Ambulance Movie Review: An energetic heist-thriller that could have been more  

Michael Bay's latest film has all his signature moves, but the cliched, uninventive storyline kills the highs
Ambulance Movie Review
Ambulance Movie Review

Michael Bay films are a sub-genre of action films on their own. Extensively choreographed camera movements, high-speed car chases, guns ablaze every now and then... We are familiar with it. In his latest heist-thriller, Ambulance, Bay's self-indulgent style becomes both a bane and boon. He uses everything in his arsenal, from handheld cameras, creative trolley pulls, astonishing drone shots, and extreme close-ups to pull us close to the action. It's quite impressive to see how these creative decisions also add layers to storytelling. For example, in an initial scene, we are introduced to an Emergency Medical Technician Cam Thompson (Eiza Gonzalez), who has to save a little girl, Lindsey, from a car crash. The shots are shaky to suggest the urgency, and angled from below in a way that elevates and honours the novel work of the paramedics.

Director: Michael Bay

Cast: Jake Gyllenhaal, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Eiza Gonzalez

Quite obviously, Ambulance is an ode to paramedics, and the story is also right up Bay's alley. William Sharp (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) is a war veteran who, to save his ailing wife Amy (Moses Ingram) from cancer, turns to his brother Danny Sharp (Jake Gyllenhaal). However, he soon realises that Danny hasn't gotten out of his life as a bank robber and that he is just about to go on a major $32 million bank heist. In the meantime, a police officer Zach (Jackson White) chooses the worst possible date and time to ask out his bank-teller crush. The bank heist goes south, and the narrative from here-on is from the perspectives of the characters inside the ambulance and that of the law enforcement officers trying to nab the criminals. The problem with Ambulance begins here, as Bay is persistent in using just his trademark, explosive chase sequences to keep the tension going. Every time we begin to wonder if the chase is coming to an end, a shocking turn saves the brothers, whose only trump card is that they have a wounded soldier in their hold. How these big turns turn out, literally, feels strangely amateurish coming from someone who has mastered the trope. The cops, for some reason, are most unskillful! All Will, the driver of the ambulance, has to do is just make a sharp turn or an abrupt stop to send cop cars flying, tumbling, and crashing. No matter how grand the action is when a sequence is prolonged a minute more than necessary, even Bay's attempts at skillfully capturing the action becomes just another distraction.

Moreover, the morality of this world is questionable as well. During the expansive chase, many cops meet fatal ends and yet, we are repeatedly forced to believe that everything that Will, Danny, and the law enforcement officers do is primarily to just save Zach. The irony even hinders the emotional arcs that Bay painstakingly strives to weave and build amid the short span in which the story takes place. There's also a lot of convenience in how writer Chris Fedak chooses to put forward his moral stand with Will's character in the film. Yes, it's a great trick to keep us torn between a good guy stuck in a bad place, and the innocent Cam and Zach; yes, Will saves Cam and Zach at multiple instances; and yes, we do empathise for Will, but in the eyes of the law, a criminal is a criminal. There's ethical ambiguity in how the film justifies Will's actions.

Danny and Cam are stand-out characters who let their extreme emotions be felt. Amid an adrenaline-pumping sequence, Danny and Will jam to an '80s rock song. Danny's dark humour brings Ambulance's much-needed levity. Cam, on the other hand, gets the bigger arc. In the beginning, after she saves the little girl Lindsey, her partner questions whether she wanted to be updated regarding Lindsey's health, and she declines the offer, saying, "The worst day of their life is just our Tuesday afternoon." This line gets mirrored later on in the end, after she goes through hell and back, and the arc gets a thoughtful finish. Characters like Captain Monroe (Garret Dillahunt), and FBI Agent Anson Clark (Keir O'Donnell) are damp squibs though.

It's inspiring how Gyllenhaal doesn't shy away from portraying these negative roles. The actor's performance, along with that of Abdul-Mateen II's and Golzalez's, keep us invested. Lorne Balfe's background score also aids Bay's pacy storytelling. Hope, distress, and urgency seep through the music, and like with many Michael Bay films, the runtime feels shorter in experience. At a time when we are getting an Army of the Dead when a heist takes place amid a zombie apocalypse, the thin, cliched storyline of Ambulance needed more from this successful filmmaker. And yet, you do see that the real world feels a bit slow after you exit the big screen, leaving you craving a longer experience in Bay's world.

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