With exclusive access to a hard-hit New York City hospital during the terrifying first four months of the pandemic, The First Wave spotlights the everyday heroes at the epicenter of the COVID-19 outbreak. Leaving a devastating trail of death and despair, this once-in-a-century pandemic changed the very fabric of our daily lives and exposed long-standing inequities in our society. Oscar-nominated director Matthew Heineman employs his character-driven cinema vérité approach to create a testament to the strength of the human spirit, embedding with doctors, nurses, and patients on the frontlines as they all desperately try to navigate the crisis.

REVIEWS

“A vital piece of historical record that bravely captures the unseen horrors of the pandemic and a generous celebration of human dignity whose existence feels miraculous."
— Variety 

"Heineman’s pandemic film is every bit as visceral and harrowing as you might expect from someone accustomed to making documentaries that he may not survive...This is a documentary that unashamedly wants to light up our emotions; it wants to rekindle the fires inside of us that may have burned out after being exposed to so much preventable death; it wants us to feel a sliver of the same fury and impotence and eventually, occasionally, mercifully, even the same catharsis that frontline workers were confronted with every day when this nightmare was at its worst."
— IndieWire

"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...An unforgettable look at how, in the earliest weeks of a monstrously unfamiliar storm, some of the bravest among us persevered."
— The Hollywood Reporter