User reviews

Netflix's take on the Fyre Festival fiasco has a more grounded vibe than Hulu's more montage-driven version. But ultimately both platforms do well in building up what the Fyre disaster was all about, both before and after it all. We can debate on the ethics of what occurred behind the scenes of each doc, at the end of the day there was little bias to be had as the message was the same: Billy McFarland was a delusional fraduster.

The real entertainment is seeing wealthy people predictably buy into the facade of luxury only to experience first world problems as if they have it worse than the middle class. When the "worst 24 hours of your life" involves a botched Bahamas vacation because some huge festival party you paid thousands for didn't happen, it just looks ridiculous compared to people going through real issues like years of no clean water in Flint, MI.

No one deserves to suffer, but there is hilarity in seeing self-important narcissistic party socialites who never worked a day in their lives get scammed because they put their trust in some circle of wealthy social media models and "influencers"...for some luxury party.

This documentary illustrates the perfect analogy of the social media illusion with the Fyre fest disaster. Some things are just too good to be true, and may even be a facade of something much much worse. It is an important documentary to raise awareness of the problems of social media and the concept of understanding what it takes to do something seemingly impossible.

I remember seeing the infamous promotional video for this festival (not that I'm wealthy enough to attend this kind of event, but some friend sent me the link, so I could "contemplate" the "dream" that other people were going to live). I remember feeling confused about this: what is it, exactly? It's some music festival, but all we see is this Caribbean landscape with a yacht, jetskis and girls in bikinis. Not that this seemed just like a lure, but clearly this was just pretty archetypical promo that could have been just one of a thousand meaningless "influencer" videos in this Instagram era where people are more busy turning their life into a promotional object than living and enjoying it.

I also remember reading the Vice article documenting the extent of the disaster the actual event was. That article is what got me to understand that this was actually supposed to be a music festival (I did not bother looking into that sort of detail after being sent the initial promotional video, as it seemed like your typical, meaningless Instagram garbage).

Then, over a year later, I see this thing in the Netflix menu, and decide to watch it. This is an interesting story where what one would initially perceive as pure naivety clearly turns into plain deceit, and where the expectations of grandeur for the "dream" being sold were artificially inflated through social media. And on that last point, I think this documentary does a pretty decent job of mocking how social media and "influencers" (still can't believe that's how these parasites are called), in today's world, is all about style over substance, expectations vs. reality, and the culture of appealing people with luxury items and "lifestyle" while having an empty bank account or being in major debt. How many of these stories have we heard over the years, of people living the "good life", only to go bankrupt a few year later? This is the new "15 minutes of fame" concept, one heavily filtered picture at a time.

The documentary gathers a satisfying amount of interviews with people who worked on the event, of on-site footage before and during the event, and of other significant moments that show you the true colors of Billy McFarland and Ja Rule - the founders of this scam. You do get some insight on their mentality throughout, as Ja Rule and McFarland have no grasp whatsoever on reality and won't take no for an answer, regardless of whether what they want to do is within the realm of possibility or not. It does not matter to them. They're in the Caribbean, they always got a beer in their hands, and they couldn't care less about the logistics - until the very last second, when they got their back against the wall, but will take their customers' money regardless.

As I mentioned before, at first, it seems like they really are doing their best to materialize the vision they had. That vision, however, is soon enough unveiled as something that obviously won't happen, with mountains of financial and logistical challenges that just can't possibly be climbed, as could have easily been predicted, had the founders not been so short-sighted and stubborn.

The structure of the documentary quickly turns into a countdown to the event, and boy it's not short on cringey moments, let me tell you that. It obviously escalates as the event approaches and you know the ship is about to hit the iceberg, big time. While it may be hard to feel pity or sympathy towards rich kids who can afford to spend 25K on that kind of weekend getting ripped off, "Fyre" somewhat debunks a mentality that plagues North American society and reveals the emptiness behind each lavish lifestyle picture posted by these "influencers" on Instagram to a much wider scale by giving a prime example of an empty shell that was created and promoted on social media.

Overall, this "anatomy of a modern day disaster" documentary is very well put together, one cringeworthy moment after another. Worth watching if you've heard of this fiasco and you're curious about how it all went down.

As much as being about the failed festival, it's also about the unwieldy power of social media, which single-handedly created and destroyed this whole thing. But for those of us who take comfort in planning out events thoroughly, this is, quite simply, bone-chilling.

