Cast: Nicolas Cage, Patricia Arquette, John Goodman, Ving Rhames, Tom Sizemore,
Marc Anthony, Cliff Curtis
Director: Martin Scorsese
Producers: Barbara De Fina, Scott Rudin
Screenplay: Paul Schrader, based on the novel by Joe Connelly
Cinematography: Robert Richardson
Music: Elmer Bernstein
U.S. Distributor: Paramount Pictures
Bringing Out the Dead, the fourth collaboration between director Martin Scorsese and writer Paul Schrader (who previously worked together on Taxi Driver, Raging Bull, and The Last Temptation of Christ), bears as much resemblance to films helmed by Schrader as to those by Scorsese. In fact, one of the hallmarks of Scorsese's best offerings – a relentless, driving energy that impels the narrative forward – is entirely absent. In its place is the kind of smothering psychological paralysis that gripped the characters in Schrader's Affliction.
The setting of Bringing Out the Dead is a familiar one for Scorsese. After taking a one film break in Tibet (Kundun), the director has returned to the mean streets of New York City (circa the early 1990s). But Robert Richardson's cameras avoid the lighted, congested main avenues, straying instead into the back alleys and dingy apartment buildings that mark the habitations of those whose futures are as unpromising as their homes. Bringing Out the Dead is about these people, the reality of whose lives is often grimmer than the unreality of many people's bad dreams.
Nicolas Cage is Frank Pierce, a NYC Emergency Medical Technician ambulance driver. He and one of his partners, Larry (John Goodman), Marcus (Ving Rhames), or Tom (Tom Sizemore), respond to 911 emergencies barked across the ambulance's two way radio. Lately, Frank has been in a rut. His patients are all dying on him; he hasn't saved anyone in months. In a voiceover, he remarks that saving someone's life is like falling in love, but he hasn't experienced that sensation in a while. The frantic lifestyle is taking its toll on him. He rarely eats, surviving instead on an unhealthy mixture of booze and caffeine. His eyes are hollow and red-rimmed, but nightmares deprive him of sleep. And he has begun to see the ghosts of the many men and women he has lost. One in particular, a teenager named Rose, stares out at him from the faces of many of the people he sees on street corners.
Like so many characters in Scorsese's films, Frank needs redemption, and he spends the entire film trying to find it. We first meet him on a Thursday, when he and Larry are called to help a man who has collapsed from a heart attack and is apparently dead. The man's daughter, Mary (Patricia Arquette), is in hysterics by his side as Frank goes to work with CPR. He revives the patient, then transports him to the hospital, where he remains in a coma. For the next two days, nearly every time Frank brings someone in, Mary is there, waiting and wondering if her father will ever get better. Soon, she and Frank realize that they have much in common.
Those expecting bursts of high octane violence (a la Goodfellas or Casino) will not find them in Bringing Out the Dead. There are a few gruesome moments, but, at least for Scorsese, they are surprisingly low key. This is a character study, and the force behind it is stasis, not development. It's a perfect illustration of the concept of inertia: an object in motion will continue in motion, while (in this case) an object in rest will continue at rest. Frank's life is going nowhere when the film begins; his trajectory has not changed two hours later.
Several scenes during Bringing Out the Dead take place in a New York City emergency room. Watching the gritty, controlled chaos there, I couldn't help but be reminded of how it contrasts with the picture painted by TV's ER. The grim reality of Bringing Out the Dead isn't the kind of thing people feel comfortable watching, but it isn't far from the truth for an inner city emergency room, where the number of patients is often too great for a staff whose members are pulling double and triple shifts. Bringing Out the Dead is not a feel-good movie; the hospital atmosphere is merely an extension of the pervasive malaise that lingers over every frame of the film. Even the comic relief rarely gets lighter than gallows humor.
Even though Frank is on screen for nearly every moment of the film, he remains something of an enigma. We're aware of who he is here and now, and, in part because of Cage's voiceovers, we know what he's thinking, but his past and his relationships with his co-workers are shrouded in mystery. We get clues, but nothing more – he was married, his parents are still alive, his close working relationship with Tom fell apart, and he was once one of the best ambulance drivers in New York. But we never see where he lives, nor do we meet anyone that could be considered close to him. Perhaps there is no one. Even his developing relationship with Mary is uncertain and tentative.
Nicolas Cage does not possess great range, but, cast in a certain type of role, he can give a powerful performance. Frank is the kind of character that Cage is adept at playing; he's a variation on the drunk with a death wish who won the actor an Oscar for Leaving Las Vegas. Frank is a tortured individual, and Cage understands how to bring his inner demons to the surface. His eyes are often vacant and there are times when his voice is a dead monotone. If Frank smiles more than once during this movie, I don't remember it. Cage is not as good here as he was in Leaving Las Vegas, but he can still be proud of this work.
Cage's wife, Patricia Arquette, plays the only other genuine character in Bringing Out the Dead. Everyone beside Frank and Mary functions as little more than a catalyst or a mouthpiece for bits of philosophy. Arquette draws on a wellspring of pain and darkness for this portrayal; the sultry vixen she often essays is completely sublimated. Mary is just another wretch in need of some sort of solace, and she doesn't care how that relief comes. Like Frank, we learn little about Mary's past, except that she was heavily into the sex-and-drug scene, has been clean for two years, and is estranged from her dying father.
As is expected from something bearing the moniker "A Martin Scorsese Picture," Bringing Out the Dead is impeccable from a technical perspective. Director of Photography Richardson (who previously worked with the director on Casino) does not show the same aggressive approach as other recent Scorsese cinematographers, but there are some interesting moments, including one that mixes sparks, fireworks, and a red, white, and blue Empire State Building in the background. There are some fast motion shots, instances when everything is in soft focus (as if the lens is smeared with vasoline), and times when Cage's white jacket seems to glow from within. The downbeat atmosphere is consistently maintained. Even when it isn't dark, the light is so muted that it might as well be.
This is not one of Scorsese's best films. In fact, it's far from the lofty perch claimed by Taxi
Driver, Raging Bull, and Goodfellas. Yet, despite the lack of energy and the
lethargic pace, there's something darkly compelling about Bringing Out the Dead. It's an
uncomfortable excursion, sort of like a ride in a hearse to a funeral, and it has stayed with me
longer than 90% of the movies I see. That, more than anything, is a testimony to Scorsese's skill as
a director. See this film if you appreciate bleak character portraits that do not feel the need to let a
little sunshine in.
© 1999 James Berardinelli