Bringing out the Dead (1999 Martin Scorsese)

Requiring more of Thelma Schoonmaker we return to Marty's mean streets of New York, in the hands of Paul Schrader, from a novel by Joe Connelly based on his own ten years' experience as a paramedic. In febrile, frankly astonishing film we repeatedly had to stop and rewind scenes edited at all manner of arbitrary film speeds, dazzlingly shot by Robert Richardson in Panavision. 'Dream' (drug) sequence is amazing and makes me think of Michael Powell (Hoffman and The Red Shoes ).

Nicolas Cage is magnetic as the burned out driver, supported by John Goodman, Ving Rhames and Tom Sizemore and finding some salvation with Patricia Arquette. Could have been overwhelmingly bleak without flashes of black humour e.g. accusing coma patient.