Currently hot on Netflix, starts promising -- 1st episode is disturbing and compelling and about a bank robbery as described in the blurb. Then the pacing goes to hell.
This "bank heist" documentary is not so much about that bank heist, which is well-explored in the 1st episode (and a Hollywood movie). That becomes a side-story and three more episodes are spent exploiting a woman who is severely mentally ill (and psychotic) and barely in touch with reality, trying to paint her as some sort of Femme Fatale. It's at least vaguely sexist, but moreover the severe mental illness renders it utterly pointless and becomes increasingly tone-deaf the longer it drags on.
The mental illness is acute and obvious enough I find it hard to call anyone here "Evil". More like a couple dangerously mentally ill people had access to weapons and enabled each other. As for "Genius" -- well the crazy people praise each other's intelligence, while they spout make-believe French swear-words and engage in completely irrational rants. The makers of the film eat it up and milk it for all it's worth. They acknowledge the mental illness issues right-off-the-bat, so obvious it would be impossible not to, but then proceed to make hey of their "stars" unhinged and un-medicated ramblings. Crazy talk is just not that interesting or compelling and the filmmakers seem rather "dense" to be so fascinated by it.
The filmmakers either don't understand mental illness, or are pretending not to, but either way it gets stale somewhere in the third episode, with well-over an episode to go.
I much prefered series such as The Making Of A Murderer, The Staircase, Wormwood...Those are great. This is not.
This "bank heist" documentary is not so much about that bank heist, which is well-explored in the 1st episode (and a Hollywood movie). That becomes a side-story and three more episodes are spent exploiting a woman who is severely mentally ill (and psychotic) and barely in touch with reality, trying to paint her as some sort of Femme Fatale. It's at least vaguely sexist, but moreover the severe mental illness renders it utterly pointless and becomes increasingly tone-deaf the longer it drags on.
The mental illness is acute and obvious enough I find it hard to call anyone here "Evil". More like a couple dangerously mentally ill people had access to weapons and enabled each other. As for "Genius" -- well the crazy people praise each other's intelligence, while they spout make-believe French swear-words and engage in completely irrational rants. The makers of the film eat it up and milk it for all it's worth. They acknowledge the mental illness issues right-off-the-bat, so obvious it would be impossible not to, but then proceed to make hey of their "stars" unhinged and un-medicated ramblings. Crazy talk is just not that interesting or compelling and the filmmakers seem rather "dense" to be so fascinated by it.
The filmmakers either don't understand mental illness, or are pretending not to, but either way it gets stale somewhere in the third episode, with well-over an episode to go.
I much prefered series such as The Making Of A Murderer, The Staircase, Wormwood...Those are great. This is not.