We’re calling out for a hero: Michael Bay. But is his Ambulance good?
As painful as it might be to admit, it’s the perfect time for Michael Bay to make a comeback. Cinemas need big, bold crowd-pleasers, and there’s no-one bigger or bolder than the man behind the Bad Boys and Transformers franchises. His new film is called Ambulance, but those thinking this will be a sensitive ode to first responders will be in for a shock.
Yahya Abdul-Mateen II plays Will, an army veteran with a wife who needs expensive surgery. He turns to his adoptive brother Danny (Jake Gyllenhaal), a career criminal, for help. Danny is planning to rob $35m from an LA bank, and with no options left Will agrees to help. Things go south quickly when an officer arrives at the wrong time, and is shot in the resulting chaos. The brothers steal the ambulance caring for him, with paramedic Cam (Eiza Gonzalez) trying to keep the officer alive while Will and Danny evade capture in a frantic car chase around The City of Angels.
All the tricks in Bay’s toolbox are present and correct. Cars race down sun-bleached LA streets, overshadowed by helicopters, with the whole thing captured on a camera that can’t sit still. It’s as if Bay is paying homage to himself, which in a way he is; he even references his own work when a character quotes from The Rock. Still, there’s a pleasing familiarity to the execution that keeps you entertained: brainless, but never boring.
The script offers a cast of sarcastic, hyper-masculine characters, with even hostage Cam being quickly established as a no-nonsense maverick who gets the job done. Gonzalez has little to do other than shout at Gyllenhaal and look into the middle distance, but she adds emotional stakes to this live action Grand Theft Auto mission. Abdul-Mateen, recently wasted as the new Morpheus in The Matrix Resurrections, is an interesting anti-hero, doing the wrong thing for the right reasons and never losing your sympathy.
The film is made for Gyllenhaal, however, as the kind of fast-talking sleazebag who fits perfectly in these movies. Moving at a million miles an hour, his energy matches the pace of the film as he once again proves more effective as a villain simply because he seems to be having a lot more fun. It’s not exactly Nightcrawler, but he has a presence that elevates the madness.
Ending as puzzlingly as it began, Ambulance is not a smart movie, and is unlikely to win any new fans for The God of Explosions. However, if you want to switch your brain off and watch things blow up, there are worse ways to spend two hours.