Rating: 
Summary: Viewable, for adults only:
Review: I rather enjoyed this movie. I thought the acting was very good. It kept me alert, and thinking throughout. THIS IS NOT A FILM ABOUT lesbianism at all. What I do think, it has a lot more to do with "bondage" "s/m". If your looking for kinky lesbian sex, your not going to expierience it here.However, if your looking for a movie that dabbles, in the minds of certain main stream adults who have hang-ups with sex and pain, then this may be entertaining for you. Ellen Barkin, was perfect for this role, her facial expression told her story before her mouth moved. yet you wern't quite sure if she was wondering out loud on the fact that she may like this alternative life style. Peta Wilson, also did a tremndous job in role playing in this film. Im serious wondering, why I havent seen her in more films. She was utterly convincing, and beautifully attired in this movie. All in all a good movie, that I will view again in the near future.
Rating:
Summary: Viewable, for adults only:
Review: I rather enjoyed this movie. I thought the acting was very good. It kept me alert, and thinking throughout. THIS IS NOT A FILM ABOUT lesbianism at all. What I do think, it has a lot more to do with "bondage" "s/m". If your looking for kinky lesbian sex, your not going to expierience it here. However, if your looking for a movie that dabbles, in the minds of certain main stream adults who have hang-ups with sex and pain, then this may be entertaining for you. Ellen Barkin, was perfect for this role, her facial expression told her story before her mouth moved. yet you wern't quite sure if she was wondering out loud on the fact that she may like this alternative life style. Peta Wilson, also did a tremndous job in role playing in this film. Im serious wondering, why I havent seen her in more films. She was utterly convincing, and beautifully attired in this movie. All in all a good movie, that I will view again in the near future.
Rating: 
Summary: You Decide!
Review: I really can not make up my mind properly about Mercy, and it did offer me a slight dilemma reviewing it,
On the plus side, there is Peta Wilson, playing a lesbian who is into SM and who has an erotically charged scene with Ellen Barkin. So as far as erotic/thriller genre is concerned this is somehow a new twist.
On the down side, it is very badly filmed and scripted, a poor imitation of Dressed to Kill without the Hitchcockian atmosphere or De Palma's able direction. And it has also poor Julian Sands with yet another bad role, as bad in fact as his role in Boxing Helena, and this is no easy feat to manage, but he did!
So you can watch/buy this movie for Peta 'lezzing' it up, not a bad thing in itself,yet you can also be excused for using the word 'Mercy' only to be spared such mediocrity in the future..You decide!
Rating:
Summary: Not Quite Ellen Barkin
Review: I thought this video had a lot of potential for being a strong quiet erotic mistery, but everyone, especially Ellen played it way over the top. Trying so hard to be sensuous, when she should have just let her normal wonderful sensuality come through on it's own. It started off very nice. Wonderful music (where can I get that sound track), but then starts to get somewhat thin. The actual plot is interesting. I just don't think the actors pulled it off very well. It may have been the direction. I'm still very much an Ellen Barkin fan.
Rating:
Summary: better than the novel
Review: i was interested because i had read, several years back, the novel on which this was based, which was imperfect but exciting enough in its way. there are all kinds of flaws... which the film faithfully recreates. but the performances are very good, so it's not bad at all for late night video fare. ellen barkin and peta wilson are especially good.
Rating: 
Summary: Perpetuation of innacurate stereotypes
Review: If it were possible to give this movie a poorer rating than a single star, I would gladly do so. The movie is not only a badly made rehash of critical scenes from films such as Silence of the Lambs, it is also completely offensive. Sprung from some perverted, male fantasy, the women's BDSM group is comprised of nymphomanic sex offenders, each and every one a stone femme, complete with long hair, killer makeup and spiked high heels. There is not a single short-haired lesbian in the bunch. They seem capable of seducing any woman, no matter how straight, because it isn't just lesbians who are insatiable sexual animals with no morals, but all women. It is not only the killer who comes across as a fiendish killer, but the cast at large, as everyone is lambasted from therapy patients, cross dressers, lesbians, war veterans, therapists, police officers, and sexual abuse survivors etc. ad nauseam. The implication is clear; in order to be gay, cross dress, go to therapy, participate in BDSM, it is prerequisite that you be either sick and crazy, or at least be labouring under the burden of severe sexual abuse that somehow exhonorates you for your perversion by shifting the blame to some other pervert. For anyone in these communities, for anyone who might not appreciate the impression being broadcast that abuse survivors have all been made psychopaths, this movie may be more than a let down, but also a slap in the face. If you are interested in BDSM, this is not the place to look. It offers a skewed picture of the community based on non-consensuality, murder, torture and rape. Supporting films such as this one, aimed at a cheap thrill at someone else's expense through gross misrepresentation and misinformation is a poor idea. Were it a case in which a psycho-killer were the only demented character, that might count as good entertainment value, as Hannibal Lector has taught us. When the supposed weirdos are whole communities and when the film serves to perpetuate distorted understanding of people's lifestyle choices, it becomes inexcusable.
