'Bourne' star's aide gives up matches at NAIA

MANILA, Philippines - An aide of Jeremy Renner, lead actor of “The Bourne Legacy,” was asked to surrender a box of matches, a banned item on airplanes when his backpack passed the X-ray scanner at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport Terminal 1 before noon yesterday.

Renner and his aide, David Cox, left for New York after spending more than 40 days filming in various locations in Metro Manila and Palawan with Rachel Weisz and Edward Norton.

They boarded Korean Airlines flight KE622, which took off at 12:15 p.m., bound for New York via Seoul, Korea.

Office of Transport Service personnel confiscated the matchbox, whose blurred image was mistaken for a small Swiss knife by the X-ray technician.

Cox immediately surrendered the matchbox and apologized, “Sorry for the inconvenience, I just forgot to leave the matchbox behind when I placed it my backpack.”

Renner, also carrying a backpack, went through the same screening process and was cleared after he was asked to lift his black baseball cap and remove his sunglasses during the final check.

Last week, Weisz, who reportedly said “I can live in Palawan forever,” left for the United Kingdom, following her husband British actor and James Bond lead Daniel Craig, who came for a short visit two weeks ago.

Metro Manila Development Authority chairman Francis Tolentino and Tourism Secretary Ramon Jimenez Jr. went out of their way to provide assistance to make the filming of Bourne Legacy a success.

The movie, which will be advertised that it was shot in the Philippines, will showcase scenic spots and some of the seedy parts of the metropolis.

Bourne Legacy is the fourth installment in the Bourne series, an action-thriller spy film based on the character Jason Bourne, a former CIA assassin who suffers from memory loss.

The film series is known for its realistic settings, in contrast to the growing use of computer-generated imagery in action films.