Ambulance, produced by Michael Bay, stars Yaha Abdul Mateen II, Jake Gyllenhaal, and Eiza Gonzalez in an action packed, fast moving movie about a bank-heist gone wrong.
Danny (Gyllenhaal) has a plan to rob a Los Angeles bank for 32 million and Will (Mateen) is desperate for a way to pay for his ailing wifes experimental surgery. Will agrees to help Danny, even though he has promised his wife that he was done with that path in life.
Through one mishap and then a cascading series of them, Will & Danny end up hijacking an ambulance in order to make their escape. The ambulance is carrying a police officer shot during he attempted robbery, however, and the resulting police chases are crazy, loud, improbable, and occasionally edge-of-your-seat exciting.
The filming methods at some points left me feeling a little queasy, as they spun around, and dipped and dove through the sky to get views of the action from above, but most of the car chase scenes were interesting and exciting for the action of them, if not for the acting involved in them.
There were bits of comedy and one-liners scattered throughout the film which broke up some of the tension and non-stop (someone in the theatre complained “never ending” as well) drama of the get-away escapades.
It is definitely a movie you would want to watch “on the big screen” as the scope of the car chases would lose something in translation to a home viewing. Part of what draws the viewer in, here, IS the very size and overwhelming close ups and noise and chaos in the film.
The story line was rather predictable, but the constant action was able to mostly counter-act that and leave me feeling like this was a decent, entertaining way to spend the evening, escaping into someone ELSES problems for 2 hours and 15 minutes.
I would give this movie 3 out of 5 stars.
