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Bringing Out the Dead Movie Review

Bringing Out the Dead is a 1999 drama film directed by Martin Scorsese and starring Nicolas Cage. It’s a very flawed, but somewhat interesting effort from Scorsese.

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“It’s not your fault.

No one asked you to suffer.

That was your idea“

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Frank, a mentally strained and overworked paramedic from Manhattan, tries to maintain his sanity as he tends to various emergencies and hallucinates about all the people whose lives he could not save. First off, this movie is said to be a supernatural horror, but I wouldn’t call it a horror or a thriller despite it having those elements. It’s most definitely a drama and a very dark and depressing one at that.

This is one of Scorsese’s least popular and talked about movies, but it’s not bad at all. In fact, it’s quite solid and better than some of his most renowned efforts. The movie is at its best when it’s showcasing the extremely hard and honorable work of these paramedics and how important for society their work is while being obviously straining on their psyche. It has its very moving moments, but for the most part the film did not fully delve into this job and what it entails psychologically.

Nicolas Cage had a respectable career back in this period and this is one of his better roles for sure. He was excellent in the role of Frank, a role that demanded a lot of subtlety and emotional expressiveness from him, which he delivered in spades. Of the other characters, only one has stuck in my mind and that is Marcus, his colleague played so well by the always reliable Ving Rhames. Their dynamic was so good that I wanted much more of it.

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Bringing Out the Dead’s main problem is its episodic nature. It’s one of those movies that focus on so many different characters (patients in this instance) that the end result felt underutilized and rushed in most of these storylines. The film was at its best when it focused on the protagonist’s guilt and other emotions of frustration and despair, but it was at its worst when it tried to depict the more colorful characters in its roster and giving the love letter to Manhattan. The latter element felt particularly shoehorned in this story that didn’t need it. The cinematography also did not appeal to me as the movie has those dark, dreary visuals that I simply never gravitated toward.