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Early Reviews Pan AI Thriller ‘Mercy’ Ahead of Friday Theatrical Debut

Critics single out the high-concept premise and performances while questioning the film’s worldbuilding and logic in Timur Bekmambetov’s screenlife courtroom experiment.

Overview

  • Rotten Tomatoes stood at about 30% on Jan. 21, with notices broadly praising the idea and leads but faulting execution, coherence and thematic depth.
  • Set in 2029 Los Angeles, the story follows LAPD detective Chris Raven (Chris Pratt) racing to prove his innocence in 90 minutes before AI judge Maddox (Rebecca Ferguson).
  • The film leans on Bekmambetov’s screenlife approach, surfacing evidence from social media, surveillance feeds, body cameras and doorbell videos inside a high-tech courtroom.
  • Amazon MGM Studios is giving Mercy an exclusive theatrical release on Jan. 23, with an IMAX presentation and a real-time, roughly 100-minute runtime.
  • Pratt said he asked to be strapped into the chair to intensify claustrophobia, and Ferguson shaped a largely motionless AI performance using an emotion chart provided by the director.