The Good Nurse is based on a true story. Jessica Chastain plays nurse Amy Loughren. Eddie Redmayne plays Charles Cullen. Charles Cullen is a serial killer who killed patients in hospitals. The film is based of the book written by Charles Graeber. Krysty Wilson-Cairns (1917) adapted the book. Tobias Lindholm who directed tiff favorite Another Round as well as The Hunt in 2012 helms The Good Nurse.
There was a lot of anticipation ahead of the premiere of Lindholm's first American feature film. The journey of this film was a long one as Lindholm was sent a version of the screenplay several years ago. He was drawn to the material because the focus was not an obsession with the serial killer but the nurse who stops him.
The film opens in a hospital room as doctors and nurses rally around a bed of a patient who is dying. The camera. They are of to the side. The focus of the opening is a slow zoom towards Charles Cullen (Redmayne) who stands expressionless as the events unfold. The patient passes away. Cullen slouched walks down a hallway under a glowing red exit sign.
The events of the film center around Parkfield Memorial Hospital in New Jersey in 2003. The hospital is run on a strict budget. The American hospital is a business. The nurses are overworked and exhausted. She works the overnight ICU shift as well as caring for her two kids. Amy is informed that she will be getting help soon as another nurse was just hired. Amy also has health problems of her own. As she sits on a bed in a doctor's office he walks in with a clipboard and informs Amy, "If you continue like this you're looking at a serious coronary incident within months." Amy is in danger of suffering a stroke. She has to continue to work the long stressful hours because she does not receive health insurance until she has been employed by the hospital for a year. The consultation she just had runs 980 dollars. The American healthcare industry is a business.
Amy sits in her car in the parking lot of a hospital as the rain pours. We see her grappling with her circumstances. She gets out of the car and pushes forward. She meets Charlie and shows him around the ward. They begin to bond over the job and their similar backgrounds. Both have two girls around the same ages. The dynamics of their burgeoning friendship is what makes The Good Nurse fascinating. Amy has a heart episode in front of Charles. He shows empathy talking her through the situation. He asks her if she has spoken to their hospital.s cardiologist. She panics and asks Charles not to mention her health condition to anyone. They both have secrets.
In a film where the two lead actors are Jessica Chastain and Eddie Redmayne one would expect that performances are great. One would be correct. The filmmakers do a great job balancing the film, as the stories unfolding are personal dynamics, hospital drama and police procedural. The film becomes quite compelling as the tension increases with intensity. Amy becomes trapped between the system of the healthcare industry and the legal system.
A hospital should be a place of empathy, care. People should be treated with dignity. In the apparatus and gears of capitalism, patients can become products. When something is suspect the system is designed to protect the hospital from lawsuits. The American healthcare system, the insurance machine, the bureaucracy, the costs of care can be horrific. To then have a serial killer running loose in ICUs that hospital administrators and lawyers are covering up, truly horrific. The film made me think a lot about systems and how they operate. How the hospital industry dealt with, not dealt with Charlie Cullen reminded me of another giant system, the catholic church. How they move abusers around. The policing system, problematic police are fired only to be rehired somewhere else. The film speaks to the fortitude and strength of Amy Loughren a good nurse that stood up against the system and fought for justice for Cullen's many victims.
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