The Nailbomber

Netflix can been quite hit or miss with It's documentaries and the stylistic presentation can quite often make or break a netflix documentary. As can how long it runs for. Be it 1 episode or 4 episodes.

The Nailbomber did a very good job at telling the story of a lone wolf bomber who let off multiple bombs in attacks that were racially motivated in London in a single solid episode.

My number one desire from a documentary is to get across as much interesting and relavent information as possible and The Nail Bomber certainly did that. I was only 9 or 10 at the time of the attacks and although I'm from the UK, I don't really recall the attacks. Also being from Northern Ireland, terrorism based around The Northern Irish troubles was far more prevalent in my mind and still is when I think back to the 90s. So it was very interesting (and saddening) to learn about other problems occurring in the same decade. The show had interesting interviews with victims and played insightful tape recordings of the perpetrator being interviewed. Unlike other Netflix documentaries (Son of sam). It doesn't mix and match the style of voice over vs interviews. Nor is the the documentary stretched out over many episodes. Someone could have tried that if they had the motivation or had been given the go ahead. Due to it being a multi bomb and court case story. Luckily they stayed with an hour and a bit single episode and it worked.

It's definitely a crime documentary to watch if this genre is your thing and it's better than other recent attempts by Netflix. A good solid 7/10. So give it a go.

What these people did, and their ilk, deserved nothing less than the death sentence. Despicable excuse for human beings.

But once has to ask. Why now? With tensions in the world reaching critical mass, why now choose to bring this story to the globe. Just something to think about.

As other reviewers have said it felt short.

When I started watching this I was thinking "how do I not know about this?". To be fair I was 15 at the time and in a not very nice home situation so had other things on my mind but my home town is one of the London satellite towns so I can't believe I didn't have this imprinted in my consciousness. When I got to the end I realised I did remember this... The bombing at the gay bar and thought it was something to do with the IRA. Is my lack of memory about the bombs in the black and Bangladeshi neighbourhoods a reflection of my ignorance or the way it was reported at the time? I hate to admit it but I was raised with right wing family members, and although I've always had my own mind and learned to be more open minded as I've got older it isn't unreasonable that some of the poison I heard when I was growing up was still in my mind.

I feel that this doc would have benefitted from more focus on the long reaching effects of the bombings on the Brixton and Brick Lane areas. The focus seemed to be on survivors of the Soho bomb. Yes, they suffered deaths there but physical and mental injuries are also horrific. I can't be the only one who wanted to know what the outcome was for the baby who had a nail stuck in their head. We don't need to infringe on this person's privacy but it would be nice to know if they recovered.

Lastly, some update on how human rights and equality has progressed, or not, in the years following would be nice. Some insight into the animal's background and upbringing. What made him so full of hate? What were his parents like? I think we all have a need to understand what makes someone hate so much.

BOOM!

A documentary about a series of bombings in London in 1999, aiming at minority groups.

This was a boring one. There honestly wasn't really much to the story in the first play. Most parts in the documentary were seen before. There was a person who was a spy within an far-right group. He was potentially interesting, but then there wasn't much revealed from his aspect.

The biggest problems here are that the themes felt underwhelming and I didn't learn much about the event. Except for the spy guy, the other interviewees were all not interesting. Many times in this documentary I was bored and looked at phone instead. For only an hour and 12 minutes, it still felt long.

Overall, it's better to just watch some YouTube videos or go to Wiki to learn about the event. 4/10.

The story is interesting, but the film does not expound enough on the racial environment at the time; nor the white supremacist movement, either then or now. There's plenty of film footage, primarily old news clips, but very little in depth analysis. For instance, not much in the way of the immediate aftermath, or the long term effects of these events.

It's not a very long film; but with that, it felt like further details were needed for some context. A more diverse range of credible interviewees would've helped. It's still worth watching, it's not terrible by any means.