Film Review: Mercy

Welcome back to the blog readers. One genre of film that has never really sat right with me would have to be the screenlife genre. To be honest with you all, I really do not get why the genre exists in the first place. It feels like a lazy way to save money on a budget, but they all feel the same, especially that terrible War of the Worlds (2025) film from last year. Hearing this film would be coming left me intrigued and nervous at the same time since I love the stars of the film. Would this be another War of the Worlds? Stick around to find out.

Mercy was directed by Timur Bekmambetov from a screenplay by Marco van Belle. The film stars Chris Pratt, Rebecca Ferguson, Kali Reis, Annabelle Wallis, Chris Sullivan, and Kylie Rogers. In the film, an LAPD officer that had championed an AI judge system finds himself on the stand accused of murdering his wife and must prove his own innocence, but finds that there is more to his case than meets the eye.

I was conflicted on the idea of this film because like I said, I love the stars and the concept is admittedly brilliant, but the screenlife concept hampered my excitement. Then, seeing the negative reviews really got to me. I ventured into the theater on a freezing Saturday night and came out of the film expecting to hate it, but actually not hating it as much as I did. I did enjoy the performances of Chris Pratt and Chris Sullivan and the concept of the film, but the execution and the script are things I did not much enjoy.

Since this is the beginning of year four of this blog, you should know from my reviews of The Super Mario Bros. Movie and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (both 2023) that I am a big fan of Chris Pratt. I have no idea what it is, but I really like his style. While I may not have liked (or cared for) some of his recent projects like The Garfield Movie (2024) and The Electric State (2025), he is actually pretty convincing in his role in this film as LAPD officer Chris Raven. I could feel the rage and sadness in him when he is learning about his wife's murder. I could feel the regret when Raven's past is revealed. I can imagine it is more physical and mental since Pratt spends about 95% of the film restrained in a chair, and it really works in the end.

I also want to talk about the performance of Chris Sullivan in this film. This is a reunion of the Chris's because Sullivan was a small role (Taserface) in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017) and he was undoubtedly the best part of that pretty disappointing Presence (2025) film last year. But as Robert Nelson, there are things that I really gravitated towards with his performance. There is a part of the film (the first half) where Nelson is a brother figure and a warm presence (see what I did there?) where you are left to root for the character. But in the second half of the film, we see a Nelson that is completely turned on his head and is treated as a maniacal force that cannot be stopped. Seeing a more sinister side of Sullivan was really nice based on what we saw from him in Presence, and I hope he does more villainous roles in the future. Maybe a DCU villain?

The next thing I want to talk about regarding this film would have to be the concept of it. In case you do not remember my rant on the topic from my review of Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning (2023) and its sequel The Final Reckoning (2025), I am very against the notion of artificial intelligence being integrated so recklessly into our society. Some people have decreed that the concept of this film is declaring a pro-AI and pro-cop stance, but I would reckon against that. Using an AI court system and having a defendant prove their own innocence in 90 minutes is a real look at how flawed the justice system is that we have to resort to AI to convict and execute the worst of the worst creates a groundswell of issues that we will be dealing with in real life soon enough in my estimation.

Unfortunately, a good concept does not always lead to good execution, and this film is one of the unfortunate commonalities to the rule. I do have to say that this is going to go hand-in-hand with the script because the failure in execution has to do with the script. The dialogue that is said by the actors is wooden most of the time and felt very unlike what people would say, and I thought that it was pretty convenient in a sense. I could have telegraphed our main character's true innocence and one of the other characters' betrayals. Oldest trick in the book right there. It was nice to see that the final twist of the film is ties to the first big twist and that there are some layers to it.

In conclusion, Mercy is a not terrible (but not great) look at the potential future of law enforcement that features some pretty solid performances. Thank you all for reading, and I will see you for the next post.