Midnight Family

Realistically showing the real life struggles of private ambulances in Mexico City. With tons of Insert/Extreme-Closeup/Point-of-view shots, it keeps going upwards and downwards. Sometimes feel like a well written/acted family-drama, other times just a documentary, that's trying too hard.

If you find yourself in Mexico City take out the best health insurance possible but first and foremost, don't get ill or sick or have an accident or hope to rely on the private ambulance service run by mercenaries that's occasionally supported by the corrupt police but quite often not - or you might not get home or be the person you were when you left.

Great example why free market economics and health care doesn't gel as nicely in reality as it does in the text books.

Imagine a member of your family. They were injured and they required immediate assistance. So you call for an ambulance. The ambulance showed up. Took care of your family. Drove you both to the hospital. Then they ask you for compensation. Would you be angry with them? Would you take it for granted that if you or your loved ones should fall ill or have an accident that they would get the help they need? The help they are entitled to. Why then would you pay good money for such a service?

This movie tackles this issue head on as we follow the Ochoa family, consisting of a lovable father and his, mature-for-their-age teenage sons, as they burn rubber to be the first paramedics on the scene. It emphatically delves into what it means to be part of a necessary and, what some might call, predatory occupation. Because even after charging large sums for their services, the family barely scrapes by after (required) bribes, legislation, arrests and competition make a dent on their bottom line.

Documentarian Luke Lorentzen is so close up to the action, and shoots so well the astonishing and heartbreaking scenes he encounters that this might be mistaken for a feature film. Few filmmakers would dare or even be able to come as close as Lorentzen does here, which allows him to reveal the ugliness of a system that in the end affects patients the most.

For a documentary it is a rare treat to experience something that is as entertaining as it is eye-opening, making Midnight Family something of a rarity.

I watched this documentary at the beginning of the Corona outbreak in Europe. I can't imagine what will happen when Mexico will get hit hard like here. It's probably only a matter of months before there will be hundreds of thousands casualties over there. What a heartbreaking but also heartwarming documentary I just watched. Heartbreaking when you see that in a big country like Mexico they still can't get rid of all those corrupt people. You would think that after so many years they would do something about it but instead you still see policemen bribing people that actually try to save peoples lives. The police is supposed to serve and protect but in a country like Mexico (well not only in Mexico) those b*stards are still allowed to play their dirty games and nobody does anything about it. They should be ashamed, I just hope one day they will need an ambulance and that they leave them rotting in the streets. Heartwarming when you see the Ochoa family doing their best to save people, most of the time they just don't get paid but they still continue trying to make a difference, trying to save people abandonned by their government. It's a hard documentary, but very well made, one that makes you think that we're so lucky not to live in a country like Mexico. I don't think we realize how lucky we are sometimes. My utter respect to the Ochoa family and all other independent paramedics that try to survive in such a corrupt country, and my utter disgust for those filthy pigs not worth being called humans.

A fly on the wall exploration of a family barely surviving by operating a private ambulance in Mexico City. The contradictions are clear. The situations heartbreaking. The humanity obvious. The film making is compelling. A wonderful documentary. Thoroughly recommend.