It was almost palpable, the sense of unease that you feel as the concert goers began to realize just how much of a disaster they'd signed up for...even though you knew it was coming. This was a very well told story, and aside from that, the best thing I could say is that it was told very to-the-point. It wasn't a long, rambling documentary...it said what needed to be said, yet also gives the viewer a nuanced view of just how some of the people behind this promotion were able to be dragged in over their heads. You can't help but feel for some of these guys, as they were taken for just as much of a ride as the festival attendees, but lost more than just the cost of a ticket. There's currently a Gofundme page set up for the owner of a restaurant who worked tirelessly to provide food for everyone, giving up her life savings in the process. Apparently she was very reluctant to speak on camera, as the issue is still very hurtful for her, but hopefully it'll end up being worth it for her having done so.

If you don't know much about this event, this is one heck of a story insofar as the difference between what was advertised and what was eventually produced, the dichotomy itself provided quite a bit of entertainment value with its "wow" factor. Great documentary on a very interesting part of our zeitgeist, a testament to the power of social media as well as its potential for abuse and the superficiality it helps foster.

This is a fascinating look on what really happened about the this failer festival from 2017. Goes to show it was just an event with a bunch of Influencers being tricked out of all their money and stranded on a desert island. I see literally nothing bad about that, we should have one every year. My kind of mess.

You'll laugh at some of the scenes, but this whole thing is a no joke. The collapse of this whole event (it was inevitable since inception), shows that the governments should take necessary steps to prevent financial fraud caused by social media.

Hilarious look at how idiots buy into influencer's BS.

People with more money than sense being sold magic beans.

When it rains it pours. Both Netflix and Hulu decided to come out with documentaries about the Fyre Festival at almost exactly the same time.

The main takeaway from both is just how easy it is to separate people from a *lot* of money if you're willing to lie with a straight face, and when it comes to that, there's really no substitute for letting McFarland tell the story in his own words, which is what the Hulu version does. Unfortunately, so much of that version is devoted to him that they leave out some pretty important things, so if you only watch one, definitely watch this one instead.

This version is a much better documentary all around, and gives a much more complete picture of what happened.

I had exactly the same reaction watching this as I do watching documentaries about religious cults. There's no question McFarland is a pathological liar and narcissistic sociopath, and absolutely everything about him is a red flag. If I ran into someone like that, I would immediately conclude he was at best a blowhard, and more likely a straight up con man, yet somehow he was able to put a lot sincere, hard working people under his spell, some of whom were young and naive, but some of whom definitely should have known better.

My guess is he's already running scams from inside Club Fed, but if not, there's no question he'll waste no time once he gets out, and he'll have no trouble finding marks.

Of course, in the end, the real victims are the Bahamians worked round the clock trying to make this happened, and then didn't get paid. They were pretty much left out of the Hulu version, but my understanding is that this film is raising awareness of them, and they're getting some relief.

I guess not being a social media follower or a rich kid I was unaware of this festival fraud. The whole part of a festival for me is about the camping music and atmosphere such as I have experienced at Glastonbury and other UK music festivals. Hand on heart I can't feel sorry for all the rich kids that got duped specialy after listening to one of them admit to wrecking the large dome like tents and pissing on beds because he didn't want people staying in them near him! However I do feel sorry for the local people who worked hard and not only didn't get paid but also lost their own money in the process I have never heard of Billy McFarland the guy who organised ,lied and in effect stole millions in the process of selling a 5 star music festival experience to the over privalaged and delivering a bag of s***e. The main thing that left me speechless was the sentence that this guy was given,taking into account that whilst on bail he tried to and did sell exclusive tickets to high profile events under another person that were also not genuine ! Apparently this holds a 20 year sentence of which he was given 6 yrs!! WTF so he basically got a slap on the wrist! Wouldn't surprise me if he has a pimped out cell to boot!

I remember hearing about Fyre Festival through friends on social media talking about how it looked like the coolest thing ever. I watched the promo video and it all seemed way too good to be true, but then I'm a cynic and I thought "Hey, maybe I'll be wrong". Yeah, not a chance.

This documentary in a lot of ways is a brilliant insight into social media & its influence on modern society. The entire festival was built up from promo videos posted on social media and posts from 'influencers' (a term that I absolutely hate and this documentary shows why you shouldn't trust 'influencers') that detailed an idealistic experience that every Instagram and Facebook obsessed kid would dream of.

