No Mercy

Director - Richard Pearce (South Pacific, The Long Walk Home)

Starring - Richard Gere (The Mothman Prophecies, The Hoax), Kim Basinger (Batman, My Stepmother is an Alien), and Jeroen Krabbe (The Punisher, Snuff-Movie)

Release Date - 1986

Genre - Crime/Drama

Tagline - "When passion and hatred know no limits, expect no mercy"

Format - Bluray (Personal Collection) (Screener)

Rating (out of 5):

     Over the weekend I set out to finish the Andy Sidaris films that was sent my way from Mill Creek Entertainment.  I enjoyed myself for the most part but the repetitiveness of the stories did wear thin as my day went on.  After I finished my marathon I decided to keep the action rolling.  I went to my review stack and I saw that I had a few action films to go with.  I decided that since I was already working on some Mill Creek blus that I could keep that trend rolling and review their blu release of No Mercy.  This 1986 film starred Richard Gere and Kim Basinger.  I want to thank Mill Creek for sending this one my way.

     The film follows Detective Eddie Jillette (Gere) who follows up on a lead on a hit when he crosses paths with the lovely Michel (Basinger).  Michel is "owned" by an evil man named Losado that is responsible for killing Eddie's partner.  Eddie's lust for revenge takes him to New Orleans so he can bring Losado to justice but has to fight for his life when he realizes that Losado will not go peacefully and neither will his private army of hired goons.

     I had never seen this one prior to getting it in for review but I had heard of it.  Several friends of mine are fans of this one so I went in with high hopes.  I have to admit that I was very impressed by what I saw and I can see myself checking this one out again.  The acting in this one is solid but the characters are painfully cliched.  Richard Gere delivers a solid performance but his stereotypical generic cop character has no personality and very forgettable.  The same can be said for most of the characters.  The cast does a solid job with what they were given but it is very evident that more thought went into story rather than character development.  The story for this one is very entertaining.  The police detective falling in love with a beautiful woman that is owned by a crime boss in New Orleans is simple enough but the action scenes are very drawn out and entertaining.  They do an outstanding job holding the viewer's attention but don't expect characters more than you would find in your typical day time soap.  Finally, the film does show several on screen kills.  Some are gun wounds while others are knife.  The effects are great for the kills and the blood flows by the bucket.  No gore but people looking for an action flick with blood will be satisfied.  Overall, No Mercy is a fun action flick that has a very solid story but the characters are just an after thought.  The blu release from Mill Creek is barebones but I do love the VHS slip with these releases.  Check it out now on blu from Mill Creek Entertainment.