The Jason Bourne saga came to life from the pages of Robert Ludlum’s book series through Matt Damon, and it will forever go down as some of his finest works in an action franchise of all time. But while the way the actor brought the titular protagonist to life throughout the film series has been nothing short of a feast for the eyes, making it all wasn’t all that easy.
This stands especially true in the case of the best Bourne film to date, i.e. The Bourne Ultimatum. As much as that flick won both critics’ and viewers’ hearts, curating it wasn’t all that easy. In fact, it might as well be admitted that the masterminds behind the flick pretty much bent reality to bring it to life. Then there was Damon’s public outburst, which put salt on the wounds.
Making The Bourne Ultimatum wasn’t easy, majorly because of the script
Although The Bourne Ultimatum is widely deemed the best movie in the film series by most – as even its 92% fresh critical score on Rotten Tomatoes justifies – its script wasn’t the finest in the beginning. This is because Tony Gilroy asked to be contracted to write only one draft for this third installment, with no rewrites and notes, which seemingly resulted in a not-so-good script.
Because of this, the mastermind team behind the movie, which included the likes of Paul Greengrass, Scott Z. Burns, and George Nolfi, actually had to scramble to refine and fix the script piece by piece to meet the August 2007 release date. In an interview with Collider, actor Matt Damon came clean about it all, praising the brainboxes for handling everything, saying:
We were lucky enough to have George Nolfi on set with us every day. So George kept out ahead of us. He would literally be in his hotel room working on the pages for the next day while we were working on the pages he had given us for this day, and we were making our tweaks in the real location, going, ‘Okay, well let’s change this to that, because that thing’s over there.’
To be more precise, the dynamic masterminds were actually making real-time changes to what they were going to shoot since they didn’t have a perfect script from the get-go. This, indeed, is “not an advisable way to make a movie. Like, you couldn’t teach that in film school and send people out there. But it works for Paul,” as the Bourne portrayer continued to add.
But, of course, it all worked out in their favor, as the movie turned out to be not only a critically acclaimed masterpiece but also a commercial global box office blockbuster: Per Box Office Mojo, the flick was made on a budget of $110 million but its box office performance perfectly quadrupled that number by grossing $442 million from theatres worldwide.
Matt Damon’s public outburst after this third Jason Bourne movie posed problems
While it was Tony Gilroy who presented the original script for this third installment, all the tweaks and changes it had to go through by Greengrass, Burns, and Nolfi were enough to earn them the writing credits on the movie as well. Though Gilroy arbitrated to get the sole credit, the investigation into the matter had WGA sincerely denying him his rather unfair request.
However, while that was that, Matt Damon ostensibly ended up putting salt in the wound for Gilroy with his public outburst that followed. In an interview with GQ in late 2011 (via E! Online), the actor went on an unhinged rant about Gilroy’s work on the script before adding, “It’s really the studio’s fault for putting themselves in that position.” Damon said:
I don’t blame Tony for taking a boatload of money and handing in what he handed in [for The Bourne Ultimatum script]. It’s just that it was unreadable. This is a career-ender. I mean, I could put this thing up on eBay and it would be game over for that dude. It’s terrible. It’s really embarrassing. He was having a go, basically, and he took his money and left.
Notably, these comments came when Gilroy was busy working on The Bourne Legacy, which starred Jeremy Renner as Aaron Cross, another former CIA assassin who’d been in a similar program as Bourne, and who was being attempted to be made the new anchor of the saga. But, of course, it all didn’t work out, and on the other hand, Damon also apologized for his comments.
Reaching out to the writer of the GQ interview, the Good Will Hunting actor – who won an Oscar for screenwriting for the said movie – cleared the air of this feud, saying, “If I didn’t respect him and appreciate his talent, then I really wouldn’t have cared. My feelings were hurt. That’s all. And that’s exactly why I shouldn’t have said anything. This is between me and him. So saying anything publicly is f–king stupid and unprofessional and just kind of douchey of me.” Well, for what it’s worth, the comments might have been a bit too harsh, but he wasn’t entirely wrong either. But, then again, to each his own.
The Bourne Ultimatum can currently be watched on Prime Video.
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