Broken Vessels is a 1999 medical drama film directed by Scott Ziehl and written by Ziehl along with David Baer and John McMahon. The film debuted at the Los Angeles Independent Film Festival and marked Ziehl's directorial debut. It stars Todd Field, Jason London, Roxana Zal, Susan Traylor, and James Hong. The film follows a rookie paramedic and his hardened drug-addicted partner as they take calls and cruise L.A. in their ambulance. Although it shares the same name as the book, it has nothing to do with the Andre Dubus essay collection of the same name.

Plot

The film tells the story of Tom, a young man from Pennsylvania who travels to Los Angeles to start working for an ambulance company. There, he is paired with an utterly self-assured veteran named Jimmy who has apparently gone through many partners in his time. In the beginning, Tom is overwhelmed by Jimmy's competence to deal with the high-pressure job, but slowly but surely he discovers that Jimmy is not the cool and collected man he thought he was. While Jimmy seems to have everything under control on the surface, he gets through the traumatic effects of the job by heavy use of drugs and avoiding commitments. Before long Tom finds himself pulled into the same world and has to come to a decision about what direction he wants to take in his life.