Customer Reviews

Mercury Rising (Widescreen Collector's Edition)

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(17)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

Really happy to have this film on Blu-ray. It is one of the better Bruce Willis films made, IMHO!!

I truly enjoyed this movie. In my opinion, this is one of Bruce Willis's best films.

This one could easily serve as Exhibit B in any indictment of knee-jerk Hollywood anti-Americanism. Exhibit A would have to be a better film.

The premise concerns an autistic child who is able to sightread extremely high-order classified ciphers. He's accomplished exactly that with the National Security Agency's latest version, which he's accessed through one of the lamest plot twists imaginable. (They've placed it in a puzzle magazine to beta-test it--no, I'm not making this up.)

So great -- the NSA hires the kid and turns him loose on Chinese, French, and other unfriendly ciphers, right? No they do not. Wake up -- this is Hollywood. They send goons out to kill him, which is where Bruce Willis, playing a conflicted law-enforcement officer of uncertain antecendents, comes to the rescue. From there on it's the standard huggermugger--unnecessary hairbreadth escapes, elite assassins who turn dopey at the most convenient moment, all-but-omniscient villains who can't see the obvious trap at the climax, etc.

The acting was phoned in. Willis can do many things well, but he can't do conflicted. For some peculiar reason, the guy who fed Buscemi into the wood chipper in "Fargo" has his hair dyed black in this one. All traces of quirkiness evident in his performance for the Coens has vanished here.

The sole exception to the overall blandness is provided by the Bloviator himself, Alec Baldwin. Perhaps the film's major offense is the implication that whole scheme is being carried out in support of Iraqi agents working against Saddam. (Kind of getting a jump on Fatboy Moore here.) Baldwin repeats this contention several times during the film, very impressively, too. With conviction, you might say.

All in all, this is a film that makes "Enemy of the State" look good. A clearer recommendation I cannot provide.

There was an article about a script writer's journey in getting his picture made. I sympathize with the guy. He was down on his luck, his rent was three months overdue, and his wife was getting seriously pissed off.

The plot of his script was simple. It was about an autistic boy named Simon who can read the secret codes embedded in crossword puzzles. In other words, he took a common urban myth and wrote a script about it. Not original, but certainly compelling. Add Bruce Willis to the mix and you have a big budget movie.

Then one day, his agent called. He was nervous. A major studio was offering a six figure number for the movie. When other movie studios heard about it, a war of escalation ensued. Soon, they were trying to outbid each other. The price kept climbing and climbing and climbing.

Finally, the agent had enough. The script was sold. Presumably, the scriptwriter got to stay married and pay off his rent. And, I hope, socked the money away into savings. Because this movie sucks.

The movie went through several title changes, a sure sign that there's a problem. It was originally supposed to be Simon Says, but the execs changed it because nobody knew what that meant. So they changed it to Mercury Rising instead. As Dr. Evil would say, "Riiiight."

There's a few problems. One of them is translating onto screen the depiction of code. Apparently, the movie decides code decryption sounds like a high-pitched whining sound. Perhaps it's an accurate parallel, but it's not fun to listen to.

Simon's autism is depicted a little too accurately. His parents are killed early on, so Simon's on his own and fairly incapable of doing much besides wailing his head off when touched. This is very accurate. This does not make for a pleasant movie.

Willis' character is the usual -- haggard, determined, violent. He isn't much more than that. He gets tangled up in the plot (FBI vs. "Government Bad Guys") and calls in favors.

The bad guys show a distinct lack of common sense. It's so blithly nonsensical that it's not even worth the energy to describe the inconsistencies. Suffice it to say, the bad guys show a boogeyman-like ability to pop up anywhere when convenient, and a surprising inability to do it when it might impair the protagonist.

What bugged me most is that ultimately, this movie could have been about ANYBODY who happened to know Something Secret (TM). It wasn't about the boy's ability to crack code, it was about Bruce Willis' character protecting an innocent. Like in Eraser. Like in Enemy of the State. Like in a dozen other movies. Only in Enemy of the State, the main character's skills actually were USEFUL in the plot. Simon never gets to exercise his code-cracking abilities more than once (to meet one of the soon-to-be-dead informants).

Even in portraying an autistic person, Rain Man and Cube still managed to make the character worth liking instead of utterly pathetic.

