by its astronomical price tag. | |
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Tags: The Bourne Conspiracy
Posted by Jake McNeill on Feb 26th, 2009 and is filed under DVD/TV Reviews, Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can post a comment, or trackback from your own site.
