Guilty as Charged (Mercy), the science-fiction thriller directed by Timur Bekmambetov, is airing on Canal+ on Friday, August 7, 2026 at 9:06 PM. Released in theaters on January 28, 2026, the film brings together Chris Pratt, Rebecca Ferguson, Annabelle Wallis and Kali Reis.
Written by Marco van Belle, Found Guilty unfolds in a near-future Los Angeles where an artificial intelligence presides over the courts, ruling on the crimes of the gravest kind. Lieutenant Chris Raven wakes up in an automated courtroom and discovers he is on trial for the murder of his wife.
Presumed guilty, he has only 90 minutes to prove his innocence. The AI Maddox, played by Rebecca Ferguson, analyzes videos, communications, digital evidence and available data in real time before rendering its verdict. If it fails, the death sentence must be carried out immediately.
Chris Raven is intimately familiar with this legal apparatus, having helped put it in place. To survive, he must now reclaim control of a system he once trusted and reconstruct the events leading up to his wife’s death, even as the accumulated evidence seems to pile up against him.
Artificial intelligence thus becomes the heartbeat of the thriller, serving as judge, adversary, and interface that unlocks the evidence. The countdown pits human intuition against algorithmic logic, in a world dominated by surveillance and a faith in supposedly infallible technology.
The feature film expands Timur Bekmambetov’s visual exploration of screens and digital interfaces. The direction fuses surveillance footage, data streams, remote communications, and holographic projections to gradually trap the character inside the very system that holds his fate in its hands.
Found Guilty will appeal to fans of science fiction, to dystopian narratives, and to action films built around a tight premise. The movie prioritizes tension, the countdown, and successive revelations over a broad development of its futuristic world.
Guilty as Charged is set in 2029, a barely shifted future where criminal justice has crossed an irreversible line: the heftiest verdicts are now handed down by an artificial intelligence. Eighteen defendants have already walked through this automated system—eighteen convictions, eighteen executions. When a detective is accused of murdering his wife, he has only 90 minutes to prove his innocence against an unflinching AI. The film imposes a radical constraint: real-time narration with no escape, turning the trial into a literal race against death.
Guilty as Charged speaks primarily to fans of conceptual thrillers and constraint-driven storytelling, those attuned to radical devices like real-time pacing and near-future dystopias that feel frighteningly plausible. Viewers who crave taut, countdown-driven tension punctuated by gradual revelations will find an immersive experience, designed as a clock-ticking sprint where every new fact can tilt the verdict.
The film will also appeal to lovers of twists, so long as you’re comfortable with a tightly framed structure where twists serve more the device’s momentum than deep psychological development. If you’re after expansive science fiction, a deeper dive into AI, or richly drawn supporting characters, you may stay at a distance. Guilty as Charged prioritizes urgency, efficiency and immediate impact, even at the expense of nuance.
Despite largely negative critics’ reception, Guilty as Charged emerges as a remarkably potent cinematic experience. Where many dismissed the premise as gadgetry, the film fully leans into its device and uses it as a dramatic engine. Real-time isn’t mere formal gimmickry: it sustains constant tension, a feverish pace that won’t let the audience breathe. Every minute matters, every decision weighs, every piece of information could prove decisive. The film hurtles forward with impressive momentum.
Direction, often described as austere, actually aligns with the subject matter. Interfaces, screens, streams of data, holographic projections—the clinical aesthetic reinforces a world where humanity gradually dissolves into statistics. Opting for a screen-life style strengthens the sense of suffocation, as if the protagonist is already trapped inside the algorithmic logic that condemns him. The absence of lyricism isn’t a flaw but a deliberate stance that mirrors the dehumanization of the justice system depicted.
The film’s chief strength also lies in its central antagonist, embodied by Rebecca Ferguson. Her deliberately distant, almost disembodied performance gives the judge AI a chilling presence. It isn’t a hysterical robot or a cartoonishly malevolent entity, but a calm, logical, indisputable voice—and that is precisely what makes it terrifying. The AI doesn’t hate, doubt, or forgive: it calculates. And in this world, calculation alone can condemn.
Where Guilty as Charged truly earns its keep is in its underlying argument. The film isn’t merely criticizing technology outright; it interrogates our collective relationship to moral delegation. What does it mean to entrust the death penalty to an algorithm? Can justice exist without conscience, without intuition, without human frailty? The final twist—that there’s nothing fundamentally separating these defendants from other men— lands like a brutal warning. This future isn’t distant dystopia: it’s a plausible extrapolation of today’s compromises.
Admittedly, the screenplay doesn’t chase an endless supply of twists, and some supporting players stay in the shadows. Yet the film largely makes up for it with its rhythm, conceptual clarity and total commitment to its premise. Where other courtroom sci-fi ventures chase complexity at any cost, Guilty as Charged chooses directness and urgency—and wears that simplicity like a weapon.
Guilty as Charged stands as a tense, gripping, viscerally anxiety-inducing sci‑fi thriller. A work that doesn’t aim to please but to confront the audience with a discomfiting question: when did we accept that justice stop being human? An imperfect movie, surely, but one whose efficacy and relevance feel rare in today’s landscape of science fiction.
To go further, also check out our picks for the films, series and programs to watch on TV this week, our guide to streaming releases across all platforms, and our pick of what to watch today in streaming.
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