The Mercy ** (2018, Colin Firth, Rachel Weisz, David Thewlis) – Movie Review

Colin Firth is well cast and does well as real-life amateur sailor Donald Crowhurst who competed in the 1968 Sunday Times Golden Globe Race to try to be the first person to circumnavigate the globe single-handedly without a stop-over.

Director James Marsh’s film is done well too, brisk and professional, if rather anonymous. But unfortunately it is difficult to empathise with the irresponsible Crowhurst, who (1) cheerfully leaves his wife Clare and their children behind while all too evidently risking his life; (2) idiotically gets into a fatal mess by putting his business and house on the line; (3) recklessly sets off with a dangerously unfinished boat, the Teignmouth Electron.

This makes you lose patience with Firth’s tiresome and Firth character and the wearing, depressing film quite early on. The film wants you to admire Crowhurst, but he seems wrong-headed and foolhardy as presented here. Despite his evident bravery, he seems more of a pathetic loser than a valiant hero. His story is very frustrating. Admittedly the story is so long ago hardly anyone will know the outcome, but the outcome is so predictable that there is no suspense.

Weisz (replacing Kate Winslet) has a disappointingly passive role as his wife Clare, who is just there to support and suffer. There is little the actress can do with the role, very much a support turn. David Thewlis is irritating as the smug and smarmy journalist reporting on Crowhurst. Ken Stott is also irritating as the smug and smarmy businessman Mr Best who puts up the money for Crowhurst’s boat and expedition – at a terrible price to Crowhurst.

The mystery surrounding the real-life story doesn’t emerge into a compelling plotline. The salute to the English stiff-upper-lip seems so out-of-date that you wonder why on earth they made the movie. Scott Z.Burns’s screenplay is also brisk and professional, without warming the blood.

Firth is perfect casting in the English stiff-upper-lip department, though at 55 he is way too old for the role – 20 years older than Crowhurst at the time. Firth was taken to hospital with a dislocated hip during the shoot.

James Marsh is also known for The King (2005) and Shadow Dancer (2012) and The Theory of Everything (2014).

The London premiere is this very day, 6 February 2018, with its UK release on 9 February.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Movie Review

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