Save your money for something good and enjoyable

Captivating movie !

it is finally so absorbing because it plays like a lyrical road odyssey that’s also a detective story.

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

This is a great action-packed thriller. Chemistry between Gere and Basinger is excellent. Great acting by all & the musical score is awesome.

At the opening, "Shotgun" by Jr. Walker and the All-Stars is being played in the background as a sloppy police bust at a Chicago car- wash transpires. The two involved policemen wring from one of the captured drug dealers a potential hit; someone wants a Cajun kingpin in New Orleans bumped off. The two policemen – Eddie Jillette (Richard Gere) and Joey Collins (Gary Basaraba) – decide to pose as the hit men. It ends badly as the New Orleans' Cajun kingpin strikes first. Among the dead is Collins in a hotel room; a blonde with a parrot tattoo on her right shoulder may be implicated. Wounded, Eddie is chased in the Chicago Stockyards but somehow escapes. After recovering and obtaining permission from his superior – tough cop Capt. Stemkowski (George Dzundza) – Eddie is off to New Orleans to track down the bad guys who murdered his partner. The Deveneux family is totally non-co-operative; Paul Deveneux had been one of the shady guys killed in Chicago. Eddie's next step is to find a parlor that tattoos blue parrots on people. Next he works his way into a rough club in Algiers, a dangerous section of New Orleans. There he finds the blonde dancing and sweating. He extricates her as his captive with difficulty: There is a car chase as Eddie and the blonde, Michel Duval (Kim Basinger), wind up underwater with the Cajun kingpin Losado (Jeroen Krabbe) and his gang desperately shooting at them. Eddie and his bait Michel escape for the moment. He soon learns that she was given to Losado by her mother when she was just thirteen years old; she has never been with another man. So she is a victim, not a hooker. Eventually Eddie is captured and escapes again, Michel is left to Losado. Eddie did figure out that Losado smuggles in cheap labor, which he sells to the Deveneux clique. In the denouement Eddie is alone in the Algiers Point Hotel waiting for the confrontation with Losado and his gang of thugs. Only a cat hangs there. Michel arrives as she has fallen in love with him. But one does wonder how an out-of-state cop can set everything up without police help. And during the shootout no one seems to hear anything: No alarm appears to sound, no fire trucks arrive despite the large fire, no police arrive to stop anything. Nope, not until the absolute end! And then the crowd finally congregates as various rescue vehicles arrive. There are some nice sets, as when Stemkowski shows up at the NOPD and is appalled at Eddie's treatment. There is also the steamy love scene between Michel and Eddie. Then again, it is strange that Eddie uses a rifle shot to break the handcuff chain tying Michel to him, an action that easily alerts his captors. He could have used heavy stones or tools in the house where he and Michel stayed alone. Gere seems to take control of the movie and is believable as a sufficiently tough cop. Basinger finds her niche, playing a sympathetic and abused woman. The two have genuine chemistry together, and filming on location is always a plus.

Stop me if you've heard this one before: a loose cannon detective loses his partner when the latter is killed by a loathsome criminal, so naturally the detective becomes obsessed with vengeance and tracks the killer down to their home turf. In this case, the home turf is New Orleans. A key element that our detective latches onto is the presence of a sultry young woman who is supposedly the "property" of the bad guy. Richard Gere probably wouldn't automatically come to a lot of minds as a leading contender for this sort of detective role, but he basically does alright, and he works well with leading lady Kim Basinger; both stars look great as always. But what really helps to make this a decent if unexceptional entertainment for this viewer is that New Orleans setting, which is a very healthy asset to any film set there. That unique New Orleans atmosphere is definitely present and accounted for. The film, competently directed by Richard Pearce, gets down to business quickly and keeps up a pretty good pace while offering a fair bit of excitement and violence. The script, by Jim Carabatsos, doesn't offer anything that's terribly out of the ordinary, but the actors make the most of it. The film *does* feature an excellent supporting cast: William Atherton plays yet another of his patented Jerk characters whose lights you just want to punch out the first moment you see him, Gary Basaraba is reasonably likable as the ill-fated partner (you just *know* he's a goner because he's the married one), George Dzundza is solid as Gere's weary boss who ultimately supports him in his quest for vengeance, Terry Kinney is another victim of our bad guy, Bruce McGill is a grumpy N.O. detective, and Dutch actor Jeroen Krabbe, who got effectively introduced to American audiences here, is nicely understated as the villain, sometimes exploding into violence but never going the obvious route of throwing temper tantrums. Look also for Charles S. Dutton in a bit, and the late, great Ray Sharkey in an amusing cameo as Angles Ryan. Good action sequences are a plus, as well as a striking music score by Alan Silvestri, one compelling (and seemingly obligatory) journey through a swamp, and the finale, taking place inside a burning motel, which is a definite corker. "No Mercy" isn't anything great or even that good, but it's not without its moments. Six out of 10.

No Mercy is one of those familiar revenge thrillers that offers no novelty whatsoever and is for the most part unoriginal but that doesn't mean it doesn't entertain.Gere, a Chicago cop, goes to New Orleans to avenge the death of his partner. Basinger plays Gere's link to the crimelord and sparks fly between the two.As said before, there's nothing original here, however there are some entertaining action sequences, solid acting from Gere and Basinger (who, by the way looks incredibly HOT), nice New Orleans scenery and a refreshing unsympathetic cruelty associated with Gere's character. He's simply not very likable and therefore a little bit more memorable.No Mercy is a solid no-brainer but nothing all that special.