‘Mercy’ Review: AI Courtroom Thriller Showcases Mixed Morals

Following the end of his involvement in the Guardians of the Galaxy and Jurassic World franchises, actor Chris Pratt has made a series of baffling decisions. From jumping onboard the disaster that was The Electric State to a widely disliked Garfield animated movie, he has now moved on to Mercy, from director Timur Bekmambetov.

Mercy follows Detective Chris Raven (Chris Pratt), an alcoholic cop, who wakes to find himself in an electric chair in a courtroom, where he is told about and subsequently tried for the murder of his wife, Nicole (Annabelle Wallis), by the AI judge Maddox (Rebecca Ferguson). Soon, he must prove to this judge that he is innocent and piece together evidence in 90 minutes before he is executed by the program.

It’s a pretty simple concept, but the execution is where this film becomes more unique than other courtroom thrillers. The film is a movie that takes place in one location, using diagetic software to showcase context such as videos, phone calls, and the internet. This is not new for director Timur Bekmambetov, as he previously produced the Unfriended franchise, the Searching/Missing duology, and the recent War of the Worlds remake starring Ice Cube. He clearly has a niche in regards to his storytelling methodology, and this film proves that.

The film thrives when it is a detective/courtroom thriller where Pratt showcases his characters detective skills, connecting one dot to another, playing as a massive 90 minute puzzle. Personally, I’m a sucker for these types of stories, and was definitely satisfied for the most part of the runtime.

The film fails however in the writing, with this all-seeing AI judge being kind of an idiot, a lot of the timeline details being unbelieveable (how has there only been 19 cases in this court in 2 years if each trial is 90 minutes long), and some of the character motives feeling underbaked just for the reason of promoting a moral argument.

This moral argument, seemingly anti-police is a valid one, but the way it’s framed is really poor and the film suffers for it. On the flip side, the more prevalent moral argument and seemingly the message of the film, is a pro-AI argument where the “villain” of the film slowly turns into the main reason things turn out for the better. In an age like this, its a really irresponsible message even if it doesn’t affect the quality of the film itself too much.

In all, I found this to be a very interesting time at the multiplex, but a lack of compelling writing, silly plot threads, and poor reasoning for its themes and messaging make this movie mediocre, and the overwhelmingly poor reception this film has seen is quite understandable.

Mercy stars Chris Pratt as Chris Raven, Rebecca Ferguson as Judge Maddox, Annabelle Wallis as Nicole Raven, Kali Reis as Jaq, and Chris Sullivan as Rob Nelson. The film was released in theatres worldwide on January 22nd, and is still playing everywhere.

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