Reverend Ernst Toller of the First Reformed Church in Snowbridge, New York is writing down his thoughts in a journal for a year, after which he intends to destroy it. He leads a 250-year-old Dutch Reformed Church which was once a stop on the Underground Railroad; it faces dwindling attendance under Toller's leadership, which has taken the church in a new direction and away from its historical focus on Reformed theology and today it serves mostly as a tourist attraction. In trying to manage his own life issues, such as his alcoholism, Toller seeks a deeper experience through reading Roman Catholic writings (G.K. Chesterton and Thomas Merton) and mystical books (The Cloud of Unknowing). This new spiritual direction leads him to seek support from a nearby charismatic megachurch, Abundant Life, which owns First Reformed.
Toller, a former military chaplain, is also struggling with the death of his son Joseph, who was killed in the Iraq War; Toller had encouraged him to enlist. He meets Mary, who is seeking counseling for her radical-environmentalist husband, Michael. He further challenges Toller's beliefs: Michael explains that he wants Mary to get an abortion, because he does not want to bring a child into a world that will be rendered almost uninhabitable by climate change.
Mary finds a suicide vest belonging to her husband in their garage. Toller takes it, promising to counsel Michael about it. Mary and Toller discuss going to the police, but Toller feels it would dramatically worsen Michael's state. Just before their next appointment, Michael sends Toller a text message asking to meet in a local park. Toller arrives to find Michael dead of a self-inflicted shotgun wound. In accordance with Michael's will and testament, a service is held at a local toxic-waste dump, where his ashes are scattered. Meanwhile, plans are underway to celebrate the sestercentennial of First Reformed with a service attended by the mayor, governor, and a notable industrialist, Edward Balq, a key financial backer of Abundant Life. At a meeting in a diner, Toller argues with Balq over climate change after Balq finds Toller honoring Michael's will a political act: Balq dismisses it as "complicated", but Toller sees it as a straightforward matter of Christian stewardship.
Experiencing various physical pains, Toller reluctantly sees a doctor, who suspects stomach cancer and schedules tests. Using Michael's laptop, which he took after his suicide to prevent the police discovering his radicalism and making trouble for Mary, Toller researches Michael's concerns further, including the materials which inspired him to make the explosive vest. One night, Mary visits Toller in the parsonage of the church, and he plays Michael's role in a nonsexual rite of physical intimacy that the couple used to perform.
Toller begs Mary not to attend the anniversary service. Preparing for his role in the ceremony, he puts on the explosive vest, and arms it. When he sees Mary entering for the ceremony, he removes the vest and instead wraps himself in barbed wire under his alb. Toller pours a glass full of drain cleaner and is about to drink it when Mary interrupts him. The two embrace, kissing passionately before the film abruptly cuts to black.
Cast
Ethan Hawke as Reverend Ernst Toller of First Reformed, a tiny historic church, who is going through several personal crises
Amanda Seyfried as Mary Mensana, a pregnant parishioner at First Reformed
In September 2017, A24 acquired the film's North American distribution rights.[16][17][18] It was given a limited theatrical release in the United States on May 18, 2018,[19] and was theatrically released in the United Kingdom on July 13, 2018.[20] The screenplay was published by Archway Editions on January 31, 2023, with an introduction by Masha Tupitsyn.[21]
Its opening weekend, the film made $100,270 from four theaters, averaging $25,067 per screen—one of the best per-screen averages of Schrader's career.[22][23] By the end of its theatrical run, it had grossed $3,448,256 in the United States and Canada and $540,356 in other territories, for a worldwide total of $3,988,612.[3][24]
Critical response
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 94% of 254 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 8.3/10.The website's consensus reads: "Brought to life by delicate work from writer-director Paul Schrader and elevated by a standout performance by Ethan Hawke, First Reformed takes a sensitive and suspenseful look at weighty themes."[25]Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 86 out of 100, based on 48 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".[26]
A. O. Scott of The New York Times wrote: "First Reformed wrestles with contemporary reality, but it isn't a work of realism in the way that term is conventionally understood. The dialogue is delivered with formal, almost stiff cadences, and the images are crisp, graceful and plain."[27]Justin Chang of the Los Angeles Times described the film as "a cinephile's delight and a believer's conundrum, an austere American art film with a bracing B-movie soul, and a story in which the cruelest of cosmic punchlines may finally be no different from the most beautiful accession of grace."[28]David Sims of The Atlantic called the film "a tale of existential woe [...] an embittered look at our world through the eyes of someone who’s increasingly horrified to be a part of it, and a film that’s one of the most searing cinema experiences of the year."[29]Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian said that "the sheer Bunyanesque severity of this film is as refreshing as a glass of ice-cold water", and called it "a passionately focused film but not a masterpiece", noting that the name of the lead character is an allusion to the German playwright Ernst Toller.[30]Michael Phillips of The Chicago Tribune stated that "for such a deliberate exercise in a specific, methodical style, First Reformed is oddly bracing, full of unresolved, contradictory, vital ideas."[31]
In July 2025, it was one of the films voted for the "Readers' Choice" edition of The New York Times' list of "The 100 Best Movies of the 21st Century," finishing at number 122.[32] That same month, it ranked number 39 on Rolling Stone's list of "The 100 Best Movies of the 21st Century."[33]
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