A young CIA agent is tasked with looking after a fugitive in a safe house. But when the safe house is attacked, he finds himself on the run with his charge.
A brutally slick, if flawed, action thriller.
Bring earplugs and you’ll enjoy an efficient vehicle for Denzel that makes good use of its South African scenery. Espinosa nimbly combines flash with Paul Greengrass-style flair.
It helps that Denzel and his apprentice Reynolds have terrific chemistry – to the point that you get irritated when the film keeps cutting back to Reynolds’ low-wattage romance with a French medical student.
Tolerably exciting spycraft, but stuck with a see-through plot. Washington and Reynolds are watchable, but not exactly stretched by these roles.
A safe bet for Bourne fans.
Despite all of these positives, however, Safe House is neither as memorable nor as satisfying as it should be.
With a magisterial disregard for plausibility, everyone survives gunfire and Armageddon, over and over.
There’s much to be said for nuts-and-bolts action thrillers when they are competently assembled. But this one is falling apart at the fastenings.
Largely forgettable.
An efficient, well-tooled thriller that makes a perfectly acceptable Saturday night at the movies.
A big, dumb, boring beefcake of a film.
Safe House is a generic slam-banger, seemingly engineered to be forgotten almost while you're watching it.
Despite some impressive action scenes, the characters' motivations are underdeveloped, while Ryan is unconvincing and Washington looks rightly bored.
An espionage film by numbers.
Generic spy movie.
Daniel Espinosa keeps the action pumping and the plot twisting; just a pity you'll probably guess the destination a touch too soon.
Safe House: director Daniel Espinosa talks tough
General release. Check local listings for show times.
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