Critic Reviews

Now, more than a year and a half into the novel coronavirus pandemic, Matthew Heineman’s intensely intimate documentary arrives as a graphic and emotional reminder of the early days of the crisis, in all its confusion and horror. It’s also a breathtaking testament to the fight to live, the calling to heal, and the power of human connection.

With unprecedented access to overfilled, frenzied hospital rooms, as well as quarantined homes, Heineman makes one cringe at every prolonged beep of the vitals monitor, delves right into the patients’ eyes, their very souls. He imbues the documentary with the same sense of urgency and empathy that were evident in his previous docs Cartel Land and City of Ghosts. A tough watch but a necessary one, The First Wave marks the finest cinematic account of the COVID-19 pandemic yet.

The film succeeds in presenting an on-the-ground view of what it felt like to be inside a hospital in the spring of 2020. It was harrowing, death was everywhere and there was no end in sight.

Viscerally disturbing and achingly humanistic.

The filmmaker’s juxtaposition of overworked physicians and desperate patients offers a concentrated and intimate look at the bottomless, unimaginable depths of loss as well as the indefatigable reservoir of hope that sustains humanity during its darkest moments.

It’s hard to predict what value this documentary will retain in the future (or if it will just disappear into the content void, where history streams a mile wild and a millimeter deep), but it’s safe to assume that it will never be more urgent than it is right now, in a country exhausted by its overlapping tragedies, when so many people of all stripes could use a shot in the arm to remember what’s at stake.

Watching Matthew Heineman’s documentary The First Wave isn’t therefore a casualty of diminishing returns due to a false sense of redundancy. If anything, it proves more powerful from accumulation.

The First Wave stands as an honest, hard-hitting and compassionate reminder of loving thy neighbour wherever and whoever they may be.

This remarkable film feels like it could become a time capsule, showing future generations what it felt like in 2020 for those on the frontline.

The First Wave feels simultaneously hard to watch and vital, tragic and uplifting, like a backward glimpse over our shoulder at a period of conflict and struggle — in more ways than one — that we’re not quite done living through yet.