January can be a funny time for film releases, with awards fare carried over from the previous year sitting side-by-side on the release calendar with more low-key genre films looking to offer a dose of escapism without aiming for especially lofty heights.
Mercy – the new sci-fi film starring Chris Pratt and Rebecca Ferguson – is just about the textbook example of the latter category. Set in near-future LA, it sees Pratt playing a detective who has been put on trial by murder and whose fate now rests in the hand of an AI judge (Ferguson).
He has only 90 minutes to convince her of his innocence – while strapped to a chair, no less – or face execution, which leads to a tense thriller that works pretty well as a taut and effective mid-budget movie.
To mark the release, RadioTimes.com spoke to Pratt for our Film Flashbacks series – discussing everything from his very first film memories to why he doesn't expect Mercy to change too many perspectives on AI. You can check out the full interview in video form above and in written form below.
Do you remember the first film that you saw in the cinema when you were younger?
The first film I ever saw in the cinema was Gremlins. I'll never forget it because back then, all those years ago, you would find out what was playing at the box office by looking in the newspaper. You'd open the newspaper and there'd be the movie section. And I remember my sister being really excited... she was like, 'We're gonna go see gremlins. We're gonna go see gremlins.' But I didn't know what Gremlins was, and I thought she was saying 'We're gonna go to grandma's. And I was like... I don't know why she's so excited!
Was that a film that you then continued to revisit while you were growing up?
I don't know that I revisited that one too many times. I think I watched it one time again, relatively recently, within the last 10 years, but beyond that, no.
Was there a film that you watched and it was the first time where you thought, 'this is the industry I want to go into'?
I would say, probably around the time that Jim Carrey was really blowing up. I think I saw Ace Ventura: Pet Detective in the theatre, and I came home and I was like, 'God, he's so funny.' I loved him from In Living Color, and I was always trying to do the characters that he played. So I think around that time.
Your first film credit was The Extreme Team. What are your memories of going into the industry for the first time, being on a film set and making it as a film star?
Wow. The memories from The Extreme Team... I remember they asked me if I knew how to snowboard and I lied and said yes. And then I showed up in New Zealand to do a movie that was all about snowboarding and I didn't know how so they had to pause production for a month and teach everybody how to snowboard.
And that was in 2001, and oddly – this is a little dark – September 11th happened while we were on set, and so I remember that. That just took a real dark turn for Radio Times, so yes, that's what happened. I should learn to filter myself! But I remember being really excited, I remember thinking this is it, I'm never going to have to be a waiter again.
Was there than a moment – or a film that you worked on – where you thought, 'I've made it, I'm a movie star now?'
It's like if you throw a frog into boiling water it'll jump right out but if you put them in cold water and turn on the heat then eventually it will boil and they won't even know. And I feel like my career has kind of been like that – slow incremental steps over the course of multiple decades.
I would say that probably around the time that Guardians of the Galaxy came out and Jurassic World was coming out and we started doing press tours in international locations, where I'd go to places that I had never even heard of and people knew who I was. I think that was probably the first time it really hit me that, 'Oh my Gosh, this is unlike anything I could have possibly imagined'.
Do you remember the first time you saw your Mercy co-star Rebecca Ferguson in a film?
I think the first thing I'd seen was Dune I think. And so it was really funny because I instantly loved her, she is just so great, and she was talking about the character she had with all these tattoos on her face and I was like, 'Oh', and she was like 'Dune'. And the way she says Dune it sounds like she was saying June, and I was like, 'Oh, I don't think I've seen that. She was like, 'What?' She goes, 'But you've heard of Dune?'
I was like, 'I don't think I've heard of June.' I just thought that was like an independent movie where she played, like, a prisoner with tattoos on her face. Didn't put it together that she was talking about Dune for like ten minutes. She was like, 'You've never heard of Dune?' I was like, 'I don't think I've heard of June, I'm so sorry, I don't know you're whole filmography. Anyways, got there in the end!
View Green Video on the source websiteHow much time did you get to spend with her on set, as you're in different rooms when you're doing the scenes? What was the rapport?
It was a great rapport. We spent a few weeks together. All of the stuff that we shot was – including the reshoots – isolated in the chamber... And we cleaned up all of the courtroom stuff relatively quickly because we were doing really long takes.
So I think in the first two days, we had it almost entirely shot, and then we just came through and did a bunch of clean-up stuff and a bunch of interesting points of views and various other angles on her performance. But her performance is actually caught separately, with just her and me doing off camera for her. It was really a technical kind of a movie.
Is there a film that you would recommend people do as a double bill with Mercy?
Memento is a good comp. Minority Report would be really a good one. I love a courtroom thriller, which this is at its heart. A Few Good Men. It's not a great comp, but I love that movie!
What do you hope people take away from the film. There's obviously themes of AI and how much we can we can rely on it, how much we can trust it, how much we we can't...
I don't expect that this is a film that people are going to walk away from having seen a think piece about AI that's going to change their perspective on AI and all of that stuff. Like any anxiety this induces around AI and how it's being incorporated in our life... we feel all that stuff already.
My hope, actually, is that maybe some of the anxiety we feel in life can be turned off for 90 minutes, and you can just be brought on a thrill ride, and enjoy an experience of just sheer entertainment.
And my hope is that people see it in 3D because I think that that's there's so much that we shot intentionally for 3D that if you don't see in 3D it's still gonna be a great story, but you wouldn't be getting the full experience.
Mercy is released in UK cinemas on Friday 23rd January 2026.
Check out more of our Film coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more TV recommendations and reviews, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
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