Hulu has bought the rights to what looks like the ultimate feel-bad movie: The Contestant. The documentary was a critical hit at this year's Toronto International Film Festival, and it'll be available to stream in 2024, when it may well become one of the best Hulu documentaries.
The synopsis sounds like something from a horror movie: a reality TV show strips a man of his possessions and his clothes and forces him to live alone for more than a year; he doesn't realize that every moment of his life is being broadcast. But it really did happen – the show was a big hit in Japan at the turn of the century, with contestants largely consisting of unknown comedians desperate to break into show business. The version of the show that's focused on in the documentary, Denpa Shōnen teki Kenshō Seikatsu, began in early 1998 and ran for 15 months.
