It might make you dizzy, but this is the best pandemic drama yet
BeFOre the next pandemic strikes, can we please make sure our hospitals are fully stocked with extra beds, masks, oxygen supplies and fixed camera rigs.
Lurching between close-ups and chasing through wards, the handheld photography on Breathtaking (ITV1) was enough to bring on symptoms of dizziness and nausea.
Director Craig viveiros intended to convey the frantic urgency and sense of rising panic as the first wave of Covid-19 struck Britain in march 2020. But the technique of filming the hospital scenes as if we were in a war zone, with the picture spinning and diving, soon became an irritating gimmick.
if you could follow the story without succumbing to migraine, this was the best of the pandemic dramas yet screened. We’ve seen the Left rush to make political capital from the mishandled crisis, including kenneth Branagh as Boris Johnson in a flaccid prosthetic disguise so misshapen, it looked like he’d left it by accident on his car dashboard during a heatwave.
This version, co-written by Line Of Duty’s Jed mercurio and based on a book by Dr rachel Clarke, used news footage and archive audio from Covid press conferences to chart the progress of the disease from the earliest cases to
full lockdown. if you still suffer acid reflux at the sight of matt Hancock, Breathtaking is guaranteed to have you doubled over.
The emphasis here, though, is less on the rights and wrongs of the government response, more on the avoidable chaos caused by the total lack of readiness within the NHS. The multiple layers of bureaucracy act like a clingfilm straitjacket, trapping hospital staff and leaving them helpless. everyone can see the problems, and no one can cut away the restrictions.
it begins with a shortage of respirator masks — and those that are available have been designed for men with big noses and broad jaws, so that female staff might as well hold a top hat over their faces.
By the end of the first hour, there are ambulances queuing round the block and paramedics under orders not to resuscitate the patients on board because they lack the requisite protective equipment.
Joanne Froggatt is the sole star among an excellent cast of mostly unknowns. She plays Dr abbey Henderson, a consultant who cannot fathom how administrators and managers will allow people to die, rather than disregard rigid protocols handed down by civil servants at public Health england.
‘i don’t think they’re making up guidelines on the spot,’ scoffs one executive. ‘This is their lane. We need to have faith in their ability to assess the epidemiological landscape.’
The landscape was equally deadly as Steve Backshall went in search of Killer Crocs (Ch5) in South africa’s Ndumo Game reserve. On his hands and knees, he ventured into the ‘kill zone’ on the edge of a river, looking for 20ft Nile crocodiles weighing more than a quarter of a ton.
He also got close enough to help carry one captive animal onto a truck. ‘it’s like trying to lift a grand piano,’ he grunted, ‘except it’s alive, and it’s got teeth.’
We were given a spectacular viewpoint by outstanding drone images, soaring over the basking crocs that looked, from high above, like the little lizards you might spot in the english countryside.
The drone also picked up the boat of a poacher, trawling with nets and snares to catch crocodiles for the illegal meat, medicine and fashion markets — croc skin fetches high prices, as does oil from their fatty tissue.
Steve’s camera crew were able to direct rangers to the poachers’ hideout, and their equipment was seized. it was a small victory in an ongoing war.