MovieChat Forums > Mercury Rising (1998) Discussion > The story makes absolutely no sense

The story makes absolutely no sense

posted 17 years ago by jdlund
14 replies | jump to latest

For some odd, random reason, I was thinking of Mercury Rising today, and a thought occurred to me that bothered me at the time I saw the movie. What exactly is the motivation to kill the kid? I mean it really makes no sense at all. How is he a threat to national security? Who exactly is going to tell, and what exactly could he tell them? It's more than just a stretch to believe that the NSA would actually whack him, it's outright ridiculous. The more plausible, and superior, plot would be the NSA kidnapping the kid in order to use him. After all the NSA is the largest employer of mathematicians in the world for a reason, a significant part of what they do is code breaking. So why take out such a natrually gifted code breaker when he could be examined, studied, used as an asset? The NSA may very well be a bunch of amoral a-holes, but come on, they are least intelligent and practical enough knot to go on a half cocked killing rampage. Attempting to whipe out an entire family and then whacking half a dozen employees just because some kid is gifted at math, is not only incredibly insane, it's also incredibly stupid, pointless and impractical. Sure take it as a sign that you might need to make the code better, but killing the kid makes absolutely no sense. It's an incredibly lame set up for a 'evil government agency trying to take out someone who knows to much' movie. Around the time this movie came out, give or take, was another movie with a fairly similar set up, Enemy of the State. While granted that movie certainly had its flaws, at least its plot made sense. Will Smith's character unwittingly received incriminating material. The killing at the beginning of that movie was at least professional and well thought out rather than just running around shooting anyone and everyone. The NSA chasing that man at least made sense. This movie however stretches the suspension of disbelief so much that it just falls apart completely.

[–] illis 17 years ago

That's exactly what I thought, why kill him? Plus, they put the puzzle in that crossword magazine just to see if anyone was able to decipher it, they should have been prepared for such a case, not go all wacko about it...

[–] BillyJJack 16 years ago

The powers that be were afraid not so much of the kid but that their program would be found out as being weak and they would get the chop.

[–] sun_scryer 11 years ago

That may be the point of the movie, but I think other people's point is that that just doesn't happen in real life except under despots who are about to be overthrown for being too paranoid. Anything and everything can be cracked, and the person/thing which does the cracking is your potential resource, not something to destroy.

[–] RugGuy 16 years ago

I just saw this movie for the first time. I agree with you and will take it a step further. If one person could break the code most likely others would also. How many people wuld the NSA kill befire they would as you suggested and wruite a better code? dumb concept, yet people get paid 6 and 7 figures to make these movies

[–] ericburkemper 16 years ago

I thought the most interesting part of the movie was largely glossed over.

Namely the NSA/CIA/FBI feud.

I really would have liked to see a giant battle between the agencies at the end, and not the really retarded "over in five minutes" final "battle" scene

[–] kersus 16 years ago

"Attempting to whipe out an entire family and then whacking half a dozen employees just because some kid is gifted at math, is not only incredibly insane, it's also incredibly stupid, pointless and impractical."

That sounds like government.... Where's the problem? When has government been intelligent and practical? Redoing the code could cost millions to billions and whacking the kid and all those people only a fraction thereof. You have the false assumption that everyone in power is good hearted and parctical. That seems like blindness.

"It's an incredibly lame set up for a 'evil government agency"

I'll stop you there. There is no need to evil in front of government agency. All secret services were supposed to end after World War 2 as the originator of those services in the U.S. wanted. They were created for war and had no purpose after war.... So they keep making war.

"This movie however stretches the suspension of disbelief so much that it just falls apart completely."

That is sort've ironic in a day and age when the government can infiltrate your home without cause, arrest people and hold them for days on end without legal advice or charging them with anything - more oft than not being completely in error and destoying lives that are but pittances to the size and power of these agencies. Can you go through your life and not remember anyone who just disappeared?

K

[–] chrisw69 16 years ago

As far as I know, the NSA was only involved via the corrupt Kudrow. I assume this because Kudrow met in a secluded area as well as other hints in the movie. He abused his position in the NSA and assasinated a number of his subordinates for example; covering up the evidence via forensics and an untraceable agent. So the question is basically why would Kudrow want Simon to be killed off? Who knows? There are many incredibly stupid people in the world that have too many illusions of themself..

[–] 16 years ago

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[–] bogwart-1 16 years ago

The kid wasn't a code-breaker, he was an autistic savant. He would have had no more idea of why he could read the code than anyone else. He couldn't be used, so he was a liability.

[–] jetlag31 15 years ago

Actually, he could be "used". An example of that actually occurs in the movie: when Jeffries gets the kid to "read" the puzzle with the encoded message from "Einstein".

If Jeffries could do that so could anybody else should that kid fall into their hands.

True, the kid might not cooperate with anybody else to read an encoded message. So does that mean the NSA's problem goes away if he doesn't?

Absolutely not!

Having Simon Lynch fall into the hands of an opponent of the US would for all practical purposes render the billion-dollar Mercury code useless to the US government & its agencies even if Simon did not reveal the contents of one message to another living soul. As far as the US government would have been concerned it would not have mattered whether Simon was cooperating with the opponent or not. The mere uncertainty that he MIGHT cooperate and that he MIGHT decode their messages and that he MIGHT be handing the decoded ones over would silence the use of the Mercury code.

If you want a parallel, having Simon Lynch fall into enemy hands would be the equivalent of the German's Enigma coding machine of World War II falling into Allied hands: it would (at least potentially) give those who those fell into the ability to read any message in the Mercury/enigma code which also fell into their hands. If the Germans had ever found out that the Allies had captured an Enigma machine they would have had no other choice but to change their coding system irrespective of whether the Allies were able to break the Enigma code or not.

In real life the Allies kept the capture of the coding machines a closely guarded secret. That in turn meant that the Germans kept using the Enigma code in blissful ignorance that, in time, the Allies were able to read their most secret message just as if the Germans had sent them in plain language.

Hence the obsession of Kudrow with killing Simon Lynch. Having the kid free and alive was the equivalent of the Germans discovering that one of their Enigma machines had been posted to the WW2 equivalent of Ebay! Anybody who recognised its potential would have been free to go in and grab the decoding device/snatch the kid and thereby (at least potentially) compromise the secret code and thereby send a billion-dollar project down the plughole.

Killing the boy removed the immediate problem. It would not remove the entire problem. Other autistic people might have had similar abilities. However, doubtless Kudrow figured he would cross that bridge when he came to it. For the alternative (murdering every autistic person on Earth, never mind those living in just the United States, on the offchance that some unknown proportion might have such capabilities) would have been a project beyond even Nicholas Kudrow's reach.

[–] glennwatts2002 15 years ago

That is exactly what I thought.

It would have been a far better film if:
1 - The assassin character wasn't so completely useless, why start shooting like a maniac in the hospital?
2 - The assassin character should have been working for an enemy government who have been tracing calls to the puzzle hotline and have realised that Simon could be used against US
3 - The final shootout wasn't the lamest bit of film in existence! The rubbish assassin manages to hold off 20 armed professionals while standing in the midddle of the room, Kudrow grabs the kid, but then thoughtfully puts him back down safely before falling off the building after being shot at close range!!

This film had some potential, but was unbelievably poorly executed.

[–] jedimcarr 12 years ago

I always thought that Kudrow was just a sociopath who didn't want it to get out his precious code was flawed. He was willing to kill anyone who could tell that secret. It gave him a lot of money and power.

[–] frAnkzOnE 12 years ago

It's not NSA, but Kudrow who doesn't want his $2bn project got compromised thus jeopardize his career.