Trailer for The Mercury Factor.
This taut, relentless thriller delves into a wide ranging – and widely underreported – contemporary scourge, and manages to blend romance, character study and social issues into a finely crafted tale of one man’s awakening to the contradictions in his life. Matteo (played by director/co-writer, and ex Italian MP Luca Barbareschi) is a mob fix-it man following in the footsteps of his father, working for a corrupt multinational.
The “company” Matteo works for has undergone a change of product, if not tactics, realizing that the trade in adulterated foods is even more lucrative than the trade in drugs. Sent to Hong Kong as a troubleshooter, Matteo has a chance encounter with a beautiful Chinese woman, Jiazhen, when their paths cross at a restaurant she runs on the waterfront.
What Matteo doesn’t know is that Jiazhen has a secret in her past – a secret that will hold fateful consequences for both when a power struggle within the mob he serves threatens to upend his carefully calibrated life.