Denzel Washington plays an ex CIA agent/special forces operative (to be honest, I forget) who gets captured and taken to the (official) CIA's most inept hideout which is promptly overrun by baddies and everyone is killed. Everyone that is, apart from plucky Ryan Reynolds who is basically the CIA's caretaker of the unsafe safe house. He therefore has to rescue Washington and escort him to safety, all the time being pursued by baddies who can wipe out a professional CIA team in seconds, but can't shoot an untrained agent and his shackled prisoner.

I can suspend my disbelief to accept all that. There's car chases, slick camera work, shoot-outs and punch-up - pretty much everything you'd expect from a modern action film. But it's still only average. The only thing that elevates it from being VERY average is Denzil Washington who, as usual, turns in a pretty decent performance, given what he has to work with. He snarls, charms and punches his way through most situations and Ryan Reynolds seems to have good chemistry with him in his attempts at keeping him both safe and cuffed at the same time.

If anyone else was in the film it would simply be average, but if you like the sound of another car chase-laden action film with a better than average cast, give this one a go. It might be slightly longer than your average action flick, but it's entertaining enough not to bore.

Denzil Washington is back on our screens in this action thriller as Tobin Frost a rogue CIA agent on the run. But he's not on the run alone, he's escorted by Matt Weston, the young CIA agent (Ryan Reynolds), who was supposed to keep Frost nicely safe and locked up in a Safe House pending interrogation by the CIA. But that plan went pear-shaped when a bunch of guys from who-knows-where blasted the big steel door off and came charging in, guns blazing and didn't seem to care who they shot as long as it wasn't each other. Weston wants to know why Frost is such hot property, Frost wants to know why he was getting shot at too. We, the audience, know that Frost is carrying a secret, a list of people. If it gets into the wrong hands and becomes public then a lot of the world's secret agencies are going to be very unhappy bunnies. Frost was about to get millions for the sale of the list until other men in black got in his way and he had to turn himself in to stay alive. Can our Denzel really be a baddy? Watch the movie and find out. It certainly looks that way.

Safe House has received mixed reviews from Joe Public but while I accept it isn't a top notch thriller, I enjoyed it. I watched it without expectations which is always a good thing. Bits of it felt like watching a Bourne movie although I didn't think the fight sequences were choreographed half as excitingly, and I didn't think the car chase scenes were half as 'exhilarating' as Jason Bourne driving that mini in Bourne Identity. You have to decide for yourself and I suggest you check out one or two YouTube clips to get a better impression than can be given in written reviews. You must remember the times that someone has told you they hated a movie and you liked it, and vice versa. I think a lot of the disappointment is down to expectations and it seems that a lot of movie watchers nowadays want a lot less drama and a lot more blood with their popcorn. But, personally, I don't enjoy watching a movie without some quiet moments to contrast with the action. Also, with Denzel Washington, the bar is perhaps set unrealistically high.

There are a few very familiar faces in this, apart from Denzel. Ryan Reynolds was in X:Men Origins - Wolverine. Vera Farmiga was in The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas and Source Code. Brendan Gleeson was in In Bruges, Breakfast on Pluto and stars as Alastair 'Mad Eye' Moody in some of the Harry Potter movies. The lovely Sam Shepard also has a small role. He's looking a little older nowadays (aren't we all?) One of my favourite films starring him recently is Black Hawk Down (2011).

Oh, and the movie has an excellent soundtrack, I think. You can check it out on iTunes.

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Safe House might revolve around a tediously old-hat mcguffin (a data file? please...) but it's saved by the enthusiasm of it's director Daniel Espinosa and its charismatic stars. Washington plays 'rogue' CIA agent Tobin Frost with a wolfish charm and a manipulative streak that keep you wondering whether he's as traitorous as its claimed. Ryan Reynolds plays his junior CIA agent dead straight, without any of his usual lighthearted comedy. This makes for a wise choice, giving Denzel all the rogueish charm and letting us root for Reynolds as the scared rookie in over his head.

Espinosa is a good choice for director, and handles the initial safe-house assault (and a lengthy car chase) with a fantastic sense of tension and rhythm. The violence is loud and stunning, and the use of sudden flickers of lighting and bursts of movement make it feel full of dramatic impact.

The car chase is superb, and one of the highlights of the movie due to skillful direction and whip-fast editing. However, Espinosa does occasionally slip into 'shakycam' fanboy territory, getting up too close, and too shaky to properly convey what's going on. To begin with this adds to the atmosphere, but it gets intrusive. Luckily he quickly calms down.

On the topic of filming, the film has a similarly grainy 'real world' look to Matt Damon's 'Green Zone', and so although the dominant saturated colours of black, orange and brown used in almost every scene make the landscape and action look gorgeous, I wouldn't expect Blu-Ray to offer many benefits over DVD.

The supporting cast are uniformly good, the plot is serviceable, and the film keeps moving at a fast enough pace to remain exciting. It also managed to make the audience I was with jump at least 4 times with sudden shocks.

Good fun, with a colourful and varied South-African setting and some very decent action set-pieces. A good choice as a straight-faced and violent spy action movie.

Matt Weston (Ryan Reynolds -Waiting) is a house-keeper. For the CIA. His job involves keeping and tending to a secure agency location in Cape Town, South Africa. Matt is going out of his mind with boredom and pleads with CIA director & mentor David Barlow (Brendan Gleeson - The Guard) to find him another placement as 12 months and not a single house-guest has left him no chance to prove himself to the agency. That is until CIA turncoat Tobin Frost (Denzel Washington - Man On Fire) turns himself in unexpectedly at the US Consulate. Transferred to Matt's safe-house with a heavy-fire team, this looks like Matt's chance until the team are all killed by the people chasing Frost. With no other CIA assets in the area, it's now up to Matt to take care of his ward and deliver him to the agency, will Matt manage to stay alive for long enough to deliver Frost? Are things that straight forward?

Safe House is a tense and well-filmed affair; credit to director Daniel Espinosa, filmed in the picturesque surrounds of South Africa. It's a high-tension affair with a lone agent endlessly pursued by a heavily-armed force all the while trying to transport his prisoner, who is playing psychological games with him the entire time. It's a great performance from Washington, but he has played this type of role many times. Ryan Reynolds is good here, but it's not a runaway performance by any means despite the fantastic box-office figures ($85m budget, $202m generated) thanks to choppy action sequences, that look like they are frenetic, but you just end up losing track when you are left watching an 115-minute long alternating stream of gunshots and car-crashes, back-dropped by some thinly-described CIA conspiracy story.

Extra Content: A featurette titled: "Behind the Action" - interesting seeing the fights inside of a car, but ultimately, nothing too outlandish.

Recommended for a pulse-heightening action movie, but it's not going to blow you away despite solid performances from the actors. Read more ›