Ambulance is a 2022 American action thriller film directed by Michael Bay. It is a remake of the 2005 Danish film. It stars Jake Gyllenhaal and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II as adoptive brothers who hijack an ambulance after robbing a bank and take a paramedic (Eiza González) and an injured police officer (Jackson White) hostage.
The film was first announced in 2015 and went through several crew changes. In 2020, Bay came on board to direct after the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted his plans to shoot a different film. Filming took place in Los Angeles, in the midst of the pandemic, with cinematographer Roberto De Angelis. The score was composed by Lorne Balfe.
Ambulance was released in the United States on April 8, 2022, by Universal Pictures. The film underperformed at the box office, grossing $52 million on a budget of $40 million. It received mixed reviews from critics, with some praise for Gyllenhaal's performance and the action sequences.
Plot
Afghanistan Marine veteran Will Sharp, desperately needing money for his wife Amy's surgery, reaches out to Danny, his adoptive brother and life-long criminal. He is talked into being the getaway driver for a $32 million bank heist. Though initially hesitant, Will agrees after Danny reaffirms that he is doing it for his wife, Amy.
The plan nearly succeeds until Officer Zach, who enters the bank to ask out a bank teller, discovers the situation and is held hostage. A shootout then occurs between one of the heist members and Zach's partner Officer Mark. The Special Investigation Section (SIS) of the LAPD arrives, killing or arresting most of the crew except for Will and Danny, who retreat toward the garage.
Zach attempts to escape, and during a scuffle is accidentally shot by Will. Leaving him behind, the brothers attempt to exit through the back of the building but find it surrounded by police. They then hijack an ambulance with EMT Cam Thompson, who is treating the injured Zach, on board. After a chase that leads them into an alleyway, Cam makes a desperate attempt to escape using a fire extinguisher but is quickly recaptured by Danny.
SIS Captain Monroe arrives on the scene and deploys helicopters to chase after the ambulance. Cam gets Danny to help her use a defibrillator and Will to transfer some of his blood to Zach, much to his confusion and frustration. Danny then calls Papi, one of his father's criminal friends, for help losing the police in exchange for $8 million.
When Cam stops Danny from shooting Mark, who has been chasing them, he threatens to throw her off the ambulance. The police are forced to retreat when it is discovered that Monroe's dog is inside Mark's police vehicle. FBI Agent Anson Clark, a former friend of Danny's, is put on the case. Zach begins to bleed out; Cam calls her surgeon ex-boyfriend, and with Will's assistance, begins to perform surgery on him.
Despite her inexperience and his spleen rupturing, Cam successfully performs the surgery. After, she tries to convince Will to stop Danny, to no avail. Monroe, unaware of the surgery's success, moves forward with the operation, preparing to snipe Will and Danny without negotiating for Cam's life. Clark calls Cam and tells her to get down.
Cam, not wanting them all to die, alerts Will and Danny about the snipers. Danny, fed up with her, decides to shoot her, but Will intervenes, causing the brothers to fight about their predicament. They later partially reconcile and listen to music together to ease the tension.
In the Los Angeles River, helicopters chase the ambulance as Danny shoots at them. Will and Danny then drive on the opposite lane of the interstate, creating multiple accidents. On Papi's orders, his son Roberto sends multiple ambulance decoys to distract the police and drives an ambulance towards a police roadblock after filling it with C-4 explosives. Papi deploys a minigun on a separate car to cause additional damage, wounding Monroe in the crossfire.
Mark chases down Roberto and fatally shoots him after a scuffle, leaving Papi angry and distraught. Will and Danny escape to Papi's hideout. He demands the brothers leave Zach and Cam with them to deal with; Will refuses to cooperate and teams up with Danny to kill Papi and his crew.
In the chaos, Cam accidentally shoots Will with Zach's gun. Danny takes the ambulance to a hospital and discovers the gun. He is enraged when Cam reveals that she was the one who shot Will. Danny vows to kill her along with himself on live television before confronting the police.
Left with no other choice, Will shoots Danny in the back, who apologizes to him before succumbing to his injuries. The police arrest a critically injured Will, taking him inside for surgery. Cam secretly gives some of the heist money to Amy for her surgery, and Zach, when questioned by the police about his injuries, tells them that Will saved his life.
Cast
Production Development Ambulance is an American remake of the 2005 Danish film of the same name. Producer Bradley J. Fischer said Michael Bay was his first choice to direct but he originally passed on the project. The film was announced on August 28, 2015, with Phillip Noyce attached to direct from a script by Chris Fedak. Two years later, the directing duo Navot Papushado and Aharon Keshales replaced Noyce, but this version of the film never entered production.
