All rights reserved. Promising flights to the island in the Bahamas that it will be held at and luxurious accommodations, it truly would look like something that(TM)s not to be missed for those who could afford to attend. It's a story that inspired a documentary gold rush(we'll be reviewing a second Fyre Fest doc from Netflix on Friday), but in the case of "Fyre Fraud," it has made for an often hilarious andincisivetreatise on Millennial hubris. Your AMC Ticket Confirmation# can be found in your order confirmation email. We want to hear what you have to say but need to verify your email. That world isn't available to everyone. Ive broken down the two docs based on eight different factors that should help you determine which one to watch. Terms of Service apply. And one restaurant owner claims she spent about $50,000 (Dh184,000) of her savings paying staff, whose wages should have been covered by the festival organisers. Hulu casually dropped their own Fyre documentary, Fyre Fraud on Monday, apparently just to flex on Netflix's previously announced . The Oneness of All Things: On Sofia Alaouis Animalia, New York International Childrens Film Festival Opens Window to the World, A Preview of the 2023 Rendez-Vous with French Cinema, The Mandalorian Tries to Find Its Place in Third Season. The Netflix documentary is more professionally done. Just leave us a message here and we will work on getting you verified. Excellent account of youngest FBI's Most Wanted. Research shows a connection between kids' healthy self-esteem and positive portrayals in media. FYRE: THE GREATEST PARTY THAT NEVER HAPPENED - Film Inquiry Fyre smolders with agonizing tension when a party in paradise goes awry, but this slickly assembled documentary reserves its greatest horror for damning observations about the dangers of wealth. Things you buy through our links may earnVox Mediaa commission. Fyre review viral festival disaster relived in shocking Netflix documentary. Luckily, Hulu's Fyre Fraud came through with the juice. And yet he plows through with Fyre Festival with the help of investors and support from Ja Rule (looking to fall into success) and the absurd sidekick Grant Margolin (referred to as McFarland's Dwight Schrute). Netflix announced its highly-anticipated documentary Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened late in 2018, but on the week of its release, Hulu scooped the mega-streamer by releasing Fyre Fraud. But a brilliant new documentary on Netflix, Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened, shows that the real victims of this ill-fated project were not the hoodwinked people who went, but the Bahamian people. Astonishingly, it wasnt long beforeMcFarland and his team were using the Fyre Festival email databaseto try and sell tickets to other exclusiveevents depressingly, with some success. Nick Allen is the Senior Editorat RogerEbert.com and a member of the Chicago Film Critics Association. All rights reserved. Catastrophic decisions stack up as fast as the bills, which amount to some $30 million. Nason & Furst have a welcoming flashinesswhen telling this story, cutting quickly between talking head interviews, select archive footageandvarious accentuatingclips from pop culture, as if it were taking that filmmaking method back fromsecond-stage Adam McKay movies The Big Short and Vice. These clips can be appropriately hit and miss, especially if things are too on-the-nose, like a whack-a-mole insert meant to accompany McFarland's comparing of his self-made problems to the futility of that game. The Netflix documentary has received some backlash because it was produced by a company called, F*ck Jerry, who worked closely on the production and social media advertising of Fyre Festival and filmed most of the candid footage seen in the documentary. One thing that the audience should take away from the film is DO NOT go to a festival without doing proper research and see the signs of a scam. If these people would have noticed the signs beforehand, they would not be as upset when they watched the other poor souls on the island that had to sleep on wet beds from the storm the night before. Kendall Jenner was reportedly paid $250,000 to do this. What is meant by the term "a cautionary tale"? The account directed them to their Fyre Festival FAQ email, but the emails sent were never returned. Profanity is frequent, including "s--t," "hell," and countless uses of "f--k." There's one frank conversation about oral sex, and people drink frequently (sometimes to excess) and smoke cigars. Little did they know that the money on these wristbands would be going to pay off McFarlands debt and since there was little to no internet on the island, if the wristbands were legitimate, they wouldnt have worked anyway. One thing that the audience should take away from the film is DO NOT go to a festival without doing proper research and see the signs of a scam. Smith's interviews in Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened are compelling, insightful, and rigorous. Common Sense Media's unbiased ratings are created by expert reviewers and aren't influenced by the product's creators or by any of our funders, affiliates, or partners. Coming Soon, Regal The Hulu film, . To revist this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories. Both documentaries purport to tell the "real" story behind the Fyre Festival debacle of 2017, in which the charlatan Billy McFarland ripped off customers who had bought into an Instagram-fueled. 