Skip to main content

Mercy (2014) - More People Do Things In The Name Of Love Than Anything Else

Often, I find myself asking things like, "How did I accidentally pick another zombie movie to watch?" or "How did I accidentally pick another found footage movie to watch?" Tonight, on the heels of watching The Taking of Deborah Logan, I have to pose the question, "How did I accidentally pick another Stephen King movie and another possession movie to watch?"

There was very little I could turn up on the internet about this movie, leading me to believe no one really gives a crap about it. There's good reason for this: like most movie adaptations of King's stories, the plot is convoluted, the tone is that of a made for tv movie, the writing is childish, and the acting is uneven (at best). I have never seen such pathetic fake crying before this. 

Alright, here's the gist: 
A woman must move back to her childhood home to care for her ailing mother. Which is pretty much the identical story of Deborah Logan. "Ailing," in this case, turns out to mean, "sold her soul to the devil and is now paying the price for that sale." As you might expect. Along for the ride are the woman's two teenage sons; one wants to be a chef and the other talks to spirits. Cryptic messages are delivered, supernatural encounters are had, and oh yes, people die. Unfortunately, not nearly enough of them, if I'm honest. The ending is some bullshit, happily ever after nonsense. I was actually worried that they were going to have the soulless grandmother live. Thankfully, she doesn't.

Great segue here: what I did turn up about the source material is that it ends very differently than the movie. Apparently, King's unhappy ending didn't fly with the studio - which is a bummer because it reads way better than the movie ending.

There are shades of Pet Sematary and The Shining coloring this one, but that doesn't help the story any. Perhaps this one is the final, unequivocal proof that Stephen King loves money more than he cares about his art. Side note here: the source material is actually pretty old. My point here is that the movie version is shit and is clearly just a chance for King to make a few bucks for very little work.

I'd also like to note that I can only suspend my disbelief so far. Central to the story is a man killing himself with an axe blow to the head. Who kills themselves with an axe to the head? I guess the idea is impressively creative, if not impossible and idiotic to execute. The only redeeming piece of this movie may be the hilariously bad joke that the death by axe is called (by one of the characters) an "axe-ident." Puns. Glorious puns.

Top all this off with Dylan Mcdermott running around pointlessly in the middle of it all, still desperately trying to convince the world that he's a real actor... to no avail.

Watch it if: you like sub-par stories about selling your soul to the devil.

For your viewing displeasure, the Mercy trailer:
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Rebuttal: 17 Disturbing Horror Movies You Will Never Watch Again

When I'm not watching movies, I'm reading about movies. I stumble across all kinds of articles, blog posts, book excerpts, etc. in my quest to absorb as much movie knowledge as possible.

Now, I'm snotty and loud-mouthed and opinionated but I'd never begrudge another human their opinion. Seriously. You're absolutely welcome to have any opinion about any thing you want. However, I must warn you, if I think your opinion is stupid, I'm absolutely going to say so.

I've recently stumbled on an article completely brimming with so many idiotic opinions that I'm actually compelled to craft a response.

Here's the gist of the original article: there are some horror movies out there that are so disturbing, you'll only ever want to watch them once. I've have taken her original list and refuted her claims without pulling her entire article over. You can read the original article here.

Let's start at the beginning, with her opening statement:
"Hor…
Post a Comment
Read more

But The Flesh Is Weak: Cronenberg's Body Horrors

Body horror; something that effects each one of us as we are made of squishy, fallible, and finite flesh. Tackled many times in many ways throughout the years, body horror will stick with us until we finally learn to lose these weak, human bodies and begin existing in some other form.

There are many lenses through which to view body horror, lets talk about a few quickly before talking about some specific films in this genre.


Science and Technology
We depend on technology, especially in regards to our flimsy, fleshy bodies. Hip replacements, new hearts, brain surgery, iron lungs, cheek implants, etc. We have limited abilities and a limited lifespan, so we lean on technology to increase both. But what happens when we take that melding of mechanical and organic too far? Horror and scifi have taught us that going too far can lead to frighteningly devastating consequences and monstrous creations. (Species, Robocop, Frankenstein, etc.)


Gender
Much of body horror is related to or revolves arou…
Post a Comment
Read more

Pet Sematary

I learned a really interesting lesson the other night: no matter how many times you've seen a movie on a small screen, you haven't really seen it until you've done so on the big screen. Thus begins my story of realization in which I discover Pet Sematary (seemingly for the first time) and develop a theory that it might actually have been directed by David Lynch (this last bit being hyperbole, of course–but I've got a strong case for it, so stick with me).

Over the years, I've watched Pet Sematary a handful of times and while I know all the major plot points (and always remembered Denise Crosby as being completely awful), I definitely feel like I've seen a completely different movie this time around.

In case you're coming in late and don't know how the story goes, here's the $.25 of it: family moves into house positioned (oddly close) to an Indian burial ground. The neighbor is friendly (albeit creepy). The road they are on has absolutely no regular…
Post a Comment
Read more