Review of Bringing Out the Dead (1999) by Catherine H — 31 Aug 2009

From the onset of this film you get the feeling that this isn't going to be your typical Nicholas Cage movie and at the time it was released (1999) We hadn't seen Cage in any great major roles (Such as City of Angels) So I'm probably over estimating his role in this one. I was expecting it to be your typical horror meets dark comedy type film and although in some ways it was in the majority it wasn't. I liked Nicholas Cages' performance, he's an amazing actor at any role he plays, he always sends shivers down my spine with his heart wrenching performances, but this felt so...Out of character for him.

The movie takes a long while to get going and even longer for it to get even slightly interesting, your paramedic guy attending jobs on late night shift isn't exactly what I call interesting. The film felt to me as if the whole cast, crew and directors were stoned when they were putting it together, with the ocassional tortured memories Cages' character (Frank) keeps having about some girl named Rose.

I normally will sit through a film and try to find something intresting to grasp ahold of, I desperately searched for that in this film and the only part I found morally interesting was UB40's "Red, Red Wine" cropping up out of no-where.

I can only write what I feel about this movie, majority of Flixster users enjoyed it and maybe in some ways it was appealing to them. I just couldn't knuckle down with this one, there's no back bone, no happy ending just mixed up thoughts written on blank peices of paper...Definately not worth watching if your settling down to a good movie, maybe one you would stick on if you were flicking through the TV channels and there was zero else on.

Sorry Nicholas...At least it got better at the end.