Safe is both a slavish imitation of cinema gone by and a movie for our time. I found it wickedly entertaining and perversely refreshing in its total lack of contemporary piety.

A preposterously enjoyable - or enjoyably preposterous - action-thriller.

Statham probably isn't going to be doing Shakespeare anytime soon. But everybody ought to be good at something, and when it comes to this kind of thing, Statham is very good, indeed.

Safe's primary contribution to the burgeoning Jason-Statham-kicks-everyone's-ass subgenre is setting three of its set pieces in crowded New York City venues (a subway car, a hotel dining room, and a Chinatown nightclub) where shootouts lead to believable mass-exodus pandemonium.

You can't help feeling that an initially adventurous movie has had its rough edges sanded away.