“A New ‘Tinder Swindler’”: documentary about jet-setting fraudster coming to cinemas
The Man With A Thousand Faces, a new documentary about a seductive conman, will be released in UK cinemas this November.
Written and directed by French filmmaker Sonia Kronlund, The Man With A Thousand Faces brings to light the crimes of a man known as Ricardo, who manipulated many women into relationships with him by lying about his job and intentions.
Here’s the official synopsis: “He goes by the names of Alexandre, Ricardo or Daniel. He calls himself a surgeon or an engineer, Argentinian or Brazilian. He lives with four women at the same time, adapting his story and even his personality traits to each one. A first-person investigation, with the help of a private detective, into an imposter with a thousand imaginary lives.”
The Man With A Thousand Faces will see Kronlund interviewing some of Ricardo’s victims and trying to track him down, resulting in a confrontation with the man himself. It’s described as a “timely and cautionary look at the perils of taking things at face value in a world where nothing is quite what it first appears.”
The film has been likened to Netflix’s popular 2022 fraudster documentary The Tinder Swindler – including in the official press release – which told the story of Shimon Hayut, who allegedly used dating apps to con multiple women out of millions of dollars.
The Tinder Swindler became Netflix’s most-watched documentary upon release, with the streamer revealing that 166million hours of it were watched within the first 28 days of it hitting the platform.
It did face some backlash from its subjects, however, with Hayut saying that the women featured in the doc “weren’t conned and they weren’t threatened”. He deleted his Instagram account when the documentary came out, only to reinstate it to share posts denying the allegations shortly after. Hayut’s bodyguard Piotr, who was prominently included in the documentary, issued Netflix with a cease-and-desist letter.
The Man With A Thousand Faces received its world premiere at 2024’s Raindance Film Festival. It arrives in select UK cinemas on November 22.
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Sophie Butcher
NME
