BRINGING OUT THE DEAD (1999)

In Bringing Out the Dead, protagonist Frank (Nicolas Cage) sees ghosts all around him. Working the graveyard shift in Hell’s Kitchen as a paramedic would do that to anyone, but Frank has a more pronounced problem. It’s not just those who die in front of him that he’s forced to watch, but the apparitions of those he couldn’t save. They’re lurking everywhere, daring him to reconsider his line of work, to reconsider humanity altogether. They are most apparent in the roughest parts of New York City, where sex workers, drug addicts and the homeless try to get by. As Frank watches these people, it’s unclear if he is haunted only by the ghosts of those who died on his watch in neighbourhoods just like these, or if every sorry soul he witnesses in these mean streets is a corpse-to-be in his eyes, a ghost-in-waiting.

In Martin Scorsese’s Bringing Out the Dead, a criminally underrated film that would be a career-best achievement for almost any other director, there are no easy answers about how to deal with the thankless, nigh unbearable work of a paramedic. Frank has been cursed with the affliction of caring too much, a trait his shift partners, who work with him over three tortured nights, seem to have no understanding of. They can treat the job as any other, while Frank is the only one who can see that it is a matter of life and death (one of the few times that often figurative phrase is literally true).

Cage portrays Frank’s insomnia better than any actor could, looking not just as if he is on death’s door, but as if his eyes and deathly pale skin are crying out for sleep. It is a yearning so profound that it almost makes this performance feel like it has a strong physical dimension to it, with tiredness seeming to seep out of the actor’s skin. The fact that all of this is conveyed through Cage’s haunted expression is such a spectacular achievement that one has to wonder if a portrayal this vivid could be achieved without dragging oneself through the psychological depths that Frank is subjected to.

The lighting in this film is one-of-a-kind, where at times the colour seems to have been sucked dry from its scenes, looking as lifeless as the bodies that Frank tries in vain to resuscitate. Light fixtures glint and sparkle in the way they only do to tired eyes, appearing almost beautiful if not for the hollowed-out greyness dousing these images. But in other moments the lighting is akin to that of a dream, where it’s not Frank’s drowsy mind dimly registering his environment, but a stark hallucination, a vivid dream state more akin to a nightmare than a peaceful slumber.

These very distinctive looks should contradict one another, but the effect is seamless, with the film’s visual palette consistently bringing us closer to Frank’s view of the world around him. If other people simply reflect our own emotions and perspectives back at us, then this film is a stark example of that human experience, as wherever Frank looks he sees more confirmation of his jaded but hopeful worldview. The city streets are alive, their activity even more pronounced under the glow of streetlights or ambulance lights. For as much as this film is crowded with people whose inner lives seem profoundly sad (and petty squabbles undeniably gritty) the churning mess of drugs, crime and sad or screaming faces creates an almost beautiful mosaic.

In all its tortured glory, Bringing Out the Dead proves that the old adage about New York is true—the city never does sleep, for how else could it be so alive? Kicking and screaming at every turn, its force is undeniable, outshone only by Frank and his partners’ ambulance, which has all the intensity of a flaming coffin ship as it charges through these streets. Forget Cage’s interpretation of the Marvel Comics character: this is his true Ghost Rider role.

Though Frank is clearly fraying at the seams, he remains buoyant by clinging to the brief notes of hope found in this unforgiving city. But these are getting harder and harder to come by when it has been months since he last saved someone, while the faint echoes of those he failed are calling out to him. Wherever he looks he sees Rose (Cynthia Roman), an 18-year-old homeless woman who he couldn’t resuscitate. If he can just save one unfortunate soul, he reasons, he will no longer be plagued by guilt. But, as is the curse of someone who cares for others too strongly in a job that necessitates emotional compartmentalising, Frank’s true failing is his inability to see that the person who most needs saving is himself.

His efforts are in vain because this cycle will continue even if he gets his glorious high through knowing he saved someone else’s life. Frank is not so different from the wayward folk he administers help to so often. Just like any addict, he is completely preoccupied with looking for the next fix, too caught up in his sad chase to understand how fruitless this pattern is. He begs to be fired, yet refuses to quit, just like the suicidal characters in this film who never end up killing themselves. Frank might only see vague impressions of his sorrow in these people, but he fails to look deeper into the similarities he shares with them.

