Statham does what Statham does best
Starring: Jason Statham, Catherine Chan and Chris
Sarandon Playing at: Angrignon, Banque Scotia, Colossus, Côte des Neiges, Kirkland, Lacordaire, Marché Central, Sources, Sphèretech,
Taschereau Parents’ guide: frequent
violence Proving you can be a major force in the movie world without really saying much, Jason Statham could be compared to a Marcel Marceau in need of anger management – because the man communicates perfectly with his body.
He doesn’t need to wax thespian the way most actors do. He just needs to kick, punch and otherwise knock the stuffing out of his screen mates – which is exactly what he does in Safe.
A moderately budgeted action feature that throws Statham up against a predictable wall of baddies, including corrupt New York cops, Safe doesn’t look all that different from anything the martial-arts expert and former Olympic diver has done before: He takes out the villains one at a time, complete with vivid, graphic violence.
The only real twist in Safe, for Statham and for the genre, is the insertion of a small child in the midst of every bloodbath.
At the top of the reel, we watch a crime boss (veteran James Hong) induct a young girl into his gang. Mei (Catherine Chan) is told her mother will probably die if she doesn’t co-operate, and being a good kid, she goes bad.
She tells the crime boss everything he wants to hear, especially her gift with numbers. Young Mei has a photographic memory, and that’s a very handy talent for a man terrified of leaving a paper trail.
No sooner does the Chinese crime boss ship her to America for a big assignment than we meet Luke Wright (Statham), a fighter who was supposed to go down for cash, but after landing just one punch, ruined everything.
He won his fight by knockout, and that cost the evildoers big coin. They need to rub him out, but before that they want to make his life a living hell.
They kill his wife, and we all know what happens when you do that in a violence-drenched action movie: You sign your own death warrant.
The gunplay is brutal and the death count is extremely high.
Director Boaz Yakin no doubt made everything so blunt to crank up the suspense value, but it puts him in a rather precarious position because, to carry off this vivid realism, you really need flawless dramatic performances to seal the deal.
Safe does not possess the calibre of talent to fire correctly.
While Statham does his best to bring some Bronx honk to his working-class British accent, he never really pulls it off. So it’s good he doesn’t talk too much.
In fact, the best scenes in the movie include no dialogue whatsoever. They just feature the bullish form of Statham goring a succession of hapless, gun-toting thugs.
If you like that kind of thing, this movie will deliver all the blood, guts, bruises, cracked ribs and bullets to the head you’ve been waiting for.