The other problem is that the villain's execuse is -- *GASP! -- being a patriot to protect undercover agents in Iraq. Well, that dates the movie just a little bit. Not their fault, necessarily, but certainly the movie loses its sting. In addition, the whole concept of "sacrificing one for the good of all" is a little more strict these days. Ask an American if an autistic boy's life should be spared to save thousands of agents attempting to stop terrorism and more than half will doom the boy.

I can understand why the studio execs bid on the idea. It was a great concept but utterly defanged of any real meaning, failing to utilize its characters, its high-minded ideals, or even its action scenes in a way that makes us care about anybody in the movie. Yes, even an autistic little boy.

Bruce Willis returns in the role of a loose cannon, demoted by the FBI after a hostage situation goes tragically awry. Willis is great in these kind of roles, eliciting both a strong macho appearance, but with an inner sensitivity that evades other actors. Willis' scenes with Miko Hughes as the autistic Simon are the highlights of the film, as is the supporting performances by Chi McBride as Willis' buddy and Kim Dickens as a young lady who gets involved in the situation. Alec Baldwin is smarmy again as the villainous NSA director. The main problem I found with this picture is director Harold Becker's meandering pacing and inability to maintain a tight level of suspense. The climax is great, but wading through some really slow scenes hurts it overall.
Not a great film, but a good one.

This adventure film is based on the assumption that a state-of-the-art encrypted message could be read by an autistic nine year old! It is another film that is full of sound and fury. There is Alec Baldwin playing a reactionary Govt. agent who is out to kill this autistic child and his parents. Bruce Willis plays the bleeding-heart liberal out to save the world, one child at a time. Hollywood tells the truth.

The film opens with a botched bank robbery in "South Dakota", of all places. Undercover agent Bruce pleads for more time so he can save two teen aged boys. This fails, and they are killed resisting arrest. (Could an agent really get this deeply involved?) [Does this allow latecomers to take seats and not miss anything?] Next comes the main plot. The autistic boy reads a puzzle magazine, and solves it in his head! This causes the murder of his parents, and the boy's narrow escape. The Chicago police are called, and Bruce gets his assignment: cover this case. He finds the hidden boy, takes him to a hospital. Now Bruce figures out that the boy is a target, and the rest of the story is how he tries to keep him alive until the happy ending.

The assassination of a code clerk on a busy street reminds me of Hitchcock's "Foreign Correspondent" or similar replicated scenes. The tale of "rogue agents out of control" was disproved by the Watergate hearings. These agents are never "out of control" until they're caught. Andrew Jackson said that government was not a necessary evil, only its abuses were evil. Is this still true?

one of Willis' softer more gentler side as he trys to save a young boys life from the evil clutches of the menacing Alec Baldwin. some lagin parts but its picked up by Willis' care for the kid and the ending where Baldwin flys and soars to the bottom off the building. suspense and plot take good aim here

Very good job of an exciting and different thriller. OK the kid is annoying at times, but the movie really is great. See it!

There is nothing very new about Mercury Rising but the standard ingredients are well assembled and the end product is professional and enjoyable.
Willis plays a maverick FBI agent who blames the trigger-happiness of his superiors for the failure of an undercover mission he was involved with .This involved infiltrating a survivalist group ,and ended in the avoidable deaths of the leader's teenaged boys .For his violent reaction Willis is downgraded from undercover work to routine surveillance jobs.He is called to the scene of a shooting in a quiet Chicago suburb -a man and wife callously shot ,by what we know are NSA agents.The prime target was their 9 year old autistic son ,Simon ,who has unknowingly cracked a code ,"Mercury "that guarantees the safety of several key undercover US agents in the Middle East.The head of NSA -played with the right cold eyed precision by Alec Baldwin-has ordered the death of the child.
Willis goes on the run with the child and the movie revolves around his attempts to protect the boy ,and expose the forces hunting him down.

The action that folows is predictable to an extent --car chases,rooftop shootouts and narrow escapes but it is done well and the role represents an interesting softening of the hard man Willis image in his concern for the child .More could have bben made of the autism angle but I recommend the movie for those in search of a proficient thriller which nicely balances humanity with swift and compelling action

It is better than its critical reputation suggests it will be.

I guess I'm not an intellectual, but I love it! It's one of those movies that I can watch over and over again (and have). While the action plot may not be that original, the acting and personal side of the story line captured me. I like the scenes that show how the different adults in the boy's life care for him and accommodate his disability and, also, how that plays into the suspense side of the story. I also love the scene in the wine cellar! Plausibility, shmausibility - if you just want to watch an entertaining and captivating movie without too much analysis, try this one.