Since its release in the US Safety Not Guaranteed is a movie that has been garnering a fair amount of buzz as well as acclaim and going into the movie that's all I knew, unfortunately the thought of a good movie was soon quashed when it turned out that the movie was nothing more than a predictable rom-com.

The film follows three magazine employees played by Aubrey Plaza, Jake Johnson and Karan Soni heading out on an assignment to interview a man who placed a classified advert in the local paper, seeking a companion to travel through time with him.

As I said I knew nothing about this movie going into it other than it had received highly positive reviews and yes, I was somewhat disappointed. It's safe to say despite receiving a rather wide release this is not a movie for a mainstream audience. What this is, is a movie that is incredibly low budget (minus one use of CGI) that I imagine has been doing the rounds at a lot of film festivals. Don't get me wrong I didn't hate this film it's just that I didn't enjoy, as it's definitely not what I expected.

Watching the movie felt like a bit of a chore to me, despite its relatively short running time of eighty two minutes. On the other hand the film did feature good performances from its various cast members; it's just that I never felt emotionally invested by it. It just has a very strong indie feel to it and I personally feel its innovative concept is an attempt of trying too hard to do something different. It's a romantic comedy that wants you to believe it is not.

We've all seen similar stories told time and time again in the movies yet I won't go into detail as I don't want to spoil the film for anyone, I imagine that there will be a lot of you out there that will enjoy it but it just wasn't for me. It's a very well-constructed movie that is just far too predictable, in a way it's kind of a teenage girl movie due to its underlying tone that it seems to be hiding with its marketing campaign.

Originally I heard that this film was also particularly funny however I am definitely going to have to disagree. Minus garnering the occasional snigger it doesn't get any laughs at all.

Overall I respect Safety Not Guaranteed for its low-key production values; unfortunately I'm not the romantic comedy type, especially when I can see the ending coming from a mile off.

4/10