Bringing Out The Dead

Bringing Out The Dead (1999): starring Nicolas Cage, Patricia Arquette, John Goodman, Ving Rhames, Tom Sizemore, Marc Anthony, Directed by Martin Scorsese
In Bringing Out The Dead, Martin Scorsese once again attempts to show us the sleazy, sickening underbelly of New York City, this time through the eyes of an ambulance driver (Nicolas Cage) working the graveyard shift in the rough part of town. He befriends the daughter of a man he brought in one night (in a fairly interesting sequence that begins the film), but is also seeing ghosts of a girl he failed to save in the past. The plot, though, just seems incidental to Scorsese and his attempt to shove as much filth and disgust onto the screen as possible. Scorsese also seems to be aping the style of earlier (and better) movies such as Seven and 12 Monkeys, in the way certain scenes are shot and edited. Unfortunately, it's mostly empty symbolism working towards a nihilistic end. The movie also invokes The Bad Lieutenant in the way it shows a man's descent into hell. But The Bad Lieutenant commits to showing it's bleak underbelly without any flash and flare, while Bringing Out The Dead seems to be nothing but flare, all camera techniques and hollywood make-up (and even some c.g.i.). While it's not a horrible movie (and Cage gives a great performance), it seems like a missed opportunity for something really great.
*** out of *****