Louis delves into the controversial world of hypermasculine influencers at last, while Nicole Kidman and Jamie Lee Curtis light up a fun thriller about a crime-solving forensic pathologist
It was inevitable that Louis Theroux would collide with the manosphere: his diffidence is a perfect counterpoint to the empty bravado that defines the assorted blaggers and oddballs he meets here. As Theroux spends time with influencers including Harrison Sullivan and Myron Gaines, it becomes clear that their performance of hypermasculinity is often linked to loss and trauma. This manifests as bullying but also as an inescapable dullness. However, it’s worryingly evident that many vulnerable young men take the manosphere’s posturing at face value and, as the film goes on, it’s also apparent that Theroux and these influencers are talking to completely separate worlds.
Netflix, from Wednesday 11 March
Nicole Kidman’s TV roles are rarely understated and the trend continues in this melodramatic thriller, adapted from a series of novels by Patricia Cornwell. Kidman stars as Kay Scarpetta, a brilliant but troubled criminal pathologist, who is having a second try at the job of chief medical examiner of Virginia. Her previous spell finished unhappily so the last thing she needs is a case (a possible serial killer) with freakish echoes of one that defeated her years earlier. It’s never subtle but everyone involved commits admirably and Jamie Lee Curtis is in fine sardonic form as Kay’s sister Dorothy.
