Safe House

Director: Daniel Espinosa
Writer: David Guggenheim
Starring: Denzel Washington, Ryan Reynolds and Robert Patrick

After much talk about Safe House movie, i finally went to watch it on Sunday. Well, Safe House is a 2 hour ride that was packed with action but thats about it.. Like many others, i saw the trailer, heard the leading stars names and decided i want to watch it. 

 The story opens with Matt Weston (Ryan Reynolds) who is a a housekeeper at CIA's Safe House in South Africa. Weston's is clearly frustrated that he has seen no promotion and his boss keeps promising him the clouds and stars, but nothing has changed. He bids adieu to his French girlfriend [who's a student at the local hospital] and assumes his place at the Safe house. Life for him changes with the entry of the fugitive Tobin Frost (Denzel Washington). Frost,a former CIA operative went rogue and was last heard to have sold classified information to the highest bidder and gone off the radar nearly 9years ago. 

After years of eluding the CIA, Frost walks straight into the Consulate one morning and there begins the twist in the tale. Heavily armed CIA men take him to the Safe House, but there is a breach and the place is raided, with Weston escaping with Frost on toe. Weston, being duty conscious decides to look for another Safe house to take Frost to, during the course of which he battles quite a bit for Frost's safety. The dialogues between Frost and Weston as they are weaving through the narrow lanes of South Africa are worth a watch. How Frost judges and assess Weston, talks to him about the filth within CIA and so on.... The scene in the stadium where Frost flips and makes it look like Weston was kidnapping so he could escape is quite ingenious. Quite a bit of blood is shed, and fights rage on through the movie. As much as it is to watch the action, it kinda strays away from the main plot and the audience is left wondering "where the hell are they going with this"

It was a thrill to watch Weston, a rookie fight, all the time keeping his eyes on Frost. But it was sad to see the same old pattern of the big guns in the CIA being involved in the sham, and out to get their own, to save their asses.  Denzel with his suave character, quite demeanor steals the show as well. He fits well in the role of Frost.  The movie is all about the slogan "no one is safe", it should also be "trust no one". 

Safe House is a one time watch if you a die hard Denzel or Reynolds fan and enjoy non stop action. When the movie ended and credits rolled, all i can say is "so, what else is new?" Looks like Hollywood story tellers are fast running out of plots, and story lines. The movie had me thinking of Mission Impossible, Bourne Identity series and every other cop-criminal based movie that had ever been made across the world. The ending of the movie left a bad taste in my mouth, couldnt the director have come up with something bit more original? Why did he have to rip off the end from MI4 to the T ? sad....  And well, i am glad they dint go and make this movie in 3D.. would have been painful to watch,albeit for the fight and chase sequences.

My Rating: 2.5/5

Mounaguru

Directed by Santha Kumar and produced by M. K. Thamizharasu, this movie is quite offbeat amongst the run of the mill, romance, villain strewn movies churned out by the Tamil Film Industry... 

I was sceptical when i heard it starred Arulnithi, but with names such as John Vijay, Iniya, and Uma Riyaz Khan, and a few good reviews from friends, i told myself it will be worth a watch!

Last night, marched into PVR and got set to watch this "Crime thriller" as many had labelled it... From the beginning to the end, the movie was well chalked out and i was quite impressed with Arulnidhi's acting....

it is the story of a college student Karunakaran[Arulnidhi] who is a good student, but gets into trouble often. Due to this, his mom moves bag and baggage to Chennai where her Older son gets admission for Karunakaran at Aruldoss college, with accomodation in the hostel. His wife's sister Aarthi [Iniya] is living with them and so their apartment is quite crowded. What starts off as initial teething trouble soon becomes a nightmare and Karunakaran is caught up in a scam for no fault of his.

4 policemen - Assistant Commissioner Marimuthu (John Vijay), Inspector Rajendran (Madhu), Sub-Inspector Selvam (Balakrishnan) and junior policeman Perumalsamy (Krishnamurthy) are crooks down to the T. when they stumble upon a car crash, they open the boot to discover a bag filled with money, decide to loot it, and even go to the extent of killing the driver who is still alive...

From there on, begins a snowball effect, to hide their actions, they keep passing the blame onto others. One lady the AC has sexual connections with records his actions in her bedroom in an attempt to blackmail him and get rid of him. But this proves fatal for her, and she ends up losing the camera and her life.

Amidst all this drama, love blossoms between Karunakaran and Aarthi... but that is known only to his mom.. One day, during the holidays when Karuna returns to the hostel [ he is alone as others have gone off home], he finds a bag outside his room, pours out its contents and while wondering whose bag it is, is caught by the 4 crooked cops.. They were infact waiting to see who the student was who had called and blackmailed them about the murder and money... 

One thing leads to another, and finally karuna ends up in a mental asylum. Cops and the psychiatrist convince Karuna's family that he has lost his mind.  The twist comes in the form of Pazhaniammal [Uma Riyaz] who is investigating the murder and stumbles upon the truth. And finally, just when they have everyone caught and guilty, she is given orders to let them go as the murder could lead to issues between the 2 states.

karuna then takes matters into his own hands, kills all the cops and then gives in and goes into the mental asylum....

The movie is well paced and quite well scripted. There are no cliched scenes in the crime or the romance, just subtle nuances. But, i did think the end was going to be different... Wonder why the director chose this path!!! ... All in all, its a good watch... And one more grouse i have with movie theaters- We dont need intervals in all movies, especially English, Animated and Such thrillers... it just cuts into the flow of the movie!!

Overall Rating - 4/5

Bookworm Rampage

I go through these phases... Am sure all of you also do!!  There are days when i do nothing but work, and then those when fun plays a bit part of my day... The latter is what i enjoy, cos it gives me a sense of calm at the end of it all... The past couple of weeks have been such - maybe cos workload isnt that much or i've just made a subconscious choice to include plenty of fun during my busy daily routines - outing with friends, just chilling out at home with an interesting book, grooving to music on my iTouch , watching a movie or jus about anything that i am upto !!

Books have been a part of my life for as long as i can remember.. Even when we were living in Tirunelveli, i used to pick up books from chennai, people who visited us brought me books - Enid blyton, Mystery of five find outers, Naughtiest girl in school, Archie comics, Chanda mama, Sense &Sensibility and what not!!  .. This awesome habit has stuck with me, infact mom keeps saying- its because of this reading[err, reading in the dark, with improper light] that you wear glasses.. Heck, it doesnt matter~!! :) Infact its thanks to family that i got into music as well - specifically english music....

Couple of weeks,or a month ago, Apar gave me a whole load of books.. What joy i felt cant be expressed in words.. A colleague was leaving the city, and left behind all his books for grabs!  Amazing right?!! There were plenty by 2 of our favorite authors - Lee Child &  James Patterson. [here's a whole list of James Patterson's books]

Was introduced to James Patterson last Jan, during the ride to Pondy with friends! Murder mystery, cop, thriller kinda writer who has me going till i finish the last word on the last page.. Infact same holds for Lee Child, who was introduced to me by another friend... :-)

Here is a collage of all the books by these authors that i have read till date.... !! each of them are fabulous, atleast i enjoyed them thoroughly... !! :)

Another author I've been reading a lot is Jodi Picoult... Every visit to the library, will have me clutching a book by this amazing author!! Waiting to watch My Sister's keeper movie to see if its just as the book or altered... But most of her books are about kids, parents, and health related issues... !!

and before you ask.... Yes, i've read 'em all .... hahaha~!! Reading some more, but that shall come in another post...!!