Vera Farmiga Cast In 'Safe House' Alongside Denzel Washington And Ryan Reynolds
The film Safe House has been shooting for some time now, and it's one that has our interest thanks to a great collection of talent: Snabba Cash director Daniel Espinosa makes his English-language debut with the movie and the cast is toplined by Denzel Washington and Ryan Reynolds, with additional roles filled out by Brendan Gleeson, Sam Shepard and Robert Patrick.
Now, despite the fact that it's a little late in the game, Vera Farmiga has been added to the cast.
Deadline reports her addition, saying that she plays "a CIA operative overseeing Reynolds' character." My recollection of the script is that this will be a role not dissimilar to what she played in Source Code. Double feature!
The plot in general has the young CIA agent played by Ryan Reynolds overseeing the transfer of a dangerous criminal (Denzel Washington). Or, in fuller terms, "When a group of villains destroy a CIA-operated safe house, the facility's young house-sitter must work to move the criminal who's being hidden there to another secure location."
David Guggenheim wrote the script, and then Terry George (Hotel Rwanda) came in for a rewrite. The original draft was solid with some crackling sequences but a slight dearth of personality. I don't know what the rewrite has done to it, but with this cast in place I'm hoping that little hurdle has been cleared. Combine Denzel Washington and Ryan Reynolds in the frame and 'personality' should be the one thing that isn't in short supply.
Worth noting, too, is that the shoot is going on in Cape Town, South Africa, so there might be some excellent texture added to the film simply by virtue of the fact that it doesn't take place in the States.