Spies will be spies in 'Safe House'

A bantamweight spy thriller, "Safe House" has just enough bone density to emit some satisfying cracks and pops whenever the action gets going. If you need more than that -- like nuanced characters or sharp dialogue -- then you're in the wrong theater. If not, then you're good to go.

First-time screenwriter David Guggenheim, a former Us Weekly editor, efficiently covers the bases. It's clear that Frost may not be all bad, so the film plays hide-the-villain by shuffling around various CIA honchos (serviceably played by Brendan Gleeson, Vera Farmiga and Sam Shepard). To keep our heroes running, there's an ethnically vague assassin named Vargas (Lebanese actor Fares Fares). And Matt's pretty girlfriend (Nora Arnezeder) is quickly ushered out so the boys can have their fun.

"Safe House" occasionally takes itself too seriously -- just because Reynolds starts crying over something doesn't mean we will -- but it's energetically directed by Daniel Espinosa, part of a new Scandinavian wave landing in Hollywood that includes his fellow Swede Tomas Alfredson ("Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy") and Iceland's Baltasar Kormákur ("Contraband"). If nothing else, it's a welcome sign of life during a mostly dull winter at the movies.

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Swedish director doesn't play it 'Safe'

When Universal Pictures hired Daniel Espinosa to direct its rogue CIA agent thriller "Safe House," the studio knew it was rolling the dice. The Swedish filmmaker had never made an English-

language feature, hadn't worked with big names such as "Safe House" stars Denzel Washington and Ryan Reynolds, and he was graduating from a $4-million Nordic drug drama to an $85-million production.

None of that prepared executives for the first batch of footage Espinosa sent back to California from his "Safe House" set in South Africa last year. The director was shooting actors through partially closed windows and doors, his cameras weren't on anyone's face for more than an instant and the scenes didn't look as if they could make a coherent narrative.

"They said it looked like a French movie from the 1960s," the 34-year-old Espinosa recalled. "But that was exactly what I was going for."