Rating:
Summary: Not a very good thriller
Review: If you are looking for a thriller that will keep you on the edge of your seat, then this is NOT the movie for you. The plot is slow! I prefer movies that a constantly making you question who the killer is, and at the end revealing the final clue to "who did it". The killer was unexpected, but it seemed as if the screen writer was grasping at straws to keep the movie going. Save yourself the 2 hours it took to watch this movie...
Rating:
Summary: is it Lindsey or Harris?
Review: In her previous roles Ellen Barkin has been the kind of actress willing to take risks. She was a repellent face-slasher in Johnny Handsome, she cross-dressed in Switch, or rather played a man reborn as a woman, even if it was within the context of a comedy, and in Bad Company she dabbled with miscegenation, having an affair with Laurence Fishburne. It is said that she turned down the Sharon Stone part in Basic Instinct, which may be evidence of her reluctance to explore lesbianism, and which also may explain her performance here. Even accepting that she is playing a homicide detective and a widow, her humourless restraint is baffling. She is amusing cursing when angry, but she is lit so unflatteringly that it's amazing that Peta Wilson as a suspect in serial murders would be interested in her. Director Damian Harris adapted the novel by David L Lindsey, and as apparently another version of the film includes flashback scenes between Barkin's dead husband and the woman he had an affair with, whom we see Barkin glare at, perhaps it is these scenes that give a clue to her behaviour. Wilson is presented as a lesbian predator by Harris in a way that doesn't pander to the exploitive porn genre, and has a scene where she picks up a stranger the way a heterosexual man would, which is a refreshing demonstration of sexual fair play. However when she attempts to seduce Barkin and is rebuffed, we are as perplexed as Wilson, primarily because Harris has set the tone with an expectation that Barkin has latent homosexual impulses, a theme given less weight than the tracking of the serial killer. (Note: I am not the type who pants for lesbian love scenes). Barkin actually responds most passionately to a dog that attacks her. So in spite of Harris' skill for pacing and glossy interiors, the killer plot is unsatisfyingly treated with bits thrown in from 8MM, and an inexplicable ambiguous conclusion. Julian Sands as a psychiatrist who has some connection with the victims and some professionally unwise private activities, points out the little known phenomena of male victims of female sexual abusers, and although the serial killings are all women, this is either a huge McGuffin, or the dubious alliance of sexually abused females and adult lesbian behaviour. This theory has some partial contextual legitimacy by having the lesbians we see interested in sadomasochistic play, much like the sm behaviour of male homosexuals in Cruising was prefaced as being marginal. The idea that the male abuser destroys the nurturing relationship between mother and daughter, that the child then seeks the return of that mother love in other forms and inherently rejects any other male attention, denies the pathology of women who continue in heterosexual abusive relationships. There is also a suggestion that the mothers of these victims were aware of and indifferent to the abuse - that the girls had been abandoned - which is an enormous generalisation, but echoed in Barkin's meeting of Wilson's family. Harris gives Barkin an inde styled dream of the murdered women seen naked, and other women progressively unclothed, the way Diane Arbus would have shown us if she had used colour, which is at odds at the way he otherwise fetishises the women as amazons. This may be indicative of Barkin's homophobia, but it reads more as a mistake, after the serial killer takes the trouble to wash the hair and apply doll-like makeup to the victims.
Rating:
Summary: Steamy and hot!
Review: It's a must for your lesbian video collection! The story and acting are sometimes a little clanky, but not at the most important scenes; it's well worth to watch. However, I'm glad that I saw the movie BEFORE I read some of the reviews here; they give the story away. And I do not remember any perversion, especially incest in the movie, as another previewer noted. I guess I can include the following since others already gave it away: The only problem is that it plays into the very outdated notion that the lesbian characters have to get killed by the end of the movie (or must turn out to be murderers). Shame on the film makers!
Rating:
Summary: I got everything except for the psychiatrist
Review: Mercy was a movie that was released on HBO. Thus, I found it to be a "hotter" than anything that is usually released in the theater. Therefore, most viewers would probably compare it to a lesbian Basic Instinct with the post-violent scenes of Seven. This movie could have been far more ugly and brutal had we had to witness the deaths of the victims. Instead, we only had to view the aftermath. Ellen Barkin did a tremendous job of playing a homicide detective with the brains, intuitiveness and, dare I say, spunk. Really, I loved her chasing after the bald bad guy. Barkin showed physical dominance, as well as brains as she tried to get into the lives of these potential lesbian victims in order to find her killer. Peta Wilson's character Vickie Kittrie was a dark, hurt, yet successful woman. She made you see how awful the effects of sexual child abuse often comes back to haunt adults. This character is not at all like Nikita, so if you're expecting your USA Network hero, it's not one to watch. However, I think that this film could have happened without having Julian Sands character at all. All you know about the Sands character is that he sleeps with his patients and likes to dress up as a woman. I'm not sure how either of those facts really improves the film. Overall, I think the script was satisfactory and that the cast really played their parts very well. Harris did a good job here on gutting the underbelly of a dangerous, sexual underground of some deeply disturbed, rich people.
|
