Brief, humane, and (literally) visceral documentary about the ER at LA County Hospital. (The title refers to those increasingly frequent times when the combination of patient load and acute emergencies demand maximum effort and attention from the doctors on duty.) Director Ryan McGarry opens with a flurry of life-or-death activity, steps back for a brief history — the original LA County Hospital was the birthplace of Emergency Medicine as a discipline — and then digs into the lives of the young doctors who are willing — even wanting — to wade into the hottest of medical hot zones. Then he drops a ton of paperwork on the proceedings, followed by frustrations with nursing shortages, overcrowding, regulation, and everything else that gets in the way of actually practicing medicine. The film refuses polemic, grants access, and mostly steers clear of the heartstrings in its effort to humanize those on both sides of the institutional front line. (2013) — Matthew Lickona