MERCURY MAN (2006)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical, psychological*

In contrast to the ten-years-later misfire VALENTINE THE DARK AVENGER, MERCURY MAN is a decent formula superhero movie from a modern-day Asian nation. There's no grand vision here-- though there are a few metaphysical elements that could have been expanded upon-- but at least it moves quickly and has a few good jokes.

According to various sources of exposition, there are various amulets that have fallen to Earth over the years; amulets charged with either "sun power" or "moon power" according to what climate the objects first encounter. Not surprisingly, the only two with which the movie is concerned, "Solar Mercury" and "Lunar Mercury," happen to be in Thailand. The amulets' secret is known by a foreign terrorist, Usama Bin Ali, and he wants them so that he can score a major blow against the United States. Usama himself is a captive in a Thai jail, but he has a small army of fellow terrorists, led by his kung-fu henchwoman Areema (Metinee Kingpayome), and they make their way into the country to liberate their leader. On the way they manage to steal the Solar Mercury from a Buddhist temple, which gets a kung-fu Buddhist emissary, Purima, on the terrorists' trail.

Meanwhile in Bangkok, a young firefighter named Chan (Wasan Khantaau) saves a baby from a blazing inferno with a daredevil feat-- but is he congratulated for his bravery and resourcefulness? No, because the whole farrago is a training session, the baby's just a doll, and Chan gets chewed out by his superior for disobeying orders to withdraw from the inferno. In fact, the commander even quotes Stan Lee's Spider-Man, "with great power comes great responsibility," in support of the idea that subordinates should stay in their lanes-- which was not quite the moral Stan Lee had in mind. This opposition between authority and impulsive heroism might have been expanded upon, but the script doesn't follow up on this potential.

Chan's relatives are quickly introduced, his mother and his bro-ster Grace (another reviewer called her that because her character is a transexual, which may be the case with the performer as well). Then Chan happens to be on the scene at Usama's prison break for some reason. An unthinking henchman stabs Chan with the Solar Mercury talisman, and all the terrorists flee, not bothering to pull the amulet out of Chan's body (because the script needs them to try to get the object back later). In truth, the writers could've had the villains take the amulet with them, only to find that it bestowed its powers upon the unwitting fireman.

Purima, who has an "amulet-detector" on her person, contacts Chan, who's surprised to find that he now has weird heat-powers as a result of the Solar talisman. Purima suggests that this bestowment was the will of the amulet, which doesn't make much sense unless they incarnate alien intelligences, though the script doesn't seem to want to go there. Purima chooses an unusual means to demonstrate the way Chan's heat increases when he's excited: she gives him a copy of Penthouse, and he burns his clothes off. Despite this bit of jocularity, Purima is dead serious about getting Chan to use his powers to battle Usama, who in short order gets hold of the Lunar Mercury. By a wild coincidence, Chan's bro-ster Grace happens to be a designer of superhero costumes, and she puts together the attire for the new Mercury Man, who looks a little like Spider-Man covered in rubber.

There's some cursory attention to Chan gaining psychic control of his powers, setting him up for a big showdown with Areema when she assimilates the power of the Lunar Mercury (which makes her look like an ice-woman). And there are also a lot of good fights here. But the one sociological aspect of MERCURY that I liked was its unapologetic renunciation of Islamic terrorism. True, Usama does get a chance to rage against foreigners who invaded his country-- which I don't believe is specified-- but he and his buddies are all basically okay with wholesale slaughter to promote their own cause, and it's rather refreshing to see such an ideology condemned without any mealy-mouthed relativism. Also, though the hero's side includes a trans character, at least (a) it's a former guy who really looks like a woman thanks to surgical alteration, and (b) she's a little funny at times.

One detail that I'm sure is mere coincidence: at times Mercury Man propels himself from place to place by using magnetism to pull him to stationary objects, a means of locomotion first demonstrated by the Golden Age comics-hero "Magno."