Mercy Road (Australian Films)
Key Cast: Huw Higginson, Luke Bracey, Martha Kate Morgan, Susie Porter, Toby Jones
Director: John Curran
Producer: Alex Proyas, Daniaile Jarry, Gary Hamilton, Michelle Krumm, Penny Karlin, Ying Ye
Screenwriter: Christopher Lee Pelletier, Jesse Heffring, John Curran
Cinematographer: Ross Giardina
Composer: John Curran
Company Credit: Distributor: Rialto Distribution
The first virtually produced Australian feature, Mercy Road is an unrelentingly tense psychological thriller from Tracks director John Curran.
Pushed to the limit and on the edge of sanity, single father Tom learns just how far he must go to protect what matters most to him. His daughter Ruby has been abducted, and to save her, he must carry out a series of tasks as instructed by a disembodied, psychopathic voice on the other side of a phone call. Battling against near-impossible odds, Tom realises that the true ransom demanded of him is a piece of his own soul.
Curran teamed up with Alex Proyas’s (Dark City: Director’s Cut, MIFF 2017) production company Heretic Foundation to bring Mercy Road to life using a real-time in-camera compositing technique involving LED screens and Unreal Engine. Matching Curran’s ingenious direction is an arresting star turn from Hollywood star-on-the-rise Luke Bracey (Point Break; Hacksaw Ridge), who is ably supported by fellow cast members Toby Jones (Berberian Sound Studio, MIFF 2012) and Susie Porter (Cargo; Ladies in Black). The result is a groundbreaking and visually spectacular depiction of one man’s desperate search for redemption.