Tuesday, 7 January 2025

Introduction

                              Welcome to Stuart Fernie’s Blog



Please scroll down or find on the right links to articles, pages of reflections on films, books
and occasional pieces of short fiction.

These include thoughts on Jason Bourne, Advocating Arts and Humanities, "Heaven's Gate", "Civil War", "The Ghost and Mrs Muir", "Ad Astra", Duality in 19th century literature, "Living", "Hell in the Pacific", "Point Blank", "Vera Cruz", "Dr Strange in the Multiverse", my interpretation of "Il faut cultiver notre jardin", "Jean de Florette" and "Manon des Sources", "Drive my car", "The Batman", the place of acting in society, thoughts about religion and fate, "The Banshees of Inisherin", "Full Metal Jacket", "The Bishop's Wife", "Moliere", "Les Fleurs du Mal", "Soylent Green", "Bad Day at Black Rock", "The First Great Train Robbery", The Dreyfus Affair, "Persona", "The Seventh Seal", "A Clockwork Orange", "Night Moves", "Lonely are the Brave", "In the heat of the night", "The League of Gentlemen" (1960), thoughts on the nature of film noir, "Star Trek", "Seven Days in May", "Dead Poets Society", "Good Will Hunting", "Callan", "The Hill", "Cool Hand Luke", "The Hustler", "Road to Perdition", "The Verdict", "Three Colour Trilogy", "Jojo Rabbit", "Jeremiah Johnson", "Collateral", "Joker", "Barry Lyndon", "The Bridge at Remagen", "Le Mans '66 (Ford v Ferrari)", Charles Foster Kane ("Citizen Kane"), "The Deer Hunter", "Highlander", "No Country for Old Men", "Gattaca", "The Adventures of Robin Hood"(1938), "Apocalypse Now", "Spartacus", "The Bridge on the River Kwai", "The Long Good Friday", "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood", "The Third Man", "Finding Forrester", "The Outlaw Josey Wales", "Untouchable" (2011),"Unforgiven", "The Manchurian Candidate", "The Wild Bunch", "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre", "Papillon" (1973), "Public Eye", "Existentialism in society today", "Seven Samurai", "It's a Wonderful Life", "Don Quixote", "We're No Angels", "The African Queen", "Babette's Feast", "War for the Planet of the Apes", "Dunkirk", “Dances With Wolves”, “Inherit The Wind” and “The Prisoner”. 

link to my YouTube channel with video presentations of a number of my pages.

After I retired from teaching, I thought I’d write my memoirs, “What have I done?”, and present them online. Please find links to these memoirs, some French support pages and reflections on "Les Miserables" below.


I can be contacted through the comments sections or at stuartfernie@yahoo.co.uk

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Reflections on the nature of conflict in the Jason Bourne films

 

Reflections on the nature of conflict in the Jason Bourne films

Directed by Doug Liman and Paul Greengrass

Principal screenwriter Tony Gilroy

from books by Robert Ludlum

Starring Matt Damon, Franka Potente, Julia Stiles, Brian Cox, Joan Allen, 

David Strathairn, Albert Finney et al

 


The Jason Bourne films (and here I am referring to the original trilogy of films) were a series of high-octane spy thrillers renowned for their style, intensity and engaging characters which exercised a huge influence on other action/adventure films produced in the same time period.

Filming techniques and the accompanying music serve to heighten sensory and emotional response but everything is underpinned by and rooted in a battle between amorality and purity of heart, tinged with a sense of guilt and an occasional desire for redemption.

Jason Bourne is trained to be an unquestioning and highly effective tool in the service of his C.I.A. masters. He put his faith in the authorities and fulfilled dubious missions under their instruction without challenge or hesitation until, while on a mission to assassinate a target, his underlying humanity caused him to hesitate and as a result he was badly wounded and left with amnesia.

As he struggles to uncover and pursue clues to his identity and the life he has chosen for himself, he discovers he has a wealth of combat and judgment skills that enable him to avoid or elude a variety of dangerous situations while we, the audience, discover his masters do not necessarily possess the integrity we and Jason might expect of them.

The storyline cleverly avoids tarring the entire C.I.A. with the same brush and implies that a number of senior figures are perhaps tainted by disillusion, ambition or cynicism and are willing to pursue their own ends without accountability, using Jason to help them achieve their aims. Of course, Pamela Landy remains a beacon of hope and integrity, though even she is sidetracked by disinformation and bureaucratic red tape.

However, the stroke of genius in terms of emotional engagement and hope for principle, integrity and morality is that through his amnesia Jason has rediscovered purity of heart and independence of mind and spirit.

This is a fascinating turn of events which appears to imply the innate goodness of man who is influenced and perhaps corrupted by his response to experience, encounters, events and emotion. Although he is fortunate enough to have retained the skills he accumulated during his training, Jason’s slate is effectively wiped clean and this allows him to view situations and circumstances with objectivity and reason.

Although he can recall only fragments of his past, he follows enough clues and builds enough of a picture of his life to find it questionable. As he recalls these fragments, he judges his actions in his former life and questions his motivations. His perceptions and judgments are now unaffected by previous thoughts, experiences and outlooks which may have been blurred, manipulated or falsified. The fundamental faith he had in his handlers is lost through objective analysis of evidence, experience and consequences. The only person of standing in the C.I.A. community who proves herself worthy of his trust is Pamela Landy, and this trust is gained by way of reason and action.

I think this fundamental juxtaposition of amoral and Machiavellian methods to pursue one’s own ends, and the professed pure-hearted desire to lead a simple, peaceful and independent life is the reason for the Bourne films’ success. Jason is the little man being pressured and manipulated by forces well beyond his ken but because he is now free of imposed societal respect and fear, and because he has the means and indignant determination to right newly-perceived wrongs, he is well placed to defend himself as it becomes necessary.

It boils down to the age-old conflict between good and bad, or at least the idealistic and honest versus the conniving and opportunistic, though in this case the protagonist is able to use the antagonists’ own methods against them and that adds a sweet sense of retribution.

While Jason’s success in bringing down his opponents is satisfying, his true victory is in the fact he is left to lead his life on his own existential terms, something to which many of us aspire. Having gained a different perspective, he sought independence and peace but he was willing and able to defend himself using whatever level of force his opponents were prepared to use against him, but without initiating the aggression.

This may not be the first time a government agent rises above the moral level of his or her creators and uses his or her skills against them (I’m thinking of television’s “Callan” and Luc Besson’s “Nikita”), but I think Jason Bourne is the most successful in terms of entertainment and emotional engagement.

I have to say the use of amnesia to liberate and exercise man’s innate goodness and allow an objective review of one’s own life is a masterstroke and, although a vaguely similar device was used in “Unknown” and “Sleeping Dogs”, once again it is used to greatest effect here.


My thanks for taking the time to read this article. I hope you found it of some value.

Stuart Fernie (stuartfernie@yahoo.co.uk)

 

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