Amanda
Knox

Documentary Film92 Minutes2016Netflix

My first feature documentary, Amanda Knox, took five years to make, and post-production overlapped with the beginning of my decade-long adventure on Chef's Table. The documentary tells the story of the 2007 murder of Meredith Kercher, and the subsequent decade of sensational trials of the American Amanda Knox and her Italian boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, for Kercher's murder. We shot the majority of the film in Perugia, Italy.

We interviewed most of the central characters in one of the most covered murder cases of all time, including Knox, Sollecito, lead prosecutor Giuliano Mignini, and Daily Mail journalist Nick Pisa, among others. The film premiered at TIFF in 2016 and was a NY Times and LA Times Critic's Pick, before being nominated for two Primetime Emmys, for Best Documentary and Best Writing for Non-Fiction.

Amanda Knox - Times Square

Credits

Directed / Written / Produced byBrian McGinn
Directed / DP'd / Produced byRod Blackhurst
Edited / Written / Co-Produced byMatt Hamachek
Produced byMette Heide & Stephen Robert Morse
Executive Produced byLisa Nishimura, Adam Del Deo & Ben Cotner
Original Music byDanny Bensi & Saunder Juriaans
Graphics & Title Sequence byLeanne Dare & Elastic/RPS

Press

The New York TimesJeannette Catsoulis
VarietyOwen Gleiberman
The Los Angeles TimesKenneth Turan
The AtlanticSophie Gilbert
Entertainment WeeklyKevin P. Sullivan
Vanity FairJudy Bachrach
RogerEbert.comBrian Tallerico
Daily TelegraphEd Power
The WrapRobert Abele
AV ClubJosh Modell
Hollywood ReporterJohn DeFore
The Globe and MailJohn Doyle
The GuardianBenjamin Lee
We Got This CoveredDarren Ruecker

Completely riveting…a tightly edited, coherently structured and ultimately moving reassessment that burrows beneath the lurid in search of the illuminating…a savage denunciation of the way entertainment imperatives have corrupted the news media. At this singular moment in our political history, the resonance is deafening.

Carries the force of revelation. Gripping and incisive…a resonant documentary, with a reach far beyond this case. The film captures how the unreality of tabloid journalism has slid through digital portals into the mainstream, becoming part of the toxic air of misinformation that we all now breathe.

Equal parts Alfred Hitchcock and Patricia Highsmith…Hard as it is to say that anything is the last word in this most divisive of cases, “Amanda Knox” looks to be it.

Sharp and frequently enraging.

Feels almost like a nostalgic throwback to The Thin Blue Line and Paradise Lost…what you end up with are portraits of individuals — people who are scared or angry or ambitious — all a part of a story that, from the start, ignored their humanity.

More illuminating than a decade’s worth of trial coverage.

A well-made, accomplished piece of filmmaking that illuminates how something like this could happen to anyone. Whether you think she did it or not, “Amanda Knox” is a horror story that should be told.

An insightful procedural that functions as a meta-commentary on our obsession with true crime.

Substantive and even-handed, Blackhurst and McGinn do a vise-tightening job with the unpacking the facts as we now know them, as we never knew them, and as they were originally distorted beyond all reason.

Simultaneously maddening and frightening…Amanda Knox serves as a corrective — a simple, brutal look at the dangers of hype, hysteria, and rushed prosecution.

Amanda Knox makes for succinct, involving viewing, a true-crime doc that acknowledges the lingering debates over its subject’s guilt while prompting one to ask: Why did anyone ever believe this outrageous stuff in the first place, much less cling to it for years?

Coolly eviscerating…an astounding but subtly illuminating documentary about how women are condemned for having normal interests and urges…one of the great cautionary tales of this century.

Plays like a narrative thriller…explores the role that the media, and wider societal stereotypes, had in affecting the case…a carefully balanced and frightening film with Knox a terrifyingly unknowable character at the grisly centre.

For sheer craftsmanship and watchability alone, Amanda Knox is a must-see offering on Netflix; for its exposure of the workings of justice systems and media culture, it’s an essential piece of work worth sharing and discussing.

RecognitionSelected Awards & Nominations

Awards &
Nominations

Primetime Emmy Award Nomination (x2)Outstanding Documentary & Outstanding Writing for Non-Fiction2017
Toronto International Film FestivalWorld Premiere2016
DOC NYC — The Short ListSelection2016
Critics’ Choice Documentary Award NominationBest Documentary TV/Streaming & Best Director2016
Robert Award NominationBest Documentary (Danish Academy Award)2016
Project Stills
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