In the near future, a detective (Chris Pratt) stands on trial accused of murdering his wife. He has 90 minutes to prove his innocence to the advanced A.I. Judge (Rebecca Ferguson) he once championed, before it determines his fate.
Directed byTimur Bekmambetov, see MERCY in theaters January 23.
Filmed for IMAX®. Experience it in 3D.
The St. Louis screening is on Wednesday, January 21, at 7pm at Ronnies in IMAX 3D.
Jonathan Rhys Meyer (top) in the crime action thriller MERCY. Courtesy of Paramount
There isn’t much mercy in MERCY but there is a lot of action and stunt in this crime thriller set in a hospital, starring Leah Gibson (Jessica Jones), Jonathan Rhys Meyers (Vikings) and Jon Voight (Coming Home).
Leah Gibson plays a surgeon at Mercy hospital, a former military doctor in the Afghanistan War, who finds herself caught in difficult spot when the wounded son of an Irish mafia leader (Jon Voight) is brought to her hospital, and the Irish mafia seize control of the hospital. As the mafia head and his hot-headed son (Jonathan Rhys Meyers) battle FBI agents guarding the wounded man, the doctor finds herself, and her young son, caught in the crossfire, forcing her to call upon her battlefield past.
There is a DIE HARD vibe to MERCY but a little TAKEN too, as this ex-military doctor has a “special set of skills” besides in the operating room, skills these criminals aren’t expecting. That is no spoiler, since the film gives away that history early on.
And that is part of MERCY’s problem. While the action thriller has a talented supporting cast in bad guys Jon Voight and Jonathan Rhys Meyers, and the delight of a strong female action protagonist in Leah Gibson, the script gives away too much too soon. Director Tony Dean Smith does not help by doing little to build suspense, although the potential is there. Still, there are plenty of thrilling martial arts action scenes featuring Gibson, who trained as a dancer and really has some moves, but early on we get a flashback to Afghanistan that lets us know this hard-working female doctor is more than a widowed mother hoping to take a day off to spend with her young son on his birthday. After further flashbacks tells us she is a decorated sharpshooter too, we are not surprised she is a crack shot, although the bad guys are pretty taken aback by that discovery. Time and again, the script tips us off to the good doctor’s other skills before we get to see them in action.
But the real point of MERCY is the action. And the action sequences are good, with some thrilling martial arts work in the hospital corridors and stairwells. The action is kicked off with a nice, thrilling shoot-out car chase. An array of criminal henchmen are there to be picked off as this action-er unspools, and an internal divide in the Irish mafia gang, with a sibling conflict that dad Jon Voight is unaware of, gives dad and son Rhys Meyers different goals, adds to the tension.
Jon Voight and Jonathan Rhys Meyer do their best to breath life into their underwritten bad guy characters. A lot of that burden falls on Rhys Meyer, in his larger role playing the loose-cannon son that his father Voight is always trying to rein in. Rhys Meyer’s character is violent and slightly crazy and his motivations don’t always completely make sense, but the actor does well menacing hostages in the hospital and the doctor, while directing his loyal gang of odd-character criminals in a hunt for the wounded brother.
MERCY delivers a series of action confrontations as Voight and Rhys Meyers separately hunt the wounded brother, while the doctor, other staff and FBI try to hide him, a cat-and-mouse game that whittles down the participants on both sides.
If you are just looking for fast and bloody action thriller, with clear good guy – bad guy lines and a kick-ass female hero, MERCY will fit that bill, as long as you aren’t looking also for plot surprises or character depth, or much mercy. But this thriller with a female doctor with a military background as a protagonist had potential to be a more suspenseful film, with a script that had taken a different approach to the idea. As is, it largely wastes the talents of Jonathan Rhys Meyer and Jon Voight in a script that just mechanically moves from one fight scene to the next without the suspense and character depth it could have had.
MERCY opens Friday, May 19, in select theaters and on digital, and will be available On Demand on June 2.
Universal has released the official synopsis for the King of Horror’s MERCY.
Based on a short story “Gramma” by Stephen King, MERCY tells the tale of two young boys (The Walking Dead‘s Chandler Riggs and Super 8‘s Joel Courtney) who move with their mother to take care of their dying grandmother at her decrepit farmhouse. When they suspect that the elderly woman they love has encountered a dark spirit, they fear she might not be the only one who won’t make it through the summer alive.
Once George (Riggs) and Buddy McCoy (Courtney) arrive at their Gramma Mercy’s (Shirley Knight), what they find inside her 150-year-old home is nothing short of terrifying. As the brothers experience deeply disturbing phenomena they believe to be the work of an ancient witch, they must fight for their lives and overcome the evil forces threatening their family.
Directed by Peter Cornwell (The Haunting in Connecticut), MERCY is produced by Jason Blum of Blumhouse (Paranormal Activity, Insidious, Sinister), McG (Terminator Salvation, Charlie’s Angels) and Mary Viola (Brooklyn’s Finest, We Are Marshall) of Wonderland Sound and Vision. The film stars Shirley Knight, Frances O’Connor, Chandler Riggs, Joel Courtney, Mark Duplass and Dylan McDermott.
The supernatural thriller is presently set for a 2014 release. For those who can’t wait another year for more King, CBS has adaptated his novel UNDER THE DOME and will premiere the series on June 24th. UNDER THE DOME is based on his bestselling novel about a small town that is suddenly and inexplicably sealed off from the rest of the world by a massive transparent dome.
CineVegas 2009 is right around the corner (this week to be precise), and We Are Movie Geeks are going to be there in full force. Throughout the festival, which runs from June 10th through the 15th, we are going to be bringing you all the coverage you need including reviews, interviews, party breakdowns, and red carpet premiere coverage.
‘Mercy’ is the new drama/romance film written by Scott Caan and directed by Patrick Hoelck. With screenplays for ‘Dallas 362’ and ‘The Dog Problem’ already under his belt, Caan seems to be anything but an amateur when it comes to writing about relationships and connections. Hoelck is a first-time feature film director on this one, but, with a cast that includes Scott and James Caan, Erika Christensen, Wendy Glenn, and Dylan McDermott, ‘Mercy’ looks to be one of the more powerful films of the fest.
Here’s the film’s synopsis:
John is a novelist who writes about love… even though he’s never been in love. In fact, he’s pretty sure that love doesn’t exist. Yet that doesn’t keep him from leading a seemingly fulfilling bachelors lifestyle and honing his seduction skills to an art form. That’s until he meets Mercy. A critic who writes a scathing review of his latest book, Mercy sees through John’s “teetering on charming” exterior and into his shallow, egotistical core. In spite of these circumstances, or perhaps because of them, he asks her out. She says yes. Miraculously, their relationship blossoms into something very real and John begins to open up to love and life. Yet, in doing so, he exposes himself to the potential perils that come with the “L” word.Written by and starring Scott Caan, MERCY is distinctly contemporary in its setting and characters yet harkens back to love stories of old with its unabashed romanticism. Caan’s writing has an intimate quality that enables him to drop in small but pertinent insights then let the ripples spread through the story. Director Patrick Hoelck employs a winning mix of luscious cinematography and low-key naturalism to excavate that strange mix of confidence, longing and denial that underpins a certain strain of male psyche. With a tone that is romantic yet authentic, Caan and Hoelck create a charmingly comic but intensely moving story about finding oneself in love.
‘Mercy’ screens on Saturday, June 13th at 8:30 pm and on Sunday, June 14th at 12:30 pm.
