PREMISE
Set in the near future, a detective accused of murdering his wife has 90 minutes to prove his innocence to an advanced AI judge.
THE GOOD STUFF
THE CONCEPT- Many films have explored the idea of humans doing atrocious things to enable AI to run society properly. I am of the very unpopular belief that no matter how good the film is, there’s always something that these kinds of stories have to say that’s interesting. This is no different. The premise is fascinating.
“SCREENLIFE”- Technically speaking, MERCY is what is referred to as a “screenlife” film. A mode of visual storytelling that the director of this film, Timur Bekmambetov, has essentially pioneered. He’s directed four movies in this format, and he is extremely comfortable with the limitations of what can be shown. The strength of this format lies mostly when a character is in the process of uncovering a major plot secret. The way this format splices together a character’s inner thoughts as they happen works very well, in my humble opinion.
THE BAD STUFF
THE VILLAIN- It is flat-out spoiler territory to tell you who the villain of this film is, but let me tell you, they are telegraphing the f*** out of this character as the main villain in the first act. They do such a bad job of doing this. It’s almost as if they wrote themselves into a corner by exposing this character too quickly. Not to mention, this is the most elaborate dumb bad guy plan in a movie that I’ve seen in a little while, and the motives for this plan are equally as stupid.
THE ACTION- It is mind-boggling that this film is getting an IMAX 3D release, given how minimal the actual action is and how bad it looks on a visual level. Of the 90-minute run time, you are getting maybe a tablespoon of the action that you get in an average action film of equal running time. Had this film just stuck to its guns and stayed in the mystery thriller genre, there would still be quite a few things to complain about, sure, but it wouldn’t feel nearly as cheap as it does at the end.
THE UGLY STUFF
MADDOX- One thing that all of the movies about all the AI have been consistent about is that AI has NO real human emotions. It deals in statistics and facts and has no genuine interest in anything else. Sure, a couple of films in this subgenre have made their AI characters self-aware and develop human-like emotions independently. MERCY is a film that reiterates and literally quadruples down on the fact that this judge is incapable of doing that….and even still during a pivotal moment in the movie where the main protagonist is incapable of finding a clue to help his case, he is given a hint on what to do next from the AI judge in what is portrayed as a random act of empathy. Up until that moment in the film, I respected that it was sticking to its guns and not giving this AI character the human emotion of empathy, but it broke that rule, and the film quickly devolved into chaos after that.
**************
January movies have evolved quite a bit over time. We, as a film-going audience, have come to accept that in January and September, you’re just going to get sloppy s*** like this from time to time. You watch a movie like this with notable, respected stars and wonder where things go wrong and why their films are in January. And then it hits you… Many January movies have good ideas but severely lack world-building.
MERCY is a film with a good idea that requires a lot of explanation about why the characters are acting the way they are and the rules of the world they inhabit. January movies tend to give you sloppy narration before putting you in the immediacy of the moment, even though we need much more exposition to make the characters’ motives make more sense. Within the first 5 minutes of the film, you get the gist that it is not going to be well-structured. This is an attempt at a popcorn flick, not of the highest quality. And it’s a shame, because you know that wasn’t the intent. Not with something like this.
Mercy would have been a much better miniseries than it is a motion picture. Of the many movies I’ve seen over the last 6 months or so, I can actually point to this film and say that it would have most benefited from an eight-episode arc (and an explanation of the world, and physics) more than any other film that I’ve seen in that time.
MERCY is in theaters now