In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic in Los Angeles preempted Bay's plans to shoot his next film, Black Five. He recalled telling his agent "Goddamnit, I just want to get out and shoot something fast. I'm tired of being locked up at home." He pitched an idea to Donna Langley, the Chairwoman of Universal Pictures, saying he wanted to direct a "small" film focusing on the tension between characters trapped in a claustrophobic setting. Bay was reminded of Ambulance and told it could be shot on a relatively low-budget in a short period. "It kind of suited my needs," he said. On November 11, 2020, Bay was announced as the new director, and the film was referred to as a "character-driven project" that would move away from Bay's normality of "standard explosion-heavy fare" while deriving elements from Speed (1994) and Bad Boys (1995). Bay did not watch or read the screenplay of the original Danish film because he wanted to make the film his own.
The film was financed by Endeavor Content and produced by New Republic Pictures and Project X. Jake Gyllenhaal received the screenplay while shooting The Guilty in November 2020. The following month, the film was announced with Gyllenhaal and Dylan O'Brien in talks to star as the two adoptive brothers who hijack the ambulance and Eiza González in negotiations to play the paramedic. Gyllenhaal's casting was a contributing factor in Bay's decision to shoot the film. To prepare for the role, González spent three months "working intimately with firefighters, EMTs, surgeons, [and] everyone around the medical care system." She also rented an ambulance and had a friend drive her around to improve her balance. On December 11, 2020, Universal Pictures confirmed they would distribute the film and announced O'Brien had dropped out of the project due to scheduling conflicts; Yahya Abdul-Mateen II was cast as his replacement when he was able to fit the film into his schedule, following a production delay on Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom (2023). González was confirmed to star three days later. The rest of the cast was announced between January and May 2021.Multiple sources:
On joining the cast, A Martinez said he submitted a self-made audition video from Auckland, New Zealand.
Filming Filming began on January 11, 2021, in downtown Los Angeles, with a $40 million budget. Filming wrapped on March 18, 2021, after thirty-eight days.
During pre-production, stunt coordinator Mike Gunther put the three lead actors through stunt driving courses to test their driving abilities. Supervising location manager Rob Gibson obtained driving permits for numerous streets and freeway corridors in the city using his close relationship with FilmLA. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the crew had to follow safety protocols such as wearing masks on set. The production borrowed six ambulances from Falck. The scenes inside of the ambulance were captured using three ambulances: one was driven with the crew on board; a second could be dismantled; and a third was rocked on a stage. The limited space inside of the ambulance required Gyllenhaal to hold the camera for some takes.
Several Komodo digital cameras by Red were used. A considerable amount of the film was shot using first-person view drones by LightCraft, a company discovered by executive producer Michael Kase after seeing their footage of the top of the Wilshire Grand Center. Bay said this way of filming was implemented because he was inspired by Steven Spielberg's direction on War of the Worlds (2005) to come up with new ways to put his stories on screen while simultaneously limiting himself as a director. The drones in the film were flown by Drone Racing League pilots Jordan Temkin and Alex Vanover using head-mounted displays. Footage captured by the drones included scenes in the Los Angeles Convention Center and the city's Fashion District. To increase the story's authenticity, the cast improvised some of their lines. The production also hired real trauma surgeons, firefighters, SWAT teams, snipers, undercover SIS members, and 52 LAPD officers for the shoot.
On the first day of filming, while shooting footage of the ambulance driving on a freeway, Bay noticed several patrol officers and three motorcycle cops. He asked them if they wanted to star in the film, to which they agreed, and used the opportunity to sweet talk the officers into creating a rolling roadblock, allowing them to close the freeway for free instead of paying the average $350–400 thousand cost. On Garret Dillahunt's first day on set, the crew was able to secure access to an area featuring the Los Angeles City Hall, the Times Mirror Square building, and the LAPD headquarters for a mere 19 minutes worth of natural light to film. To describe the gravity of the situation, Bay was told that would be "the only time [and] the last time you are ever going to get this corner, this area." As the time started, Bay realized he had to spend some time fitting the English Mastiff in the film, his own dog, into a small vehicle. He called it the most difficult day on set.
The helicopter chase sequence in the Los Angeles River was not in the script; Bay came up with the idea over a weekend after two helicopters became available for use. The scene was shot in two and a half hours with the help of helicopter pilot Fred North. Instead of hiring stuntmen for the sequence, Gyllenhaal was actually hanging off the side of the ambulance's door and shooting at the helicopters himself while an excited Abdul-Mateen live-streamed the event to his friend as he was driving. Bay took responsibility for a video shared on his Instagram of a stunt involving the ambulance crashing into several vehicles. The clip was criticized by the mayor and the governor of Los Angeles for endangering the crew and censored on Instagram. He explained the logistics behind the stunt and how it was filmed in an hour-long interview with Collider, claiming it was "perfectly planned". Furthermore, Bay said they shot "90 shots to 120 shots a day. That's a lot of shots. Most movies are 20 to 30 shots a day. But you know I was there with the camera. I'm a director who doesn't have a video village, I don't have a director's chair, I don't have a trailer. I'm right there with the actors and we work fast".
Post-production