James Earl Jones

(In French, On Cable TV, January 2021) One of my emerging cinephile rules is simple: If I see Larry Cohen in the credits, I watch the movie. He was a clever writer-director, and so there’s nearly always something interesting in the mix whenever he’s involved. Despite lower budgets, his determination to remix familiar elements into something quirky and compelling carries through—as does his obvious affection for New York City. While The Ambulance may look like a typical horror film, it plays with slightly more wit and originality than the norm. Eric Roberts (in his regrettable mullet phase) plays a young comic book illustrator who, smitten with a cute young woman working nearby, work up the nerve to ask her out… and is dismayed when she faints and is carried away in an ambulance driven by sinister characters. His day gets worse when he can’t find her at the hospital she was supposed to go, and his attempts to warn the authorities about this mysterious ambulance are greeted with shrugs and derision. James Earl Jones shows up as a skeptical policeman, but the biggest casting surprise goes to comics legend Stan Lee making his first movie appearance playing himself as the protagonist’s boss. The rest is a chase conspiracy thriller with many paranoid moments and refreshing side characters, including a crusty veteran journalist played by Red Buttons and an attractive policewoman played by Megan Gallagher. The film keeps our interest by being clever, sidestepping some clichés of the genre while reinforcing others, and keeping its biggest irony at the very end. (But you won’t feel too bad for the protagonist, as women throw themselves at him throughout the entire film.)  The Ambulance is not what I’d call a great movie, but it falls straight into that more interesting subgenre of solid B-grade films, wittily imagined and decently executed. It fits with the rest of Cohen’s filmography and it has a few surprises in store, even for jaded viewers.