Wondering what to see this weekend? How about diving into a Netflix documentary? It’s one of the things the streaming service does best, and headline-grabbing documentaries such as make a killer, King of the Tigers and The Tinder scammer have helped make Netflix the world’s most popular streaming service.
Keep sweet: pray and obey is one of the Netflix documentary miniseries making headlines right now, but if you’ve already seen this, don’t worry, new Netflix documentaries are being added all the time. But which one should you look at? We have a few suggestions.
These choices are based on the Netflix UK and US offering, but if you’re stuck in another area and need to unlock your own country’s streaming choices, remember you can use a VPN (many of which offer a free trial ). Now let’s move on to the Netflix documentaries…
Table of Contents
Web of Make Believe: Death, Lies, and the Internet
From acclaimed American filmmaker Brian Knappenberger, this 2022 documentary series explores the darker side of life online. The series explores the aftermath of gamer “SWATing,” takes a disturbing journey down the rabbit hole of white supremacy, joins a federal hunt for the suspect in a brazen IRS heist, and investigates a murder set against the backdrop of Russian election interference.
As our online lives blend seamlessly with our lives in the outside world, it’s a fascinating, if at times worrisome, look at how misinformation and bad actors from the internet can increasingly affect our lives.
Our father
What if your child wasn’t your child after all? And what if one of the people you trusted the most to bring your child into the world was the one who was cheating on you all along? Our father is another eye-catcher from the Netflix school of crazy documentaries.
The story follows former Indianapolis fertility doctor Donald Cline, who used his own sperm to get dozens – and counting – of unsuspecting patients pregnant in a fertility fraud case. The story shows how DNA testing sites slowly revealed the truth to unsuspecting people and families and revealed the true horror of what Cline had been doing for so many years. A tough story, well told, not least because of the powerful honesty of the many victim statements.
Jeen-yuhs: A Kanye Trilogy
Epic, multi-part music documentaries are all the rage, Netflix’s four-and-a-half-hour film Jeen-yuhs is a timely, intriguing, if disturbing, study of Kanye West that proves indispensable regardless of your opinion of his recent headline. gripping behavior.
The first episode of Jeen-yuhs, to be released in three parts, introduces West as an aspiring 21-year-old producer who is recognized (and occasionally exploited) by other artists for his beats but is dying to rap himself. While it now seems surreal to see West accosting PAs in the offices of Roc-a-Fella Records, imploring them to like future classics like Everything falls down, it’s easy to see why his lovable but frantic attempts to secure a record deal didn’t meet with immediate success. He doesn’t sound like his contemporaries and, aside from his presciently big ego, he doesn’t act like them either, constantly whipping his followers in and out to the disgust of the performers he’s trying to impress.
Directed by West’s longtime friend Clarence ‘Coodie’ Simmons, who has been filming him since 2004, and Chike Ozah, Jeen-yuhs may not be entirely objective, but it presents West as an artist with a sensitive candor and offers us a voyeuristic glimpse into his creative process and the hip-hop scene of the early 2000s. The directors’ close connection to their subject also yields some of the film’s most poignant moments, such as when West’s unreservedly devoted mother, Donda, who died in 2007, reveals the tenacious bond between mother and son. It’s impossible to watch without feeling moved. Hated, adored, but never ignored, this documentary by Kanye West is fascinating to watch.
The Tinder scammer
Watch this true story told in just two hours by the victims of a carefully thought out dating app scam and whatever happens this weekend you can sleep soundly knowing you’ve unknowingly stolen designer clothes, sports cars , buying Michelin-star meals and Magnums from Cristal, and first-class flights your partner needs to snag the next bottleneck aren’t on the agenda.
Assuming it’s a basic “why me?” The sobbing tale from the mouths of three naïve women who fell in love with the wrong guy would be a huge mistake: “Diamond dealer” Simon Leviev (of course, that’s not his real name) has such a watertight story, expertly honed and supported by a dedicated group of cohorts that would put even the most experienced and cynical Tinder users at odds with his progress.
Imagine the scene: you’re on a private jet, talking to Simon’s affable ex about what a supportive father he is to the two-year-old on her knee. His bodyguard takes a picture of the two of you and says how nice it is that he’s finally met someone who is a perfect match for him. Later, he buys you a delicious meal right after his important meeting. On a balcony in Barcelona, you google him. Tell your friends to google it! Everyone confirms he’s legit, as he’s with his parents – although his father of course demands that the family keep a low profile on social media, billionaire diamond dealers would do it.
He’ll send you home on a first-class flight. It was all real. It’s just that somewhere, in another city, another woman is suffering… and soon it will be you. If you’ve ever watched The snakethe parallels are striking.
The Defiant
The Defiant is a four-part series that chronicles the partnership between Interscope Records co-founder Jimmy Iovine and rapper and record producer Dr. Dre records. It’s not just a music documentary, it’s also a story about entrepreneurship and how an art form helped build an empire for two pioneers.
Not only are there hours of fascinating interviews with all the main characters in the story, but there are also tons of archive footage of two masters at work. It’s clear that both know a great track when they hear one, and also how to get ahead in the cutthroat world of the music business (and, later, consumer technology). But of course, as is so often the case, it also shows two people who absolutely want to be successful.
Luckily, Dre and Iovine turn out to be eloquent and interesting interviewees, humble and confident (even when multi-millionaires sat in their luxurious homes), and with enough wacky tales of life and business to fill many documentaries. Sit back, relax, be impressed, entertained and inspired.
The stairs
Here’s an old but, we think, maybe with make a killerthe best documentary on Netflix and one of the first true crime documentaries to start the genre.
Originally aired path Dating from 2005 and based on true events that took place in 2001 in Durham, North Carolina, The stairs was the idea of Jean-Xavier de Lestrade. Thanks to his work documenting the events of the trial and its aftermath, a new genre of television was born – one that has come to be known as true crime series.
The death of wealthy business owner Kathleen Peterson at the bottom of the stairs in the family mansion marks the beginning of the series. Everyone tries to find out how she died at the bottom of the stairs, but her writer husband quickly becomes involved – an accusation he rigorously denies. It’s hard to write much about it The stairs without inserting spoilers, so let’s stop there. Suffice it to say that it will keep you guessing until the end. He has? He does not have? And therein lies the question that drives a thousand copycat true crime documents. But remember The stairs came first.
want more? Check out our summary of the Best Music-Related Documentaries, Movies & TV Shows on Netflix.