This adrenaline-fueled conclusion to the original Bourne trilogy follows directly from the final scene of The Bourne Supremacy (2004).
Jason Bourne surfaces in London after reading a Guardian newspaper article by journalist Simon Ross (Paddy Considine), who exposes a secret CIA program called “Blackbriar” – the upgraded, even more ruthless successor to Treadstone, run by CIA Deputy Director Noah Vosen (David Strathairn).
Vosen intercepts Ross’s phone calls and orders a team to intercept him at Waterloo Station.
Bourne meets Ross at the incredibly crowded station. Using security cameras and precise timing, Bourne acts as a phantom guide, navigating Ross away from CIA spotters.
However, Ross panics, ignores Bourne’s instructions, and is assassinated by Blackbriar asset Paz (Edgar Ramirez) in broad daylight.
Bourne steals Ross’s notes and escapes.
Ross’s notes point Bourne to a CIA safehouse in Madrid, Spain. There, he discovers the office belongs to Neal Daniels (Colin Stinton), the CIA station chief who helped build the original assassin program.
Nicky Parsons (Julia Stiles), who has been reassigned to Madrid, arrives at the safehouse. Sensing the extreme corruption of Blackbriar, she chooses to betray the CIA and helps Bourne escape when a tactical team arrives to raid the office.
Nicky and Bourne learn that Daniels has fled to Tangier, Morocco, with top-secret documents. Vosen authorises a local Asset named Desh (Joey Ansah) to assassinate Daniels and eliminate Nicky and Bourne.
In Tangier, Desh successfully detonates a bomb that kills Daniels, then hunts Nicky through the narrow streets. Bourne engages in a frantic, exhausting foot chase across the city’s rooftops, crashing through a window just in time to engage Desh in a brutal, close-quarters bathroom fight, ultimately strangling him with a hand towel.
Bourne sends Nicky into hiding for her own safety and contacts Pamela Landy (Joan Allen), who is reluctantly assisting Vosen but secretly wants to help Bourne.
In New York, Bourne calls Vosen directly from a rooftop within sight of Vosen’s office and tricks Vosen into leaving the building with his entire tactical team to chase a false lead. While the office is completely empty, Bourne walks right into Vosen’s personal office and steals the classified Blackbriar and Treadstone files from his safe.
Realising he has been duped, Vosen sends Paz to hunt Bourne down. Cue a destructive car chase through the gridlocked streets of Manhattan, culminating in Bourne ramming Paz’s vehicle into a concrete barrier. Bourne holds Paz at gunpoint but chooses to spare his life.
He passes the classified documents to Landy, who faxes them to a congressional oversight committee, exposing the illegal CIA program.
Confronting Dr Albert Hirsch (Albert Finney), the mastermind behind Treadstone’s psychological conditioning, Bourne discovers he wasn’t kidnapped and forced into the program but had in fact volunteered under his real name, David Webb, out of a fierce sense of patriotism, undergoing brutal torture to break his psyche so he could become a weapon.
Vosen and Paz corner Bourne on the building’s rooftop, and as Paz raises his gun, he asks Bourne why he spared his life earlier. Bourne repeats the words The Professor had told him in the first film – “Look at us. Look at what they make you give.” Paz lowers his weapon.
Vosen fires at Bourne just as Bourne leaps off the roof into the East River.
Days later, Nicky Parsons is sitting in a café watching a televised news broadcast.
The news reports that Dr Hirsch and Noah Vosen have been arrested, Blackbriar has been exposed, and Jason Bourne’s body has not been found despite a three-day search of the river.
The film cuts back to Bourne floating motionless underwater. He suddenly stirs and swims away into the dark water.
It’s all stuff we’ve seen before – car chases, fistfights, international jet-setting and spy vs. spy intrigue – but it’s so expertly crafted, and the cast is so superb that The Bourne Ultimatum exceeds all expectations of the genre.
Jason Bourne
Matt Damon Nicky Parsons
Julia Stiles Noah Vosen
David Strathairn Ezra Kramer
Scott Glenn Simon Ross
Paddy Considine Paz
Edgar Ramírez Dr Albert Hirsch
Albert Finney Pam Landy
Joan Allen Tom Cronin
Tom Gallop Wills
Corey Johnson Martin Kreutz
Daniel Brühl Desh
Joey Ansah Neal Daniels
Colin Stinton Jimmy
Dan Fredenburgh Lucy
Lucy Liemann Betancourt
Mark Bazeley Chamberlain
Sinead O’Keeffe Agent Hammond
Charles Venn Agent Kiley
Scott Adkins Hoody
Kai Martin
Director
Paul Greengrass
Video
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Bourne meets Ross at the incredibly crowded station. Using security cameras and precise timing, Bourne acts as a phantom guide, navigating Ross away from CIA spotters.
In Tangier, Desh successfully detonates a bomb that kills Daniels, then hunts Nicky through the narrow streets. Bourne engages in a frantic, exhausting foot chase across the city’s rooftops, crashing through a window just in time to engage Desh in a brutal, close-quarters bathroom fight, ultimately strangling him with a hand towel.
Vosen fires at Bourne just as Bourne leaps off the roof into the East River.
