Published Jan 29, 2026, 12:56 PM EST
Adam Bentz is a senior news writer at ScreenRant, where he has authored nearly 5,000 articles, including features and lists. He studied creative writing and English with a concentration in screenwriting at Southern New Hampshire University and interned as a writer/journalist for The Borgen Project, an influential organization that fights global poverty.
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Safe House has become a streaming sensation. Starring Ryan Reynolds and Denzel Washington, the R-rated action thriller was released in theaters in February 2012 and was a considerable commercial success that made $208.1 million at the worldwide box office against its $85 million budget.
Now, 14 years later, Safe House ranks third on Hulu's Top 15 movies in the United States for today, January 29, where it has been for the past five days, per FlixPatrol. It ranks below Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere in first, Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire in second, and above Code 3, Spider-Man, and Spider-Man 3.
Rounding out the rest of the chart are Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Superbad, Spider-Man 2, Together, Anyone But You, Retribution, Remember the Titans (which also stars Denzel Washington), The Ritual Killer, and Napoleon Dynamite in 15th place.
Directed by Daniel Espinosa as his first English-language film, with a script written by David Guggenheim, Safe House stars Ryan Reynolds as a junior CIA agent stationed in Cape Town, South Africa responsible for overseeing a safe house where the agency is questioning a seasoned operative suspected of turning against the CIA (played by Denzel Washington).
After mercenaries attack the safe house, they escape together and are hunted across Cape Town by a group of assassins who always seem to anticipate their moves, forcing them to question whom they can truly rely on.
The cast also includes Oscar nominees Vera Farmiga (Up in the Air), Brendan Gleeson (The Banshees of Inisherin), Sam Shepard (The Right Stuff), two-time Emmy nominee Rubén Blades, Nora Arnezeder, Robert Patrick (Terminator 2: Judgment Day), Liam Cunningham (Game of Thrones), and Fares Fares.
Despite its commercial success, Safe House received mixed reviews, resulting in a 52% Rotten Tomatoes score, with critics claiming that the film features strong performances from Denzel Washington and Ryan Reynolds, though they are undermined by a weak script and poorly edited action scenes. Safe House was received slightly better by audiences, earning a 63% score from that group.
In September 2012, screenwriter David Guggenheim was hired by Universal to develop a script for a potential Safe House sequel, which has yet to come to fruition. Still, the combined star power of Denzel Washington and Ryan Reynolds is enough for audiences, propelling Safe House to streaming success 14 years later, enough if they are occasionally undermined by a weak script and poorly edited action scenes.
Release Date February 7, 2012
Runtime 115 Minutes
Director Daniel Espinosa
Writers David Guggenheim
English (US) ·