Smith and his crew successfully capture the often hilarious, often shocking, and sometimes sad outcomes associated with this mega-disaster of a non-event. 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 . Even though I watched both films, and recommend that the consumer watch both as well if you only want to watch one movie I would watch the Netflix documentary. 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. Fyre director Chris Smith ( American Movie and The Yes Men) has experience crafting stories about guys with big dreams and the capacity to pull off long cons, and he has a great instinct for. There is definitely storytelling overlap in these documentaries, which both cover the mix of hype and lack of infrastructure that lead up to the last weekend in April 2017, when Fyre Festival-goers arrived on Great Exuma Island to discover tents, mattresses sitting on the side of the road, and slapdash sandwiches instead of the glamp-y villas and gourmet meals they were promised. The locals who built the site were never paid. Not that many lessons seemto have been learnt, however. Someone should tell him that the story withinHulu documentary Fyre Fraud beat him to the punch, telling of how a new upstartwith privilege, coding skills, and an intuition for what his peers want mostsold a fantasythat became a monstrous failure. In other words, both are relatively concise, which is a good thing if you plan to do a double feature. While that all seemed great, the budget they came up with and the gameplay they created, clearly wasn(TM)t thought-out enough, because the event itself slowly collapsed and the worst of it happened when the people actually were there to experience it. Winner: Hey, guess what? The film features archive foo. That's why we've added a new "Diverse Representations" section to our reviews that will be rolling out on an ongoing basis. 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. The siren callof social media and the idea of perfection it peddles isfar too irresistible. This password will be used to sign into all, A Timeline of How Fyre Festival Became a Massive Failure, 8 Takeaways From Hulus Surprise-Released Fyre Festival Doc, Fyre Festival Founder Billy McFarland Sentenced to 6 Years in Prison. By coincidence, presumably, these streaming movies are almost exactly the same length. Guests arrive at Fyre Festival. Luxury lodgings and the finest cuisine was also pledged. "It really pains me when I have to talk about it. FYRE: The Greatest . Ad Choices, 70 Incredible Forgotten Photos From Vintage Oscar Nights, See Every Look from the 2023 Grammys Red Carpet, Phil Ohs Best Street Style Photos From the Fall 2023 Shows in Paris. 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. The account directed them to their Fyre Festival FAQ email, but the emails sent were never returned. Privacy Policy and Smith does a terrific job of stringing it all into a taut narrativebut the real revelation of Fyre is in the insider interviews. A young entrepreneur called Billy McFarland was working withrapper Ja Rule on an app called Fyre, which was designed to let ordinary people book talent. The photograph was posted on social media at the time by a furious festival-goer expecting exclusive parties with supermodels. The Hulu Documentary interviewed a former worker of F*ck Jerry, who told them that they had a bigger hand in Fyre Festival than the current production company led you to believe, and they werent as ignorant to the ongoings of Fyre as the Netflix documentary led you to believe. Chris Smiths Fyre deftly understands this, never turning into the millennial schadenfreude it easily could have become. Why is it important to be aware of paid influencers' participation on social media? ", "Who has the better Fyre Festival documentary, Netflix or Hulu? Having said that, whats notable about Fyre, and perhaps makes it an interesting counterpoint to Fyre Fraud, which I have not yet seen, is that its not Billys face that I remember. Fyre also gets more granular as it recounts the festivals eye-popping budget ($38 million on building stages, $3.5 million to pay performers) and shoddy logistics, like how the event ended up on a gravelly patch of Great Exuma, rather than Normans Cay, an island famous for its connections to drug lord Pablo Escobar, because McFarland and his colleagues were kicked off the latter location. Is Netflix's Fyre Documentary a Scam, Too? Theres something to be said for people who forge on, pushing past adversity and jumping the hurdles placed in front of them by life. Ive broken down the two docs based on eight different factors that should help you determine which one to watch. happiness and then made them miserable. Fyre is a document of a disaster, speaking to a number of the key players behind the scenes, although never McFarland himself (he is a part of Fyre Fraud, and this great piece by Scott Tobias details the controversy there). suggesting a diversity update. Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened Movie review by Renee Longstreet, Common Sense Media Common Sense says age 15+ Mature doc about outrageous scam is funny, sad, instructive. The documentary is excruciating to watch. None of the people got to see the progress photos from the place they were going to stay in. About five months before the event was due to take place, McFarland flew a group of supermodels, including Bella Hadid, Emily Ratajkowski and Hailey Baldwin, to the Bahamas and shot a promo video, all super-yachts and sunshine. Mesmerizing mature drama with just a bit of sex, violence. Dont worry, it wont take long. That Never Happened is available to watch in the UAE on Netflix now, 5 reasons you should watch season 5 of Grace and Frankie no matter what age you are, Japanese tidying guru Marie Kondo sparks joy with cluttered Americans. McFarland and his cofounder, the rapper Ja Rule, are ruthless villainsas greedy as they are narcissisticand yet they manage to convince an incredible. Its only right that a pair of documentaries focused on an event designed to exploit those who suffer from FOMO should elicit their own form of FOMO. The buzz became deafening when McFarland and his team convinced major influencers to tweet just an orange block, promising them villas at the actual eventwhich no one really had done any planning for at all. The Fyre Festival Instagram was posting recycled pictures from the same photoshoot that was shot in Normans Cay, which was not factual. Fyre. The Netflix doc also captures the feelings of betrayal experienced by Fyre employees who were focused on developing the app and had nothing to do with the festival, but still wound up unemployed because of McFarlands recklessness. For his part, Ja Rule has been busy distancing himself from the ordeal,recently postinga message on Twitter claiming that he, too, "was hustled, scammed, bamboozled, hoodwinked, led astray". FYRE - Netflix Documentary Film Review | The Review Geek As people around him scrambled to put together a music festival that could never really happenin a matter of months, McFarlands blind refusal to admit that it was going to be a disaster just amplified the inevitable pain. The Netflix documentary is more professionally done. Call it product placement, but it also makes for apt metaphors that speak to the same absurd tone, likewhen someone compares McFarlands ventures to those of Jean-Ralphio and Tom Haverfords on Parks & Recreation, their own failed Entertainment 720 business only excelling at displaying flashy nonsense. That's human nature; it's why we love watching comics flopon stage. The final section of the documentary shows how he succeeds, even as a convicted criminal out on bail, at launching another fraudulent insiders club. To most of us, the Fyre Festival, a high-profile debacle in the Bahamas in the spring of 2017, crystallized something about Internet culture. He promises luxury accommodations, first-tier entertainment, first-class food, and unending fun. Netflix's Fyre also shows the viewer just had absurd people can get when they have more cash than legitimate ideas and . 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. Bad Projection Is Ruining the Movie Theater Experience, 6 Stand-ups Analyze ChatGPTs Attempts to Steal Their Jobs, Travis Barkers Finger Is Now the Enema of Blink-182 Fans. FYRE - Netflix Documentary Film Review 18/01/2019 by Greg Wheeler How Not To Throw A Party Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened is an engrossing, shocking documentary that sheds light on one of the biggest flops in festival history. It just seemed as if McFarland was doing the interview as a redemption piece so that people would see him as not as bad of a guy as this incident made him out to be, so people will begin to trust him again and his future projects. Mattressesand tentsfor attendees of Fyre Festival. By creating an account, you agree to the And [then] this happens in some form again.. McFarland shares a similar interviewsetting for those who have gotten into his orbit, whether it's lawyers, former employees, or social media types,who speak in big spacesthat look like someone forgot to fill in. I had already watched Fyre Fraud when I sat down to view Fyre, so I was pretty well-versed in the depths of McFarlands callous fakery. Fool's Paradise. And what of McFarland? McFarland and his cofounder, the rapper Ja Rule, are ruthless villainsas greedy as they are narcissisticand yet they manage to convince an incredible number of investors and employees and ticket-buyers that they have entrepreneurial vision. Has anyone ever called you a compulsive liar? the filmmakers ask him. Fyre | NETFLIX Documentary Review | The Greatest Party that Never [6] According to Netflix, the documentary was Smith's idea. Things you buy through our links may earnVox Mediaa commission. The dinner that @fyrefestival promised us was catered by Steven Starr is literally bread, cheese, and salad with dressing. FYRE: THE GREATEST PARTY THAT NEVER HAPPENED - Film Inquiry Hulu casually dropped their own Fyre documentary, Fyre Fraud on Monday, apparently just to flex on Netflix's previously announced . It feels like the best that wecan do now is just soak up the cringe comedy, in which everyones arrival to the barren festival site is one of the Millennials darkest jokes yet. Their documentary does include interviews with a dopey-eyed, blinky McFarland that offer a bit more insight on his pre-Fyre Fest background . What Do I Do About the Ex Who Is Slandering Me (And Our Relationship) Online? It takes a lot for a Documentary to grab my attention, simply due to the fact that I prefer fictional stories over something that I can just read a news article about and get as much information as watching a film about it.