Safe House (2012) - Daniel Espionosa

Tobin Frost, the most dangerous renegade agent the CIA has ever known, comes back onto the grid after being gone for over a decade.  While in United States custody at a South African safe house, mercenaries attack, with only a young inexperienced agent, Matt Weston, and Tobin Frost able to escape alive.  On the run, the two unlikely men become allies in an attempt to figure out who wants them dead.  Daniel Espionosa's Safe House is a conventional, run of the mill Denzel Washington vehicle in which we seen Denzel playing that same type of character for the one millionth time.  The main problem with Safe House is that the story just isn't all that interesting or compelling, with stakes that never feel very important to the viewer.  It's definitely nothing you haven't seen before, and as usual for Hollywood film, there is this absolutely worthless romantic interest subplot that is completely forced, unnecessary and boring.  One could even argue that this romantic sub-plot completely slows down the pacing of the film, but really it's all pretty boring regardless.  The one bright spot of the film would have to be the director, Daniel Espionosa, who tries his best to make this film interesting.  The action sequences are well done both in choreography and cinematography, having a nice balance of capturing the frantic nature of the action, but not to the point where the viewer has trouble following what is going on in front of them.  Safe House is just too generic to be interesting, delivering nothing new to the viewer.

5/10

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