Safe House

Denzel Washington
Ryan Reynolds

Directed by: Daniel Espinosa

117 minutes


To be fair, I will have to give this one a second viewing...once it's arrives on Blu Ray. I made a
huge mistake of eating a burrito 30 minutes beforehand and had the worst case of "the itis" (food coma). I strained so hard to stay awake that despite all the bangs and booms, my eyelids were halfway closed. The haze didn't clear away until the last 30 minutes of the movie. Anyway...

Denzel Washington plays CIA agent turned rouge Tobin Frost. Never has a character had so much precautionary buildup since Hannibal Lecter. After Tobin, on the lamb overseas gets secret plans that he injects in his own body for safekeeping, he runs from the criminals who are after him. After a lengthy chase, he makes it to the U.S. Embassy (HA! I'm on base, can't catch me!). He gives himself up and is whisked off to a safe house location in South Africa.

There we meet safe "housekeeper" Matt Weston (Reynolds). Weston is bored with the position due to lack of any action or advancement and is in hopes of transferring to Paris along with his fiancee (she doesn't have a clue her man is an agent). Weston gets his wish in the form of Frost when he arrives. After Frost is subjected to a bit of water torture, the lights go off, and a coup d'état is staged on the facility. Weston is ordered to watch Frost as the firefight ensues. Silver tongued Frost convinces Weston the one way out is to let him loose and escape together. Under Weston's watch of course. The two break out, get away, Frost continues to break it down for Weston that it's all a set up and he should now watch his back around the hire ups.

Because Washington has played the villain so well in the past (Training Day), he is convincing as Tobin Frost, and Reynolds does a good performance and his character can stand toe to toe with Washington's despite his rookie vulnerability. Ryan Reynolds works best when he's not playing the smart ass. That's why I feel like this film and "Buried" are examples where we see Ryan Reynolds the actor. The only time his smart ass shtick works for me is when he played Deadpool in "Wolverine". It fit there because of the fact that Deapool in the comics is a smart ass. The best way to describe it is that Bill Murray plays the loveable smart ass. Ryan Reynolds plays more of the douchy smart ass that no one likes.

I'm on the fence with Safe House. It's too much money for a repeat viewing at the theaters, but I'll review it again once it's in the home markets.