Bringing Out the Dead (1999)
84%RT Audience Score: 85%
Awards & Nominations: 2 wins & 5 nominations
Stunning and compelling, Scorsese and Cage succeed at satisfying the audience
Somebody call 911 because Bringing Out the Dead is a wild ride! Scorsese and Cage team up to bring us a story of a paramedic on the brink of insanity, driving around the city that never sleeps. It’s like Taxi Driver, but with an ambulance instead of a taxi. The tension is palpable and the tone is both world-weary and adolescent, which is a weird combo but it works. Plus, who doesn’t love seeing Nic Cage in a crazy role? It’s brutal, it’s fun, it’s Bringing Out the Dead.
Production Company(ies)
Focus Features, Anonymous Content This Is That Productions,
Distributor
Paramount Pictures
Release Type
Theatrical
Filming Location(s)
11th Avenue & 54th Street, Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA
MPAA / Certificate
Rated R for gritty violent content, drug use and language
Year of Release
1999
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Color:Color
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Sound mix:DTS Dolby Digital SDDS
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Aspect ratio:2.39 : 1
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Runtime:2h 2m
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Language(s):English
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Country of origin:United States
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Release date:Release Date (Theaters): Oct 22, 1999 Wide
Release Date (Streaming): Sep 11, 2007
Genre(s)
Drama
Keyword(s)
starring Nicolas Cage, Patricia Arquette, John Goodman, Ving Rhames, Tom Sizemore, Marc Anthony, directed by Martin Scorsese, written by Joe Connelly, Paul Schrader, drama, R rating, box office gross $16.6M, reviewed by Anthony Lane, Lisa Alspector, Ian Freer, Geoff Andrew, Peter Rainer, Kevin Jackson, Calum Baker, Taylor Baker, Eve Tushnet, Sean Burns, Grant Watson, Rob Nelson, New York City, paramedic, saving lives, witnessing deaths, friendship, victim’s daughter, insomnia, alcoholism, haunting career, disheartening, compelling, satisfying, tension, world-weary, adolescent, anxiety, personal, political, religious, catharsis, forgotten Scorsese film, dark comedy, serious tones, storytelling issues, cohesive plot
Worldwide gross: $16,797,191
Worldwide gross (inflation-adjusted): $30,151,426
Worldwide gross ranking (inflation-adjusted): 1,549
Worldwide tickets sold (est.): 3,288,051
US/Canada gross: $16,797,191
US/Canada gross (inflation-adjusted): $30,151,426
US/Canada gross ranking (inflation-adjusted): 1,273
US/Canada opening weekend: $6,193,052
US/Canada opening weekend (inflation-adjusted): $11,116,701
US/Canada opening weekend ranking (inflation-adjusted): 928
Budget and Earnings Details
Production budget (est.): $55,000,000
Production budget (inflation-adjusted): $98,726,534
Production budget ranking: 412
Marketing and distribution budget (inflation-adjusted est.): $53,164,238
Box office net earnings to date (inflation-adjusted est.): -$121,739,346
ROI to date (est.): -80%
ROI ranking: 1,882
Patricia Arquette – Mary Burke
John Goodman – Larry Verber
Ving Rhames – Marcus
Tom Sizemore – Tom Wall
Marc Anthony – Noel
Director – Martin Scorsese
Producers – Barbara De Fina, Scott Rudin
Writers – Joe Connelly, Paul Schrader
Director(s)
Martin Scorsese
Writer(s)
Joe Connelly, Paul Schrader
Producer(s)
Barbara De Fina, Scott Rudin
Film Festivals
Awards & Nominations
2 wins & 5 nominations
Academy Awards
All Critics (110) | Top Critics (32) | Fresh (79) | Rotten (31)
The new picture comes supplied with the same tension [as Taxi Driver], but, though I hate to say so, it feels like a package.
April 14, 2020
Anthony Lane
New Yorker
TOP CRITIC
Its hard-to-pin-down tone is frighteningly original — simultaneously world-weary and adolescent with an aura of perpetual anxiety, as if the characters and filmmakers were in pursuit of a catharsis everyone knows will never come.
September 17, 2008
Lisa Alspector
Chicago Reader
TOP CRITIC
An exciting, invigorating return to old preoccupations. Welcome home, Marty.
December 30, 2006 | Rating: 4/5
Ian Freer
Empire Magazine
TOP CRITIC
Of course, it’s immaculately crafted and exhilaratingly paced, but in the end it’s never as emotionally involving as it could and should be.
June 24, 2006
Geoff Andrew
Time Out
TOP CRITIC
Scorsese doesn’t trust the power of simplicity to rock us.
August 7, 2004
Peter Rainer
New York Magazine/Vulture
TOP CRITIC
A very different and, in many respects, very impressive film.
December 2, 2002
Kevin Jackson
Sight & Sound
TOP CRITIC
A smart, urgent and compulsively entertaining blend of the personal, political and religious, this stands among both Scorsese’s and Schrader’s most accomplished statements.
May 13, 2022 | Rating: 4/5
Calum Baker
Radio Times
Episode 54: After Hours / Bringing Out the Dead / The Irishman
December 1, 2021 | Rating: 90/100
Taylor Baker
Drink in the Movies
Somebody let Nic Cage drive an ambulance… and that somebody is Scorsese. This is mostly brutal fun…
May 29, 2020
Eve Tushnet
Patheos
It’s an older, wiser Scorsese and Schrader back together 23 years after ‘Taxi Driver’ telling the story of another insomniac basket case driving around New York City late at night. Except now instead of an avenging angel he’s on a mission of mercy.
April 5, 2020
Sean Burns
The ARTery
There is no denying Scorsese is one of American cinema’s most astonishing directors, but I honestly think it is high time Bringing Out the Dead was revisited and given another chance.
June 19, 2019 | Rating: 9/10
Grant Watson
Fiction Machine
I congratulate Martin Scorsese on this miraculous triumph over his personal demons, and pray for the swift recovery of his art.
August 21, 2009
Rob Nelson
City Pages, Minneapolis/St. Paul…
Plot
An Easter story. Frank is a Manhattan medic, working graveyard in a two-man ambulance team. He’s burned out, exhausted, seeing ghosts, especially a young woman he failed to save six months’ before, and no longer able to save people: he brings in the dead. We follow him for three nights, each with a different partner: Larry, who thinks about dinner, Marcus, who looks to Jesus, and Tom, who wallops people when work is slow. Frank befriends the daughter of a heart victim he brings in; she’s Mary, an ex-junkie, angry at her father but now hoping he’ll live. Frank tries to get fired, tries to quit, and keeps coming back, to work and to Mary, in need of his own rebirth.
Trivia
Goofs / Tidbits
Nicolas Cage delivers a strong performance as the unhinged paramedic in Bringing Out the Dead.
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