His three main co-workers are a joy to watch, with John Goodman, Ving Rhames and Tom Sizemore being the ideal actors to play the wacky side characters accompanying him on these night shifts. Goodman’s portrayal of loud-mouthed and larger-than-life side characters will never be tiresome, and he is put to good use in that mould here. Rhames is possibly the funniest character in the entire movie, oscillating between being seriously concerned for his welfare given Frank’s depressive talk and unpredictable antics, and flirting with his dispatcher in between praising the good Lord. He’s a wisdom dispenser, so it is in keeping with this film’s blend of comedy and bleakness that his perspective is far more healthy than Frank’s. Take this life lesson, for example:

You ever notice, people who see shit are always crazy? Scientific fact.

Rhames appears wrapped up in his own delusions—made apparent when he gets several drug users to hold hands and praise Jesus for resuscitating a patient who overdosed, when it was Frank’s practical work that saved him—but Bringing Out the Dead’s main question isn’t simply whether it is better to adhere to reality or delusion. The only factor worth considering here is whether the delusion you buy into will help you and other people. And for as much as Frank fails to acknowledge this, it may be possible that his delusions help him while hurting others, or vice versa.

In a sense, Frank is always alone, and he can’t seem to form a meaningful connection with anyone he interacts with in his line of work. Even those he saves don’t mean anything to him outside of this very brief window of time where their life rests in his hands, even though he carries the glory of these moments of rapture with him for weeks afterwards. It doesn’t matter what these people go on to do with their lives, or even if they end up dying not long after this. The point is that they brushed paths with death and came up for air, gripping on tightly and fighting for life, with Frank as the guardian angel ushering them back into the world of the living.

That’s his romantic notion about these dealings, anyway. In fairness, it’s not far off, as even the most hardened of people can wilt in the face of impending death. When a drug dealer (Michael K. Williams) lies bleeding in the back of the ambulance, all bravado is lost as he begs for Frank to hold his hand. These vulnerable moments are hard to find in a city this callous, making them all the more important. More common are the frequent patients, like the crazed Noel (Marc Anthony), who is a welcome sight whenever he is reintroduced into this story. When Noel begs for water while in the hospital, it seems inhuman to deny him this simple request, even though, medically speaking, complying would be the worst thing for him. The film has no answers for how to treat someone like this because there simply aren’t any. Some days, you give the man what he wants. On other days, you deny his pleading. Both actions feel wrong, just as they both also feel right. It’s a fascinating ambiguity that holds a lot of weight in how it relates to Frank’s righteous quest.

The true moral quandary for Frank is what to do about Mr Burke (Cullen O. Johnson), a man who Frank saved after he entered cardiac arrest. Despite Frank essentially fulfilling his purpose here in rescuing the very first patient he treats in Bringing Out the Dead, he isn’t satisfied by this as Mr Burke is still only barely alive. He’s capable of brain function but is comatose and may end up in a vegetative state. Just as it is unclear whether aiding Noel’s request is worthwhile when it will only hinder him, Frank is caught in another dilemma with Mr Burke, where perhaps saving a man from death is the worst thing this protagonist could have done for him.

Throughout the film, he keeps bumping into Mary (Patricia Arquette), Mr Burke’s daughter, who has struggled with addiction in the past and is turning to drugs again to cope. So long as her father’s condition remains the same, where he is not technically dead, but is so unresponsive that he almost might as well be, Mary is also caught in an unfortunate limbo. She can’t rejoice in the fact that her father has recuperated, nor can she begin the grieving process to mourn his death. Stuck with the worst of these possible options, blissed-out drug binges become her escape. But for Frank, the only high that has any effect on him is through his work.

Seeing recurring characters pop up in this story carries an infectious joy, like bumping into an old friend out of the blue. Mary is understandably dour and joyless, but her reappearances in this story aren’t just a welcome surprise each time, they also offer brief notes of hope for Frank amidst this story’s darkness. She is the first person that he has truly connected with outside of his work, made even more important given Frank’s presumed isolation; the brief glimpse we get into one of his days off depicts him as being alone, observing the city through his apartment window. Frank recognises that, just like his patients, Mary is also in need of saving, so it’s genuinely heart-warming to see these lost souls be united by the grief and strife of the hospital where they keep meeting by chance.

