Mercy (2023): A Familiar Tale of Survival and Heroism

There is something about the portrayal of female heroes in films that makes me wonder why the stories crafted for them are sometimes different. Perhaps the perspective of a woman takes a completely different shape from how it would be if it were to be the other gender.

Reading its synopsis, I became interested in a film about how an ex-military doctor would be able to deal with a whole mafia gang infiltrating her hospital. The beginning of the film only served to give a bit of background on the life of the main character. Nothing spectacular or particularly fascinating. And my expectations for the film were lowered even further.

In no time, the film was over, and even my already-lowered expectations were not exceeded in any way. The film turned out to be something not out of the ordinary and basically something that I had seen times without number in the film industry before.

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An ex-military doctor finds herself in a fight for survival when the Irish mafia seizes control of the hospital at which she works. When her son is taken hostage, she's forced to rely on her battle-hardened past and lethal skills to save the day. _Source

One could easily tell just how it would end. It is very much like those stories where you know that the hero is going to win, but there's going to be a back-and-forth tossle between the heroes and the villains, with some action here and there. That really is how it happens with action films, mostly, but I was interested in passing time with just about any film that could help with that.

Although many films like this would be fast-paced, I like to think that what we had for most of the beginning was just alright for a good start. I liked how it was all progressing, slowly and steadily yet with entertaining thrills here and there. Eventually, it all started to get a little more interesting, but there was nothing particularly novel about that.

Perhaps what made the film enjoyable for most of it were the subtle nuances in the characters and their portrayal by the actors. Leah Gibson, the main actor, had, to me, the right blend of physique and intensity to convincingly depict an ex-military doctor turned reluctant hero.

The characters were all unique to me—heroes and villains. And with them all playing their parts in the film, it all added the necessary colour and life to keep the film fairly engaging. There may have been some tiny bit of criginess in some of their performances, like how the lead would sometimes weirdly display emotion over her kid in the whole ruckus—understandably so, though—when she was apparently ex-military with a good amount of decorations and impressive experience from her service.

Speaking of the visuals of the film, I would point out that it wasn't impressive in any way. The CGI or bombings in this film were clearly low-effort. Then the camera work was just meh. That all didn't reduce the film much per se, but it may have helped a little bit if there was a lot more done in that aspect of the film.

The ending turned out a little less than I expected. I felt like a little more depth in its story and action would have made the film a little more enjoyable. And for a film whose setting was beyond the hospital insides, surely some more effort would have been great. Thankfully, the interactions between the characters, particularly the villains, were one of the redeeming aspects.

Mercy (2023) offered something a bit competent, but it all turned out to be unremarkable generally. It definitely passes for a film to pass time with, but not something I would have checked out knowing this much about it. I give it a rating of 5.5/10.