House of the Tiger King

Flamholc’s documentary on British ‘adventurer’ Tahir Shah, ex-Viet vet Richard Fowler and his own search for the hidden city of Paititi, in the Madre di Dios range deep in the Peruvian rainforest is at turns fascinating, surreal and just plain annoying. Flamholc utilises Shah’s (presumably post-dubbed) commentary to describe their shamateur two-part excursion, fuelled by hope, Shah’s determination and grasped-upon advice by sundry ‘experts’. It would be acceptable as a variation on the ‘crazed searchers for Inca gold’ exposé, but it’s just too self-conscious, inconsequential and haphazard for that. Best seen as an object lesson on how not to make a documentary.