Into the Deep: The Submarine Murder Case premieres on Netflix Sept. 30. Director Emma Sullivan was profiling eccentric Danish inventor Peter Madsen and his homemade rocket for a documentary, and ended up capturing incriminating footage that helped convict him of the murder of journalist Kim Wall.
The film is rated TV-MA and goes for 90 minutes.
In 2016, Australian filmmaker Sullivan began documenting the life and work of Madsen, who was famous in Denmark for building a homemade, crowd-funded submarine. He was next attempting to become the world's first amateur astronaut by constructing his own rocket.
A year into her project, Sullivan filmed Madsen as he prepared to take a Swedish journalist, Kim Wall, on a trip in his submarine. On that voyage, Madsen murdered the journalist and disposed of her remains overboard. Some of Madsen's preparations were recorded by Sullivan's camera.
Sullivan’s film “provides an unprecedented portrait of an apparently charming eccentric who turns into a murderer before our very eyes,” said Netflix. “More poignantly, she shows us the innocent enthusiasm of the amateur space mission and then tracks the impact of the crime on Madsen's supporters as they slowly grasp the true nature of the man they called a friend and mentor.”
Standing trial in 2018, Madsen was sentenced to life in prison.
HBO aired a documentary on Madsen and Wall earlier this year called Undercurrent: The Disappearance of Kim Wall. ■
