Mexico City disposes of only 45 public ambulances for a population of over 9 million people. This situation has given rise to an illegal business of privately owned ambulances offering emergency medical services and hospital transfers to people involved in accidents. Struggling to make ends meet, the Ochoa family runs such a business. Their day-to-day consists of rushing to the scene of an accident before anyone else, helping the injured, taking them to the hospital and finally, hoping to get paid for their services. Although they provide a social service, they sometimes resort to more or less ethical methods with their patients, hoping to benefit from the circumstances. Midnight Family paints a portrait of the family’s routine, depicting their difficult livelihood as well as their private life.
 
Truly enthralling, Luke Lorentzen’s documentary shows the other side of the chaos and the anxiety experienced by Nicolas Cage and Patricia Arquette in Scorsese’s Bringing Out the Dead (1999), and Jake Gyllenhaal’s lack of moral conscience in Nightcrawler (2014) as he races to accident and crime scenes in order to capture extremely graphic images first. A type of cinéma vérité addressing serious social issues in Mexico, Midnight Family is an explosive cocktail that was honored with numerous awards at festivals all around the world, amongst others, the Special Jury Award for Cinematography at Sundance.
 

2019: Guadalajara Film Festival – Best documentary
2019: Gijón Film Festival – Best director
2019: Sundance Film Festival
 
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