Safe House

It’s a story that feels very familiar, particularly if you are an action movie fan. A rogue government agent with a file of stolen secret documents is being chased by the agency he used to work for. He forms an alliance with a less-experienced agent that starts out distrustful, even dangerous, and gradually evolves into a bromance. So what makes Safe House rise above its inherent clichés to be so addictively watchable? It all starts with Denzel Washington as Tobin Frost, an ex-CIA agent who has been off the agency radar for almost a decade. It’s the kind of role that Washington can do in his sleep; in fact, it’s the kind of ‘bad ass’ role he’s been flogging on the public since winning an Oscar for playing a bad ass in Training Day. There’s something different about his performance in Safe House, though, and it has nothing to do with the script. There’s an energy to his acting that’s almost palpable. Even when Frost is just sitting in a chair, handcuffed to a pipe (he spends a lot of time that way in the film), Washington demands your attention.