Mercury Rising
Short description
An FBI agent named Art Jeffries must protect Simon, a young autistic boy who possesses the unique ability to decode a top-secret government encryption system known as Mercury. Because Simon can read the supposedly unbreakable code with ease, he is viewed as a security risk that must be eliminated. As federal agents and assassins pursue them, Jeffries and the boy go on the run, eventually realizing that Simon's mathematical gifts are the only way to stop their pursuers.
Directed by Harold Becker, this film followed City Hall in his chronological filmography and preceded Domestic Disturbance. The movie features a cast including Bruce Willis, Alec Baldwin, Miko Hughes, Chi McBride, Kim Dickens, and Robert Stanton. Produced by Universal Pictures and Imagine Entertainment, the project had a budget of 60 million USD and earned 93 million USD at the worldwide box office.
The film holds a rating of 6.1/10 on IMDb based on 76,850 votes and 6.3/10 on TMDB from 1,727 votes. These audience scores are higher than the film critics' rating of 4.4/10, which was derived from 57 reviews.
What's left behind the scenes
- Miko Hughes spent a lot of time at a special school for autistic children while preparing for the film. He also worked with a child psychologist in Chicago to understand how a child like that should behave.
- The plot of the film bears a striking resemblance to a real story published on the DailyFinance website on December 24, 2009: "In December 1955, 'Sears, Roebuck and Co.' launched an advertisement in the newspaper listing a direct number for Santa Claus. Unfortunately, they made a mistake in one digit, and instead of 'Sears,' the secret phone number of CONAD (Continental Air Defense Command) was printed. When Colonel Harry Shoup answered the phone, he expected to hear news of a missile attack on the United States, but instead he heard the voice of a child calling Santa. And although the conversation ended with a crying child and the colonel's anger, Shoup soon corrected the situation and began telling calling children about Santa’s flights in the night sky. The following year, CONAD installed a new, unlisted phone line specifically for children’s calls. In 1958, when CONAD was transformed into NORAD, the new command continued this tradition..."
- Alec Baldwin starred in this film because he owed Universal Pictures a debt. He had once refused to act in one of the studio's films and signed an agreement stating he would appear in another film at the company's request. Otherwise, he would have faced a lawsuit.
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