(The only unwelcome character who appears multiple times in this story is Scorsese himself, who acts as the unseen dispatcher for Frank’s first and third shifts. The director has proved himself to be a compelling actor in bit-parts in many of his other films, but here he is less effective, especially when paired with the dialogue he’s given. Every time the character speaks, it’s as if he’s finding new iterations of saying, ‘Showtime, folks!’ It comes across as self-congratulatory for the film’s director to take on this role; as if he keeps nudging the audience to let them know how fun this next sequence will be. Its overuse is more of an issue than the acting itself; Scorsese never should have popped up again in the film’s third and final shift.)

It’s a wonder Bringing Out the Dead hasn’t developed more of a following in the years since its release. The film’s mildly positive reception upon its release is unsurprising, given how its mix of zany misadventures and themes like compassion, redemption and salvation make it quite unapproachable on its surface. It’s an even more difficult film to market, as is demonstrated by the fact that the movie flopped at the box office, earning just half of its production budget. According to Scorsese’s longtime editor, Thelma Schoonmaker—whose ability to make fast-paced and slower scenes come together effortlessly in this film is one of her finest achievements to date—Bringing Out the Dead had been marketed as a car chase film leading up to its theatrical run. In a 2016 interview with Den of Geek, the decorated editor said that “[It’s] the only one of his films, I think, that hasn’t gotten its due.”

Bringing Out the Dead technically already has a place in film history, being the last movie to be released on LaserDisc in the US. But as Schoonmaker alludes to, it deserves a far greater legacy than that, both on its own merits and within Scorsese’s excellent filmography. A New York City-set tale revolving around guilt and redemption with characters who have a Catholic background, directed by Martin Scorsese and written by Paul Schrader, already sounds like a dream idea, and that’s without even divulging any details about its highly entertaining plot. Don’t let the film’s morbid themes distract from just how much fun can be had with this movie. It often moves at a breakneck pace, with comedic moments and crazed sequences being hurled at the viewer, making it a pure joy to behold.

By not holding back on its ridiculous antics, Bringing Out the Dead never tries to trick viewers into thinking they’re watching a keen imitation of the day-to-day workings of a paramedic. This cover allows Scorsese and Schrader to explore a kind of emotional truth of what the job is like, eschewing a bland retelling of facts for a gritty, depressing, and faintly hopeful look at what it really means to be a lifesaver. It never holds back on exploring the sense of meaning that can be procured from this role, as well as in how it weighs on one’s spirit.

If Scorsese’s Travis Bickle were to witness the wayward lives of the people Frank is tasked with aiding, the Taxi Driver (1976) protagonist would probably be inspired to commit a killing spree. But although Frank is beginning to lose his sanity, to such a degree that there are brief moments where he abandons any notion of sympathy for his patients, it’s clear that this line of work has amplified his empathy. He might wallow in understandable frustration knowing that many of the people he helps are going to keep squandering their lives and putting themselves in grave danger. But even though the film seems like a grim depiction of paramedics and the work that they do, it has a lot of love for these patients and workers alike. It’s just not clear if that warmth alone justifies working at a job that gradually erodes one’s spirit.

Thankfully, Bringing Out the Dead doesn’t end on a note where the logistics of what it has to say about redemption need to be analysed with great scrutiny. It is intended as an emotional conclusion, not a rational one, respecting Frank’s delusions even as it shows them for what they are. This movie may cast a harsh light on its protagonist’s romanticism by creating a grimy mosaic of pain and suffering to pummel his spirit, but it mirrors his hope by ending on its own note of romanticism.

Even if it’s not exactly founded in sound reasoning, there is light at the end of this tunnel, along with some satisfying moments of salvation. It may just be one glimmer of light in a dark and cyclical pattern, but it feels like the perfect resting point all the same. After all, upon completing an exhilarating journey like this one, the viewer, like Frank, needs their rest. For the briefest of moments, we witness the redemptive glow of dawn. It feels eternal. That’s all that counts.

USA | 1999 | 121 MINUTES | 2.39:1 | COLOUR | ENGLISH

Cast & Crew

director: Martin Scorsese.
writer: Paul Schrader (based on the novel by Joe Connelly).
starring: Nicolas Cage, Patricia Arquette, John Goodman, Marc Anthony, Ving Rhames, Tom Sizemore, Cliff Curtis, Nestor Serrano & Afemo Omilami.