Safe House

Tobin Frost (Denzel Washington) is a rogue CIA agent-turned-traitor who suddenly appears at the U.S. Consulate in Cape Town, South Africa. Frost is dispatched to a company safe house under the aegis of ambitious CIA rookie Matt Weston (Ryan Reynolds) for interrogation. But others don't want Frost to reveal why he's turned himself in after spending years on the run, so he's waterboarded—as wide-eyed Weston watches with incredulity—but the interrogation is interrupted when a gang of mercenaries invade the premises. Eager to prove himself, Weston stashes Frost in the trunk of a car and careens around the city, stopping off for a cat-and-mouse chase in a crowded soccer stadium, after which Frost—who has injected under his skin a valuable microchip that reveals the names of compromised agents all over the globe—takes off to get forged papers from a longtime friend (Rubén Blades). During all the chaos, Weston must figure out whom to trust—enigmatic, highly manipulative intelligence officer Frost, who has sold military codes to enemies of the state, or cynical fellow operatives (Brendan Gleeson, Vera Farmiga, Sam Shepard) who threaten to betray him. Filmmaker Daniel Espinosa's Safe House is an overly complicated spy thriller in which predictably loud and explosive shoot-outs coupled with relentless, repetitive action sequences completely overwhelm the plot and characters. Optional. [Note: DVD/Blu-ray extras include a “making-of” featurette (11 min.), a “Hand-to-Hand Action” segment on the fight sequences (8 min.), the production featurettes “Inside the CIA” (6 min.) and “Building the Rooftop Chase” (4 min.), and trailers. Exclusive to the Blu-ray release are the behind-the-scenes featurettes “Safe Harbor: Cape Town” on location (9 min.), “Behind the Action” (8 min.), and a “Shooting the Safe House Attack” scene deconstruction (5 min.), as well as bonus DVD, digital, and UltraViolet copies of the film. Bottom line: a solid extras package for a so-so thriller.] (S. Granger)