The funniest thing is that in reality, these kids didn't actually want to attend the festival, rather they wanted to be seen attending it - they wanted to post about it on social media to show that THEY had been there. The whole festival was about the image, and that was a great marketing factor in the 'organisers' favour (I say 'organisers' because as you see in the documentary, it doesn't look like anyone organised anything here).

The beauty of this is that everything about the festival was surface level. There was nothing underneath. No-one had bothered to actually engage anyone with real business acumen in the festival planning industry until too late in the piece. It's probably one of the best examples of why money isn't necessarily the answer to everything. The co-founders had a lot of money and it didn't save anything. There needed to be some actual business development here and no-one really bothered to give that its dues.

The worst thing is that, while I didn't like the concept from the start, this type of festival could really have worked. Sure, it's still a complete shining example of the social media craze amongst our society but there was still potential. If there had been an actual plan from the start, and it wasn't throw together based on a promo video and 'influencer' posts, then we could have seen some revolutionary event that everyone wanted to attend, even if they didn't want to admit it. But we didn't see that. What we saw instead is a bunch of idiots thinking that their great ideas will just work because they're really passionate about them. Be careful of your obsession with your image, otherwise you might end up like ol' Billy.

This documentary tells the fraud of a music festival that was never going to exist.

The documentary is really well done because you hear from so many people right at the source. The employees and customers recall their accounts which is pretty convincing already. The fact that there was so much footage documenting the planning of the festival makes it even more fascinating, giving an insight into how the huge scam evolves. It is a fascinating documentary.

A tale about fraudster, Billy MacFarland and how he ripped off a bunch of shallow people along with his sidekick Ja Rule (who looked like a damn fool and an idiot!).

The only people I felt sorry for was the islanders who worked tirelessly and never got paid.

The rest of his clan (who were interviewed for this documentary) weren't innocent either (but tried to convince the viewer they were), just more of the same... greedy money-grabbing narcissistic morons who got what they deserved.

Would have been exponentially better with more footage of the disgustingly vapid "celebrity influencers" moaning about having to essentially what is for normal people called CAMPING for a night. Actually, it was glamping. I loved the comparisons from a few them to a "refugee camp" (utterly shameful) and "barbaric" accommodations. Tents on a beach. How horrifying. Yes, they were ripped off, but please. These people spend more on a pair of shoes. I have no sympathy for any of these people. I'm sure they have more footage of the "celebrities" (I didn't even know who 99% of these people were), but didn't incorporate it into the doc because these fakers didn't want to look like idiots and after all, their jobs are to "influence" and no one wants to upset the little whiners. That's a shame because it would be awesome to see a bunch of spoiled brats complaining about their cheese sandwiches while people are freezing to death in real refugee camps in Syria. Glad this guy is doing jail time though because seriously... he deserves it. Slime.

This is great as both documentary and entertainment. It makes the whole Fyre disaster make total sense, when you see this world where a guy saying "I bough a drug lord's private island" is met with enthusiasm rather than skepticism. If you like watching 'epic fails' but don't like feeling bad for the people involved, this is the documentary for you! There's hardly a sympathetic person on screen, so you can revel in schadenfreude all you want.

A well made documentary, if apparently not overly balanced due to production involvement of parties actually involved in the original events. There is a lovely dose of schadenfreuden in witnessing what happens the vacuous people sucked in to the social media 'influencer' nonsense but on the flip-side it is pretty heart-breaking to see the effect on the islands workers, local business owners etc.

This is exactly the right documentary about the social media age and the so called influencers. How a specific guy took advantage of the whole absurdity in order to make a profit and turned out to be a huge crook, taking full exploitation of the morons who are so into the lifestyle of the 21st century - trying to be social media models (or look like them), playing their own little reality show by living the high life. And at the end you're reminded that there were some hard working people, festival professionals and local Bahamians, that worked really hard to pull this off and ended up losing a lot of money plus part of their own dignity. Strong piece of film.

Good documentary on the epic fail that was Fyre festival. The interviewees were relevant and provided good insight. The doc was organized and the storyline and a steady flow. The story itself is wild, showing how one person can manipulate people into doing whatever they want, including working for free and paying thousands for an fraudulent experience.

