Film

The Panama Papers

A taut procedural about the 2016 Panama Papers leak and the international journalists who decoded it. You watch reporters chase offshore accounts through Mossack Fonseca's leaked files, racing against lawsuits and threats. Essential viewing for anyone who wants to understand how global financial crime actually works—and how few people are willing to stop it.

TMDb rating3.4

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you enjoy investigative stories that play like a heist, where the paperwork itself builds the tension, and you want to see how one leak becomes a global story.

Skip it if you need a single gripping protagonist, since this is a sprawling, talky tour of offshore company structures that can feel dense and procedural.

What it asks of you: Roughly a hundred minutes of close attention, mostly interviews and document-led storytelling, paced briskly and kept sober in tone.

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

If you liked this

The Two Popes2019

A meditation on power, conscience, and institutional corruption centred on conversations between two pontiffs. Intellectually generous, beautifully acted, and asks hard questions about complicity and reform from inside systems you can't leave.

But Mostly dialogue in a confined space. If you need action or spectacle, this will feel glacial. Some find the papal politics insular.

The Two Popes poster

All the President's Men1976

The blueprint for investigation-as-thriller. Woodward and Bernstein chase Nixon through typewriter clacks and parking garages. Suspenseful, morally clear, and proves that reporting is a contact sport with real stakes.

But Decades old and deliberately paced. The ending you know. If you prefer mystery to slow revelation, this sags.

All the President's Men poster

Spotlight2015

Boston Globe reporters unpick the Catholic Church's abuse cover-up with surgical patience. Every scene is a negotiation. Restrained, brilliant, and shows institutional evil as bureaucratic tedium rather than melodrama.

But Quiet and methodical to the point of restraint. Some find the tone too muted for a story this dark. No villain to hate, which can feel unsatisfying.

Spotlight poster

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

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

The Nest2020

Both explore how financial deception is not an external problem but something that infects behaviour and relationships from the inside. It's the psychological cost of secrets on this scale.

A micro-budget psychological thriller where a financier's lies unravel through behaviour rather than exposition. Bleak, precise, claustrophobic—shows how financial crime corrodes everything around it, especially intimate relationships. No heroes, just damage.

But Slow, austere, and deliberately small-scale. No catharsis or justice. If you need a narrative arc or a character to root for, this will feel punishing.

The Nest poster
More like this (6)

The Wolf of Wall Street2013

Scorsese luxuriates in the seductive chaos of financial fraud. It's repellent and magnetic—the film doesn't flinch from showing why people commit crimes like these, which makes it far more clarifying than condemnation.

But Three hours of excess and bad behaviour. The film loves its criminals more than it punishes them, which some read as complicit. Bluntly male-gaze throughout.

The Wolf of Wall Street poster

Catch Me If You Can2002

Spielberg and DiCaprio on a con man who forged cheques and impersonated airline pilots. It's a cat-and-mouse game with real warmth between pursuer and pursued, and shows how charisma and audacity can outrun due diligence.

But Decades old. Somewhat romanticises the criminal's ingenuity. Lighter in tone than the gravity of the actual crimes warrants.

Catch Me If You Can poster

The Laundromat2019

Soderbergh's furious essay on shell companies and financial opacity. Gary Oldman plays a Mossack Fonseca-style fixer across a narrative that refuses to stay still. Formally wild and genuinely angry about systemic theft.

But Deliberately fractured and visually restless. The non-linear approach frustrates more viewers than it enlightens. Some scenes feel more like performance art than storytelling.

The Laundromat poster

The Big Short2015

McKay turns the 2008 financial crisis into a blackly comic rampage. It breaks the fourth wall, uses needle drops aggressively, and makes derivative markets comprehensible and infuriating. Stylish moral fury.

But The formal trickery can feel gimmicky. If you prefer classical narrative, the constant breaking of frame is exhausting. Some of the explanation dumps feel patronising.

The Big Short poster

Dark Money2018

A focused investigation into how untraceable political donations corrupt Montana elections. Methodical, local, and shows you exactly how democratic rot happens at the granular level. Bracing and clear.

But Narrowly focused on one state's politics. The pacing is glacial even by doc standards. Might feel parochial if you're not invested in US electoral mechanics.

Dark Money poster

The Invisible Man2020

Leigh Whannell's remake uses invisible terror as a metaphor for gaslighting and financial entrapment. Taut, clever, and operates on multiple levels of meaning about how abuse hides and persists.

But It's a genre film disguised as allegory, which some find dishonest. The jump-scares might undercut the serious subject matter for some viewers. Requires patience with formal cleverness.

The Invisible Man poster

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We Steal Secrets: The Story of WikiLeaks, The Fourth Estate, Dark Money, Risk