The lighting, cinematography, sets and props all seems so choreographed, so purposeful, that it distracts from the film. Of course, the star is Nick Cage, and it's hard to distract from him for very long. Cage's presence dominates the film and he vies for your attention in almost diamentrically opposed porportions to Scorsese's cinematics. But Cage's and the director's struggle, like a marvelous yet unusual symphony, soon seems to stop being cacaphonous screeching and begins to be harmonious mesh. And then film begins to ascend the rungs to the heights of heavenly bliss.
Cage is an ambulance driver who has seen it all.
Working in the worst part of New York City has dragged him down into it's depths, lierally and figuratively. Scorsese wisely manifests these to the physical so that we see the doubts and turmoil that possesses Cage's driver. We are caught up in the flux that is his daily life. We see what he feels. In juxtaposition to this, the film wisely adds several humerous yet real characters to crosscut with Cage giving the film a marvellous wavering feel.