I had not heard of this festival or even it's outcome, but that could be because I am far from being in the class of people that were duped. I feel sorry for the honest minority who were robbed of their hard-earned wages and their livelihood.

That is the extent of my sorrow. It's hard to feel sorry for the upper class who think nothing of paying thousands of dollars for a weekend of debauchery. For a short time, they got to see first hand how the 'little people' live; no shelter, no food, no sanitation.

Hearing a socialite complain that the jet trip to the Bahamas was like 'riding in economy class' sums it up. And Billy McFarland will no doubt be back to prey on the wealthy again.

I wasn't that interested in watching a documentary about this festival. But after the reviews I decided to give it a watch. This is a well made documentary that keeps you engaged and while I didn't sympathize with the attendees, I did with the crew, especially the islanders who worked tirelessly on this festival. It is an interesting/entertaining story and I'm glad this was made due to the social statement that I felt this film ultimately made. (There are plenty of docs nowadays that are not engaging and don't need to exist). I haven't seen the Hulu version, nor do I plan too. I trusted the critics on this one.

I'm an oldie, and a festival veteran that has seen once great events get hijacked by the rich and gentrified. Even Burning Man is now a cabal of trust fund kids desperate to prove that their inherited wealth isn't the reason for Global Warming, because they got there in a pig poop powered bus and have a Celtic tattoo. Glastonbury is now about which fashion designer made your wellington boots.

Getting covered in mud, rained out, wind swept, sun burnt, dehydrated, not eating for 2 days were part of the experience. One thing you could rely on was that fellow festival goers would help out if you needed it, there was always a sense of camaraderie. Even the original Woodstock, a living hell, was turned into one of the greatest ever experiences because of the love shown to each other by total strangers. The common factor back in the day was that these festivals had grown from nothing, were organic, the bad ones died off, the good ones grew. Not FYRE, my God, not even close.

The more I watched this doc' the more vindicated I felt about my own views of what the festival scene has become. It's now riddled with fakers, fraudsters, wannabes, poseurs, social media addicts and worst of all...people that don't even love music, just themselves and their Instagram accounts. From the beginning, although I have no conclusive evidence, I suspect cocaine was a huge factor. Macho Alpha's trying to out snort each other and construct more elaborate party schemes to promote an app' until they ended up with FYRE. Surely buying Pablo Escobar's island, and then promoting it as such is a clue? (The festival was on that particular island until cancelled by PE's lawyer after FYRE used his name).

The oneness and kinship often displayed at other festivals in the past when things got tough was missing here. The slightest adversity turned 5,000 socialites into a baying mob that turned on each other for toilet roll. Imagine Lord Of The Flies but without the rescue at the end? Welcome to FYRE on day 1, day 1 !!! In all of my time I've never heard the cry 'Where's my villa'?! You were lucky if you had a 2 person tent and it was definitely a luxury. FYRE had large domed tents with beds and mattresses in, but just weren't good enough, apparently. As organisers fled the blood thirsty, vengeful mob and unpaid contractors we're left looking at the wreckage and an island ripped of by rich guys yet again.

This is a story of greed, machismo, hype, fakery and blatant fraud. But also a moral tale. Karma does exist and it really doesn't care how much money you have.

I laughed so much I'm about to watch this again. It's my new happy place.

Another fake product generated from social media hype created by sociopathic get-rich-quick culture of social media.

I didn't know much about Fyre. Just read back in 2017 that some festival failed big time and saw lots of people enjoying the fact that rich people were victims of a fraud. Like in many reviews here, the usual hate towards people who have more money than them. "If I can't have it, nobody should". But that was it.

So I was curious to see what it was all about when I saw this documentary on Netflix. And it sure is worth watching, a really fascinating story. The documentary was built very well. We see it all building up towards the disaster and then the footage how it all crashed. It also has people who were part of the crew working on it giving us some inside information.

At the end I feel sorry for all of them except for Billy of course. It is amazing that he still went on with fraud after already being arrested. Wow! This is all I can say about this whole story.

Not more than thought provoking into how delusional rich middle class people can be... millions of dollars being sunk into a delusional pipe dream that could be disuaded by a cursory internet search. Distressing that it progressed as far as it did in the end!

Was supposed to be a "creative genius" yet he can't form a single sentence without loading it with curse words; sure evidence of a lack of vocabulary and creativity.