REVIEW. ‘The Tinder Swindler’: “Love is… lighting up lonely souls in front of millions and apparently getting away with it” | Viewing guide

If the women in the documentary agree on one thing, it is that it would be much nicer to bump into someone spontaneously, but that the chances of true love are greater via an app. And so they turned to Tinder, where they were all presented with the same man: a 28-year-old playboy named Simon Leviev, who, judging by his profile photos, enjoys a life of some standing. When the Norwegian Cecilia, the Swedish Pernilla and the Dutch Ayleen swipe him right, they can’t believe their eyes. They have a bite! With – as it turns out later – a billionaire’s son!

The documentary first lets Cecilia speak and how she – as a fan of Disney fairy tales – was looking for the prince who would steal her. Two hours after she makes contact with Simon via Tinder, she is sitting right across from him sipping coffee in a swanky hotel. Simon really does exist and appears to be who he claims to be. Not only does his photo gallery seem to confirm that he is the son of a diamond magnate, but also Google. When he says that he still has a seat on board his private jet and he wants to continue the conversation there, Cecilia falls into a swoon. “I thought I was in a movie, but there are bad guys in movies too.” It doesn’t take long before Simon – now officially her boyfriend – asks her for money. Supposedly to ensure his safety, after his enemies track him down. And lending money to a billionaire doesn’t immediately set off an alarm. In no time, Cecilia has taken out nine quick loans and without realizing it, she sponsors the entire luxury life of her soulmate, who meanwhile puts the flowers in another big city with another Tinder date.

What’s great about this documentary is that Netflix hasn’t chopped it up into several episodes just to force you to watch more minutes. The documentary lasts two hours and that’s it. So it is a worthy successor to that other high-profile documentary ‘Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened’, with which Netflix already impressed in 2019. In addition, the stories of the three witnesses are sharply strung together with a striking amount of digital evidence with an interlude from some Finnish investigative journalists who managed to uncover Leviev’s real background (surprise: he is neither a billionaires son nor a diamond heir) and ultimately facilitate his arrest. The icing on the cake is that at one time or another all three women mustered up the courage to patch up their impostor themselves. And that makes for a surprising plot twist at the end. What the documentary doesn’t do enough, however, is be critical of Tinder. We would have liked someone to explain to us why Simon Leviev would now be back on the dating app. That’s the least Tinder could do in exchange for so much free publicity. It’s good to arm people for scammers, but what’s more important is that companies with such scope ensure that perpetrators can’t keep getting away with such crimes.

‘The Tinder Swindler’ can be viewed in its entirety on Netflix.

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