An in-depth look at how crimes, suicides and bizarre events have impacted today's society.
Director: Emmanuel Blanchard, Dominique Kalifa, Simon Thisse
In 1888, a series of gruesome murders shocked London: The perpetrator was dubbed Jack the Ripper. This was the Victorian era, when puritanism reigned, and forensic science was in its infancy. How did these factors combine to create one of the most renowned crime stories in history, resulting in the construction of the term- 'serial killer?'
30 minutes
Paris, January 1907. Albert Soleilland is accused of the rape and murder of a little girl named Marthe. The press details every step of the case as if it was a show. As early century France was on the verge of abolishing the death sentence, this infamous crime set the abolitionist cause back decades. The media strenuously called for Soleilland's execution en masse.
30 minutes
In 1924 in Hanover, Germany, untold numbers of bones were found by authorities, and the news immediately hit the press. A prime suspect, Fritz Haarmann, was quickly arrested. The heinous crimes committed by the one now called the vampire reminded the German people of the traumas of the Great War.
30 minutes
In 1929 Chicago, seven members of Bugs Moran's gang were assassinated in a North Side garage by Al Capone's henchmen. The press dubbed the brutal event the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre. Carried out during the prohibition era, these killings became the symbol of gang wars, and cemented the image of 'the mobster' in the collective subconscious of the entire world.
30 minutes
In August 1933, 18-year-old Violette Noziere poisoned her father in Paris. After a short period on the run, Violette was charged with murder and swiftly confessed to the crime, saying her motive was that her father abused her. The press and public were immediately fascinated by this patricidal teenager, who became known as The Monster in the Skirt.
26 minutes
On May 18th, 1936, Abe Sada killed her lover by erotic asphyxia, then proceeded to cut off his member and carve his name in her flesh. During a time of great military upheaval in Japan, the press was very interested in the unusual nature of this crime. The murder has become historical legend in Japanese culture and news of the crime spread an unfound image of Japan to the West, one of liberated sexual urges.
30 minutes
On July 8, 1947, the U.S. Air Force announced the discovery of a flying disc that had crashed in the Roswell area of New Mexico. This was the birth of the flying saucer phenomenon. Against the backdrop of the Cold War, when conspiracy theories were quite prevalent, the myth of the UFO gradually took shape to become a recurrent theme in science-fiction movies and popular culture.
25 minutes
On October 13, 1972, a Uruguayan plane crashed into the Andes Mountains. 72 days later, 16 survivors were found alive. The incredible rescue that ensued captivated the entire world. How did those who survived the crash live to talk about it? Over time, an unspeakable truth gradually emerged to the horror of the world. To live, the survivors had resorted to cannibalism.
30 minutes
It is 1978, Guyana. Reverend Jim Jones held an apocalyptic mass. Its' outcome? The sacrifice of 918 members of the Peoples Temple Agricultural Project, an American cult founded in the mid-1950s. The entire world was horrified by journalists' accounts, and the images they saw of Jonestown, and this event haunted small communities and alternative forms of worship throughout the 1970s.
30 minutes
On August 31, 1997, Princess Diana passed away alongside her companion, Dodi Al-Fayed, in a car crash in Paris while being pursued by paparazzi. Her untimely death prompted an outpouring of grief throughout the world and made Diana a symbol of the excesses of media intrusion, that was ironically echoed in the coverage of her funeral, broadcast live around the globe.
30 minutes
