THE FIRST WAVE

(NAT GEO)

“By employing a character-driven, cinema-vérité approach, our aim was to use distinct storylines of our characters as a microcosm through which we all can view the emotional and societal impact of the pandemic,” says filmmaker Matthew Heineman of his visceral up-close and urgent look at the confusing, confounding early days of the COVID-19 outbreak in New York’s overburdened hospitals. “It was jarring to witness what was going on in the hospital day in and day out, only to hear about people denying COVID, calling it a hoax, refusing to wear masks, and now refusing to get vaccinated. I feel like it was my job to put people in the shoes of those who lived it on the front lines and to create a historical document of this time. In a sense, it’s really a film about how people came together in the face of this devastating crisis.”