Film

The Contestant

The Contestant documents Nasubi, a Japanese comedian who spent 15 months naked in a small room, unaware that millions watched him on TV. It's a fascinating, unsettling meditation on spectacle, humiliation, and consent—how a game show became psychological torture broadcast as entertainment. For anyone curious about how far reality TV will go.

TMDb rating3.5

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you are drawn to stories about the ethics of watching, and want a documentary that makes you examine your own appetite for other people's misfortune.

Skip it if you need a lighter night in, since this is bleak, claustrophobic subject matter, and it stays heavy and uneasy for much of its runtime.

What it asks of you: Ninety-one minutes, unhurried and plainly presented, it wants patience and a willingness to sit with discomfort rather than be carried along by momentum.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

The Toys That Made Us2017

Each episode explores how a cultural phenomenon became a business empire, blending archival footage, interviews, and nostalgic storytelling. If you're drawn to how media shapes us, this is essential background.

But Mostly celebratory rather than critical; sometimes feels like a feature-length advertisement for the brands themselves.

The Toys That Made Us poster

The Circle2017

A tech entrepreneur's newest social media platform forces contestants into a glass house where privacy is currency and viewers vote on their fates. It's a sharper, more direct exploration of surveillance and manufactured intimacy.

But Heavy-handed messaging and a third act that feels didactic rather than earned.

The Circle poster

Fyre2019

Documents a catastrophic music festival built entirely on lies and influencer hype. Darkly funny, genuinely appalling, and raises hard questions about complicity and spectacle.

But Takes a while to build momentum; early segments feel scattered before the disaster crystallizes.

Fyre poster

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from The Contestant

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Casting JonBenet2017

Both trap their subject in a frame and ask hard questions about who benefits from watching someone suffer. Both pivot on our complicity as viewers.

A documentary that auditions actors for a hypothetical movie about the unsolved JonBenét Ramsey case—using the audition process itself to explore how we fictionalise real trauma and obsess over a tragedy that isn't ours.

But The premise is deliberately provocative and may feel exploitative; it's a slow, conceptual film that refuses easy conclusions.

Casting JonBenet poster
More like this (7)

The Influencer2022

A South Korean survival show where influencers compete in increasingly brutal challenges, live-streamed to millions. Explores performance, desperation, and what we'll watch for entertainment.

But The violence is sometimes gratuitous; it's easy to feel like you're complicit in the very thing the show critiques.

The Influencer poster

Nightcrawler2014

A freelance videographer weaponizes tragedy for profit and ratings. Taut, morally corroded, and brilliantly performed. Essential viewing on the ethics of spectacle.

But Relentlessly bleak; the protagonist is irredeemable and the film offers no comfort.

Nightcrawler poster

Black Mirror2011

Three interconnected stories that interrogate consent, control, and technology with surgical precision. Claustrophobic and devastating in ways that linger.

But Deliberately punishing; there is no emotional release or redemption arc.

Black Mirror poster

Squid Game2021

A survival competition where debt-ridden contestants play children's games with lethal stakes. Visceral, empathetic, and a global phenomenon that speaks to economic despair.

But The violence is graphic; some find the English dubbing distracting if you prefer subtitles.

Squid Game poster

Room 1042017

An anthology series set in a single hotel room, each episode a different guest, different crisis. Explores isolation, performance, and the lives we hide behind closed doors.

But Wildly uneven; some episodes are brilliant, others feel like sketches that didn't land.

Room 104 poster

Come and See1985

Both document a human being stripped of agency and dignity over an extended period. Both ask whether the act of witnessing and recording is ethical or obscene.

A Soviet war film following a boy conscripted into WWII. Unsparing, sensory, immersive—it's what it feels like to be utterly powerless and consumed by forces beyond your control.

But Genuinely harrowing; this is one of cinema's most punishing experiences. Not entertainment in any traditional sense.

Come and See poster

The Act2019

Both examine prolonged captivity and the blurring of performance and reality. Both ask: at what point does the audience become complicit in abuse?

A limited series about Gypsy Rose Blanchard, whose mother faked her illnesses for years—performing her daughter's sickness as entertainment and spectacle. Gorgeous, unsettling, and tragic.

But Somewhat sensationalizes a real crime; the darker impulses of the true story get softened by the production's prettiness.

The Act poster

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Squid Game: The Challenge