Artificial intelligence has always been a ripe subject to stage a movie around, and it’s never been more relevant than right now. One upcoming 2026 movieMercy introduces an interesting premise, when a detective accused of murdering his wife has 90 minutes to prove his innocence to an advanced A.I. before it decides his fate. Critics have seen the sci-fi action thriller, and they’re saying it felt like they were the ones being held captive.
Chris Pratt plays Chris Raven, the accused detective, and he’s joined by Rebecca Ferguson as the A.I. Judge Maddox — Raven’s judge, jury and potential executioner. In CinemaBlend’s review of Mercy, Eric Eisenberg says the plot “doesn’t make a lick of goddamn sense,” and without that foundation, the film can’t produce anything insightful or even fun. He rates the movie 1.5 stars out of 5, writing:
Ultimately, Mercy is a gimmick movie – the gimmicks being the new angle on screenlife filmmaking and the real-time storytelling – and I have no inherent problem with that, as there are plenty of solid features in cinematic history that hinge on unique approaches. The problem here is that those gimmicks are put on top of a rotten foundation, and that means that the work gets more and more broken as it continues to build. Save for you being abducted, locked into a chair and forced to watch it, it’s most definitely a film to skip.
Artificial intelligence? More like “artificial stupidity,” according to the Daily Beast’s Nick Schager. The critic is declaring Mercy the “worst movie of 2026,” which is a bold statement to make in mid-January. But watching people watch screens is boring, and the mystery plays out with a frustrating half-heartedness, Schager says, continuing:
Mercy is an inherently static affair that, save for reaction shots of Pratt looking harried, angry, and laser-focused, takes place entirely on Maddox’s screen, and all the whooshing about between digital windows, folders, documents, photographs, and videos is a lame replacement for genuine physical and spatial movement.
Siddhant Adlakha of IGN gives the movie a “Bad” 4 out of 10, saying it squanders its good ideas. It’s also rough to adjust your eyes to all of the different windows popping up in different planes of focus, the critic writes — especially if you see the film in 3D. Adlakha says of Mercy:
A headache-inducing screenlife film that straps Chris Pratt to a chair and holds its audience hostage too, Mercy squanders its potential as a sci-fi thriller about the dangers of entwining justice and artificial intelligence. The result plays less like the tongue-in-cheek mystery-thriller director Timur Bekmambetov seems to be aiming for, and more like an advertisement to tech investors, making the movie chilling in unintended ways.
Frank Scheck of THR says that with Chris Pratt strapped to a chair for most of the movie, Mercy is about as fun as watching 90 minutes of surveillance footage. So many low-res videos make a car chase scene near the end a welcome sight, Scheck says, and audiences will definitely be left in need of a digital detox. As for the leads’ performances, Pratt is hampered by his character’s circumstances, as the critic writes:
While Pratt can be effective in the right vehicle (Jurassic World, Guardians of the Galaxy), he’s very dependent on his athletic physicality. Watching him as he sits motionless in a chair for nearly 90 minutes, not able to resort to the humor with which he often peppers his performances, mainly serves as a demonstration of his limitations as an actor. Ferguson comes off much better, especially when she subtly reveals the hints of emotionality that begin to seep into her character’s data-driven persona.
It’s not all bad, though. Eli Friedberg of Slant gives the upcoming action flick 2.5 stars out of 4, saying Mercy poses interesting questions about privacy, policing and (of course) artificial intelligence, all while capturing the familiar anxiety of doomscrolling. Friedberg posits:
As Raven races to comb the head-spinning seas of data looking for clues to solve the mystery, discussion turns not only to the disturbing volume of personal info made publicly accessible to motivated snoops (or algorithms), but to the truths that data alone can’t reveal, or that can hide in incomplete pictures—sometimes literally. Not every aspect holds up to scrutiny, but the film is a decently tense bit of future-shock schlock, formally attuned to the chatbot-consulting, database-gorging, digitally-drunk ethos of the moment, and worth catching in its maximalist theatrical format while the opportunity presents itself.
Critics as a whole don’t seem to be buying into the screenlife sci-fi thriller, with the movie earning just 16% on Rotten Tomatoes. However, if this plot seems intriguing to you, or you never miss a chance to see Chris Pratt on the big screen — no matter how sedentary he may be — you can catch Mercy in theaters starting Friday, January 23. (Also, don’t miss that Parks and Recreation cameo!)
