Film Club reviews Safe House
So last week FTRC Film Club headed off to see CIA thriller Safe House, starring Ryan Reynolds and Denzel Washington. Was the flick as A-list as its cast? Check out peeps thoughts below…but beware! Spoilers are everywhere.
ROSANNA ‘If I’d listened to the reviews I would probably have avoided this film like the plague. As it happens, I thought it was a pretty respectable espionage thriller even though it is *unmistakably* a Bourne pastiche.’
‘Quality car-chases and breath-taking action sequences. It was a bit clichéd, but Denzel is always pretty much value for money, isn’t he? I also quite enjoyed Ryan Reynolds in a more action-based role, but my husband says he belongs in rom-coms and nowhere else. Miaow!’
‘It was entertaining, brainless action. Sometimes that’s all I want on a Saturday afternoon!’
JAMIE-LEE ‘A tad predictable, even with all the action and thrill rides. I still found it fairly boring and the acting was cringeworthy at times.’
SUPERT ‘I enjoyed it but thought it could have been better. The action scenes were great.’
‘Ryan Reynolds looks good in the gym but doesn’t convince me he is an action movie star.’
STEVE ‘I thought it was very good; it didn’t pretend to be anything it isn’t. Not a lot of thinking required just a good conspiracy thriller with non-stop action.’
SCOTT ‘Unfortunately I have been left feeling very neutral by this film. I really have no feelings, good or bad. It was by the numbers and a little boring – safe by name, safe by execution. Yawn.’
‘Reynolds hasn’t got the chops I’m afraid. He does best as the camp ladies’ man, he just doesn’t have the skills needed to do anything else convincingly. He does the name Ryan an injustice compared to the other one!’ (He means Gosling, of course)
‘I don’t know about you, but I am so over ‘shaky cam’ action sequences, time to move on I reckon. Bring back the camp Roger-Moore-as-Bond fighting!’
‘It is nice to have mindless fun, but this film wasn’t it. It was far too boring and nothing grabbed me at all, sorry!’
MARK ‘With an airport paperback storyline they just hired in Oliver Wood to shoot it in the hopes of getting us all thinking it was a bit like Bourne, but it was just nothing.’
‘The “look isn’t it a bad world, everyone is corrupt” rubbish was so tacked on to make you think it had some kind of message. If I’d cared about any of it I’d have been angry I should think.’
‘It was just cinematic confectionery I suppose, a film to make you forget that one day you will die… I still prefer more in my diversions though I suppose.’
‘If you think you are going to like it, you probably will. Its empty cinema entertainment presented to make you think it has a brain behind it. It won’t make you hate it, but it’s not got much to make you like it either.’
EVERTON ‘I thought it was fun. I don’t think it was ever trying to be in the same weight class as Bourne (Must every thriller with “rogue agents” and a bit of shaky-cam be Bourne now?) Washington and Reynolds made a good pair and were always fun to watch. Denzel is still “the man up in here”…’
IVAI ‘I didn’t know what to expect with Safe House but enjoyed it more than I thought I would.’
‘I thought the cast were acceptable, Denzel of course being the best. Ryan Reynolds did alright, but he lacks a certain ‘oomph’ for me. It was nice to see Ruben Blades make an appearance, however brief.’
‘The film had an obvious ending that was guessable early on, but it was played sufficiently well despite being nothing to write home about. It’s an acceptable beer movie but instantly forgettable.’
JEFF ‘Too much of a Bourne wannabe, with an overload of car chases and gunfights.’
‘I thought Ryan Reynolds was great in Buried but he is totally miscast here. He doesn’t look or act the part. Denzel is always good, I wouldn’t say he did anything special here, but he is always very watchable.’
‘The script was sloppy and unfocused for the majority of the film. It settled down going into the final stretch, but it’s as if they knew where they wanted to end up but had no idea of the best way to get there. I don’t mind predictability if it’s fun along the way, but Safe House wasn’t exactly that. It had its moments but they were tied together by one-dimensional characters.’
YASMIN ‘I’m going to defend Mr Reynolds! I really like him as an actor. I thought Denzel was okay but his behaviour in the movie bewildered me a bit and there were bits that didn’t make sense.’
‘I honestly felt the last 30 mins were the best, I was pretty gripped and also seeing the innocence crushed out of Reynolds’ character really moved me to be honest. I really felt for him!’
CLIVE ‘Low on plot, virtually a chase movie, but an entertaining ride.’
‘An understated performance from Denzel, but I agree – very watchable.’
‘I like to be surprised and kept guessing. The most disappointing thing about this film for me was that the identity of the ‘villain’ was obvious from the start.’
CHRIS ‘I’m a big fan of Denzel Washington and whilst this wasn’t his best film I still enjoyed it. I love it when he plays characters like this and like to see him in any role.’
‘I was intrigued by the story but it’s not one you remember after getting back home.’
CHARLOTTE ‘I found this film rather boring after a while; the same trick over and over again. Unseen cars hitting a car. Unseen people shooting other people.’
‘I got lost a bit, one thing in particular made no sense to me but I thought that was maybe because my mind wandered – it didn’t hold my attention at times.’
‘Ryan Reynolds impressed me greatly, definitely one of his better performances. You could see his character change as the film went on.’
‘It’s good to turn your brain off sometimes but with this kind of film I like to have something to get my teeth into. Sadly Safe House didn’t have anything.’
The last Ryan Reynolds movie we reviewed for Film Club was the universally slated Green Lantern. Thankfully we liked
this better. Only a little bit, mind.
There’s not much actually wrong with it. There just isn’t anything that’s fist-pumpingly right with it, either. And therein lies the problem; we just didn’t really care about anything that happened.
We’re always up for a bit of Denzel, and he’s his usual badass self here, (check out that footchase) but he’s so much better than the material we just wanted to reach through the screen and yank him out of there.
Career advice to Ryan Reynolds’ character Weston: if you’re of a nervous disposition, the spy game probably isn’t the
job for you. We get that it’s a very serious situation with crazy-high stakes, but watching you freak out gets boring after a while.
Warning! If your ears are on the sensitive side, best avoid this one. For some reason the director really likes sticking a lot of very loud gunshot sounds in very small rooms.
Where the movie really fails is in the script. It’s haphazard, some of the action makes no sense at all and other parts are simply blah. And is there anyone who didn’t figure out the ending of this movie ten minutes in? Yeah, it’s nice to have a bit of a switch-off every now and then, but still. More effort is required.
Ooh, something good to say! Nice use of Cape Town locations, folks.
It’s a step up from Green Lantern, Ry-Rey, but we know you can do better. Roll on the Deadpool movie.
But just what is this Film Club malarkey all about? It’s simples, really. Each week we send a pair of cinema tix (ODEON or Cineworld, whichever is best) to 10 of our most active Facebook/Twitter followers. We put the film we’re going to see to the vote, and the winning film is the one we all go to see. Then we all sit around on Facebook on the Sunday night (6.30) and chat about it. Magic. Sound like something you want to get involved with? Drop us a line at twitter.com/f_t_r_c or on Facebook at on.fb.me/d4dMv8
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Reynolds was GREAT in this film. I thought he was better than Washington. The other Ryan? Is as expressive as someone with facial paralysis. Get over this Green Lantern thing. It is becoming stale.