Louis Theroux is a prolific filmmaker, and has made more than 70 documentaries over the course of 25 years. He’s gone to some of the most dangerous cities on earth, met with some of the most challenging and unpleasant characters around, and has lifted the lid on some of the world’s most uncomfortable and upsetting stories.
He’s spent time with all kinds of people: UFO chasers, swingers, paedophiles, racists, gang members, body builders, porn stars, prisoners, alcoholics, rappers, household name celebrities, gamblers, religious extremists, drug addicts, bereaved families, and people suffering from terrible diseases. The result is an astonishing body of work that shines a light on some of the strangest and saddest corners of human existence.
Given that the content of each episode varies so radically, and explores such different territory, it’s near-impossible to pick Theroux’s best documentaries. Still, there have been some episodes that have stood out for being either particularly shocking, moving or revelatory. Here’s our pick of the bunch.
Louis Theroux Weird Weekends: Porn (1998)
Weird Weekends was one of Theroux’s earliest projects, and in this memorable episode, he heads to California’s San Fernando Valley to investigate the inner workings of the porn industry. The documentary is both revealing and surprising as he interviews male and female porn stars who talk about the trials and tribulations of this opaque industry. Topics range from erections and gay porn, to financial details and standing out from the competition.
In his later years, as he developed his interview style further, Theroux became slightly more of a spectator; but in this early episode he doesn’t shy away from getting involved, finding himself starring - fully clothed, mind you - in a porn film.
The Most Hated Family in America (2007)
Theroux’s stint with one of the founding families of the hate group Westboro Baptist Church became a major hit and remains one of his best-known documentaries. The Westboro Baptist Church, which was founded in the Fifties, protests against everything from homosexuality and atheists, to abortion and Jewish people, and is known for picketing funerals and celebrating the deaths of people around the world. Theroux was able to somehow show the human beings behind the hate speech: while some members of the family were steadfastly bigoted, others were evidently struggling with the church’s doctrines.
Behind Bars (2008)
San Quentin State Prison in San Francisco is famous in the States not only for being California’s oldest prison, but for holding the largest number of death row inmates in the country. And in Behind Bars, Theroux was given unprecedented access to dozens of its 3,000 inmates, many of whom are murderers, rapists, paedophiles, serial killers and extremist gang members. The result is an illuminating and astonishing portrayal of human nature, as the prisoners form new rules, hierarchies, friendships and enemies within the structures of the institution. As always, Theroux’s skill is in appearing to do very little: a well-selected word here or there often sets the inmates off on shocking and revelatory monologues.
Drinking to Oblivion (2016)
Theroux has a talent for infiltrating hate groups and getting people who have committed heinous crimes to open up to him, but some of his best work has been his more worthy explorations of human nature. One such documentary was Drinking to Oblivion, where Theroux spends time at University College London’s specialist liver ward, home to Europe’s largest liver-transplant centre. Some of the patients passing through the ward are experiencing various health complications from serious alcohol addictions. The film is deeply moving as Theroux spends time with a wide variety of characters who have become affected by the disease, showing alcoholism from angles hardly ever depicted on screen.
My Scientology Movie (2015)
The Church of Scientology, the religious movement founded in Los Angeles in the Fifties, has picked up a bad rap, being described by some outsiders and ex-members as a cult and a pseudoreligion. And in My Scientology Movie, Theroux does his best to investigate the secretive organisation, but even he fails to get a proper look inside. Although the film involves dozens of metaphorical - and literal - doors being slammed in Theroux’s face, and The Church of Scientology never cooperates with Theroux, the documentary nevertheless manages to paint an illuminating picture of the religion: he speaks to ex-members about their experiences in the church, and Theroux and his team actually start to be surveilled while they’re making the film.
The City Addicted to Crystal Meth (2009)
This extraordinary film saw Theroux investigating crystal meth addiction in Fresno, California, travelling with the police and meeting users and carers through an area with one of the highest rates of meth usage in the US. It split reviewers. Some believed it provided an eye-opening window into the fallout of drug usage, giving a human face to crime figures; others thought it veered too closely to Theroux becoming a grim globetrotter: “Theroux risks becoming the Alan Whicker de nos jours, a tourist with a typewriter,” said one critic. He explores addiction to the drug - and the city’s attempts to cope with its citizens' dependencies - from multiple angles, speaking to people in recovery, active addicts, and families who have been destroyed by meth, as well as professionals.
Extreme Love: Dementia (2012)
One of Theroux’s sweetest and most heart-wrenching documentaries, Extreme Love sees the documentarian travelling to Phoenix, Arizona to spend time at a residential institution for dementia patients. He meets the patients - some of whom are as young as 49 and are suffering with early-onset dementia - as well as with their families, who are coming to terms with losing one version of their loved ones, and getting used to another. As with many of Theroux’s other documentaries, Extreme Love includes a number of odd conversations and strange situations, but the context is radically different here.
