Every week there seems to be a new tell-all documentary hitting a different streaming service. And next week, God Forbid: The Sex Scandal That Brought Down a Dynasty premieres on Hulu. Following up with Giancarlo Granda after he exposed Jerry Fallwell and his wife Becki after their multi-year affair. The documentary seems to have everything viewers are looking for, sex, scandal, the leaders of a mega-church paying for their crimes, and the political implications the affair may have played a role in. But is the documentary worth watching?
The affairs started in March 2012 and broke in the news around 2020. This documentary covers not only what happened, but reveals some of the tapes and recordings that Giancarlo had made during the affairs. He talks about the different ways the Fallwells blackmailed him and what they did to keep him under their control throughout the years, despite his trying to leave several times. But a lot of the specifics are left out. Why? Most likely because they couldn’t be streamed for general audiences on Hulu, but also Giancarlo also has a book giving his account of the whole affair which probably has a lot more detail available.
These types of documentaries are always interesting and will make you want to watch them. Who doesn’t love a good scandal and watching the “bad guys” get their comeuppance? But the documentary does seem to make some leaps in causation. While there may be a lot of different correlations between what happened between Giancarlo and the Falwells, the major political issues and current political climate didn’t result because of it. They, obviously, can be linked, but there’s no way to prove they caused any of the current political and social issues that are happening. And it seems the documentary puts a little too much emphasis on the affair and what happened affects the current political state of our nation.
Does that make God Forbid any less salacious or enjoyable to consume as a viewer? Not at all. It may give some viewers a deeper perspective to some viewers of the inner workings of politics, the religious megachurches influences, and what it can mean to everyday people.
God Forbid: The Sex Scandal That Brought Down a Dynasty will be streaming exclusively on Hulu on November 1st.
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About God Forbid: The Sex Scandal That Brought Down a Dynasty
In this revealing documentary, Giancarlo Granda, former pool attendant at the Fontainebleau Hotel, shares the intimate details of his 7-year relationship with a charming older woman, Becki Falwell, and her husband, the Evangelical Trump stalwart Jerry Falwell Jr. Directed by Billy Corben, GOD FORBID: THE SEX SCANDAL THAT BROUGHT DOWN A DYNASTY outlines Granda’s entanglement with the Falwell’s seemingly perfect lives and the overarching influence this affair had on a presidential election. GOD FORBID is executive produced by Corben and Alfred Spellman for Rakontur and Adam McKay and Todd Schulman of HyperObject.
