‘Safe House’: Paranoia and Thrills Abound

Hallmark Hall of Fame meets 007 in “Safe House,” a wonderfully unconventional film in which a man’s paranoia may or may not be caused by the onset of Alzheimer’s disease.

Patrick Stewart stars in this Showtime presentation, which debuts Sunday (opposite the Golden Globes), as a retired military man who holes up in a surveillance-protected, munitions-stockpiled fortress of a home in the Hollywood Hills. Gradually, we recognize his walled existence as a metaphor for all Alzheimer’s sufferers--cut off from the outside world, unable to be themselves.

The story heads in directions explored in countless social-issue movies when the fiercely independent Stewart must learn to trust the earnest young caregiver (Kimberly Williams) that Stewart’s daughter and son-in-law (Joy Kilpatrick and James Harlow) have hired to live with him. In their lively interplay, Williams calls Stewart “Goldfinger” and “J. Edgar,” and when scolding him for shooting live rounds in the garden, demands: “What are you, a Branch Davidian? Where the hell do all these [guns] come from?”

Though most everyone dismisses Stewart’s behavior as a symptom of his disease, a young pal (Craig Shoemaker) indulges him by participating in home-invasion drills in which one or the other of them invariably ends up dripping with paintball blood. Though it would be easy for us, too, to dismiss these shenanigans, there’s something terrifyingly believable in Stewart’s insistence that his military career involved a stint in a secret assassination squad, and that his politically ambitious former commander wants to make sure that the truth is permanently silenced.

Tautly directed by Eric Steven Stahl from a script by himself, John Schalter and Sean McLain, the film moves, thrills and amuses us--all while keeping us guessing, right to the very end.

* “Safe House” debuts Sunday at 8 p.m. on Showtime. The network has rated it TV-14 (may be unsuitable for children younger than 14).