Mercy – Movie Review

TL;DR – This is an insipid, soulless, and excruciating attempt to appear relevant, but it ends up having little genuine intellectual fortitude.

Rating: 1.5 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene.

Disclosure – I paid to watch this film.

A ticking countdown clock.

Mercy Review Introduction

Now, I’ll be honest from the outset, while I always try to go into a film not knowing the general reaction towards it, sometimes you simply can’t escape finding out. In that vein, I did know that Mercy was generally considered a bit of a dumpster fire before I walked in, but people and critics can be very wrong, so given the cast and the premise, I was ready to give it the benefit of the doubt. I should not have given it the benefit of the doubt.  

So, to set the scene, in the not-too-distant future, Los Angeles is under attack from crime, civil disturbance, and a court system about to fail. To change that up, they institute the Mercy System, where violent offenders of capital crimes are sent to the Mercy Court, where an AI judge (Rebecca Ferguson) gives them 90 minutes to lower their guilt probability to under 92%, or they are instantly executed. One of the early proponents of this new system is LAPD Detective Christopher “Chris” Raven (Chris Pratt), who supported it after his partner (Kenneth Choi) was killed in the line of duty. Which is unfortunate for him, because he now sits strapped to a chair with that same AI judge staring down at him watching a clock count down and a guilt probability that he killed his wife, Nicole (Annabelle Wallis), sitting at 97.5%.

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Movie Review – Gringo

TL;DR – There are individual elements of Gringo that are interesting, but as a whole, the movie just doesn’t really work all that well

Score – 2 out of 5 stars

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene

Gringo. Image Credit: Amazon Studios

Review

In some respects, Gringo is a really interesting film, because it is attempting something quite different from a narrative perspective, and it is clear that the cast is giving it their all. However, like a diver doing a front four and a half over-rotating and splashing into the pool, it just does not come together.

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Movie Review – Bright

TL;DR – It is only the power of Will Smith and Joel Edgerton’s acting, plus some great makeup and prosthetic work, that drags this film out of being a complete write off.

Score – 2.5 out of 5 stars

Bright. Image Credit: Netflix.

Review

Ok, I want to start this by saying smashing genres and worlds together is kind of my jam, I love the worldbuilding, and taking something familiar and twisting it into something new. So when I heard the setting for Bright I was really excited. Taking those familiar fantasy setting, themes and races and transporting them into the modern world, it’s like Max Landis wrote a film just for me. But, and oh it is a big but, for the most part, it just does not work, and at best we get a mediocre C-List film with a B-List budget and A-List leading stars.

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