Just Mercy is a biographical legal drama co-written and directed by Destin Daniel Cretton. The film is based on Stevenson's 2014 eponymous memoir, in which he explored his journey to making his life's work the defense of African American prisoners. Michael B. Jordan plays Bryan Stevenson with Jamie Foxx joining him as Walter McMillian. The supporting cast has well known actors like Rob Morgan, Tim Blake Nelson, Rafe Spall, Brie Larson, Rafe Spall and O'Shea Jackson Jr. Jamie Foxx was nominated for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Supporting Role at the 26th Screen Actors Guild Awards. Both he and Michael B. Jordan won NAACP Image Awards for their respective roles. Both of them brought brilliant performances and did the people and the true story justice.
Just Mercy is about the world-renowned civil rights defense attorney Bryan Stevenson who works to free wrongly condemned death row prisoners, among these is Walter "Johnny D." McMillian, an African-American man who was convicted of the 1986 murder of Ronda Morrison, an 18 year old white girl.
That's what Just Mercy is about and it's overall a great film, but most importantly an important story that was needed to be told. I also think the film is well shot and Destin Daniel Cretton's direction is excellent. The characters are distinct from each other and the actors playing them does an excellent job, mannerisms and accents, list goes on in how great they're. Strong dialogue to well written characters, just how it should be. But though the narrative and acting is great and often very memorable, the length is too long and the plot predictable and not as compelling as I had initially thought. But the message it's telling justifies the flaws, overall, Just Mercy is an amazing movie that needs to be seen at least once. I think it had the potential to be greater than it ended up being.
