Safe House

With the great film adaptation of the bestseller Easy Money, the Swedish director Daniel Espinosa has solved his ticket for Hollywood. For his U.S. debut Safe House then also with Denzel Washington and Ryan Reynolds two superstars stood in front of his camera, but Espinosa has obviously not been deterred. Because the thriller is crafted first-class action cinema, which can convince with quite a few strengths, but also has to contend with some problems.

His job at the CIA had imagined the young agent Matt Weston (Reynolds) also more exciting. For several months now he has been stuck in Cape Town guarding a safe house, a secret base where important witnesses can be housed or explosive interrogations can be conducted. But none of that has happened yet, and so Matt boredly goes about his job as a janitor in the empty house. But the situation changes drastically when former agent and globally wanted spy Tobin Frost (Denzel Washington) turns himself in to the authorities in Cape Town and is brought to the safe house for questioning. Frost is apparently in possession of highly explosive information that not only several intelligence agencies are after. And so, shortly after Frost's arrival, the supposedly safe house turns into a veritable battlefield, from which Matt is able to rescue the prisoner at the last moment. Now it's up to the young agent to get Frost safely to the nearest safe house - an endeavor made nearly impossible not only by countless pursuers, but also by the wily Frost.

Safe House certainly won't win any awards for originality. The big mystery of how Frost's pursuers knew about the safe house should be obvious to anyone with a little idea of the genre after just a few minutes. And the staging, especially of the action sequences, feels a bit like Espinosa watched all of Tony Scott's movies before taking the job and is now frantically trying to adopt his visual style. But even if the shaky visuals just take on too extreme proportions in some moments, the lack of originality in the story and direction can't really be seen as a negative.

For despite some flaws, Safe House is one thing above all: extremely entertaining. Boredom does not arise for a second during the fast-paced chase through Cape Town and also the rather quiet moments can definitely please due to the good performances of Washington and Reynolds. Admittedly, there are a few little lags, especially with regard to the love story between Matt and Ana (Nora Arnezeder), which is superfluous in itself. But since these little hang-ups give the viewer a chance to take a breath and recover from the quickly cut action sequences, they don't really diminish the overall positive impression.

The way Espinosa incorporates the Cape Town location into the story is simply magnificent and gives the film a very special show value. This alone makes the action thriller stand out a bit from the crowd. This combined with the good cast and a not particularly imaginative, but still exciting story makes Safe House despite its weaknesses a real pleasure for all lovers of cultivated cinema action. Worth seeing

An article by Frankfurt-Tipp