4.5/5. Before even a minute of planning the actual event was undertaken, McFarland and his mates went down to the Caribbean and shot a promo video, complete with supermodels like Emily Ratajkowski and Bella Hadid cavorting in the sand in their bikinis. That's why we've added a new "Diverse Representations" section to our reviews that will be rolling out on an ongoing basis. He is also a writer for Vulture, The Playlist,The New York Times, and Rolling Stone,and the President of the Chicago Film Critics Association. Fyre was surrounded by sketchiness before it was even released. Courtesy Netflix. Those who like to laugh at rich white people and scoff at impressionable millennials will get the most bang for their buck on Hulu. Fyre will give audiences a tirade of feelings that provide understanding and disdain for all involved. Thousands of wealthy young people traveled to an island in the Bahamas for a weekend that was heavily marketed as a "luxury" trip of partying and music, only to find that it was a gigantic disaster perpetrated by a corrupt "entrepreneur" with a big smile and an endless supply of audacity. Then, out of absolutely-fucking-nowhere . Fool's Paradise. Oh, Loosey! What's your takeaway from the movie? (Chris Smith, the director of Netflixs Fyre, told Tobias that McFarland claimed to be getting $250,000 for participating in Fyre Fraud, though Furst said they paid less than that for the interview.). He was unflappable but he was also entirely delusional. This statement during the jaw-dropping Fyre, a new Netflix documentary about the disastrous 2017 Fyre Festival (and an interesting partner with the also-new Hulu documentary Fyre Fraud) really gets at the core of who Billy McFarland was during this entire crash-and-burn nightmare. Courtesy Netflix, It goes on and on, but even when the money runs out and the lie begins to be exposed, McFarland refuses to change course. Before it became a very real nightmare for all who had flown down to the Bahamas and spent thousands of dollars on getting a sunburn and flying back home,it was meant to be a paradise populated with everyones favorite musicians, social media riffraff and movie stars: Im talking Kendall Jenner, Bella Hadid, Kanye West and G.O.O.D. Fyre Festival Documentary Summary and Review, The film gives audience members a deeper insight into the inner workings of Fyre Festival and provides a definitive timeline to when the idea of Fyre and Fyre festival came to be and the disaster that was created in the Summer of 2016. Show me one thing I said thats not true today. At that point, Fyre Fraud runs through a litany of falsehoods that hes uttered over the course of the interview. If this turns out to be true, one thing is not in doubt he'll find plenty of customers. and the Kendall Jenner was reportedly paid $250,000 to do this. But the Netflix documentary still unearthed details that made my jaw drop and my blood boil even higher than it did during the Hulu film. [1], The film was co-produced by Jerry Media, the social media agency responsible for promoting the Fyre Festival and covering up the fraud, and MATTE Projects, the production company that directed the Fyre Festival's promotional shoot. This email will be used to sign into all New York sites. It interviews people who were in direct contact with McFarland every day, for multiple hours a day, for around five months. Stay up-to-date on all the latest Rotten Tomatoes news! The documentary never really reconciles that conflict, which is a shame because when Fyre Fraud gets serious, it asks some hard questions about modern advertising, social media, "FOMO" (fear . If you had a pulse and an internet connection when the Fyre Festival turned from fantasy tropical concert into overpriced, disastrous failure last spring, then you already know the basics of the story told in two new documentaries about one of modern historys greatest moments in schadenfreude. "It really pains me when I have to talk about it. Billy McFarland bilked everyone he laid eyes on, even the people who were most loyal to him. Youve got some Janning to do! Who has the better Fyre Festival documentary, Netflix or Hulu? The only good news is that, since the documentary, an online fund has been set up for, If this turns out to be true, one thing is not in doubt. This truly was one of the worst-planned events in history. All the essentials: top fashion stories, editors picks, and celebrity style. He promises luxury accommodations, first-tier entertainment, first-class food, and unending fun. He makes deals with celebrities to lend their names to "influence" his wealthy, would-be attendees. These people were burnt by Fyre and are still trying to recover. And yet, while Netflixs Fyre doesnt have its own interview with McFarland, I came away from that film even more infuriated with him than I was during the Hulu documentary. After all of these events, the people who decided to go were met with a barren wasteland with dingy tents.