Sweet Bobby - My Catfish Nightmare documentary review: A strange social media nightmare brought to light

Sweet Bobby - My Catfish Nightmare documentary review

Film: Sweet Bobby: My Catfish Nightmare (Netflix)
Cast: Kirat Assi, Hemma Gulhane, Anurag Mehra, Ariya Larker
Director: Lyttanya Shannon
Rating: 3/5
Runtime: 82 min

This Netflix documentary based on a hit podcast of the same name, is largely a first-person account by Kirat of her experience. Sweet Bobby was a popular Tortoise podcast released in 2021 and attracted thousands of listeners. In this documentary account Kirat narrates her own story. She talks of how she got involved with ‘Bobby' through social media ( Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, phone calls and Skype) detailing how, over the years, she grew closer to not only Bobby ( who was recovering from a shooting and a stroke in New York) but also his friends and family. Catfishing implies being victimised by getting lured into a relationship by someone who is using another person's identity on social platform.

Director Lyttanya Shannon also includes interviews with Kirat's relatives and friends in order to understand context about the pressures involved in making her ignore the obvious red flags evident in Bobby's claims. Kirat was single and in her mid-30s, desperate to start a family, with mounting pressure from her close ones to get hitched, as time was running out so-to-speak.

In a first person account Kirat appraises the audience of how it all began. It was 2009 when Kirat Assi received a Facebook friend request from a man named Bobby Jandu. At that time Bobby was happily married. Kirat, like everyone else who had gotten on to Facebook was intent on expanding her Facebook network and did not think twice about responding positively. After all, Bobby's family was well-known and the two shared many mutual friends online. Another factor was that Bobby's younger brother, JJ used to date Kirat's younger cousin Simran. Though Bobby, a cardiology assistant, who travelled frequently between the UK and Kenya, and Kirat, a marketing professional, who lived in London, had not met personally, they nevertheless struck up an online friendship. It's only nearly a decade after the friendship deepened into a virtual romance and an engagement and later on a steady stream of lies, following which Kirat was left totally upended, that the elaborate catfishing scheme comes to light. By then Kirat is already well past her 30's and future prospects seem dim.

When Kirat bumps into Bobby at a Brighton club in 2011, their very first meeting, Kirat talks to Bobby but Bobby does not seem to recognize her. The red flags were all there but Kirat was too caught-up in living up to certain expectations that she ignored them all. Kirat was in a relationship with Bobby for nine years until one day, when the so-called Bobby decides to comes clean. The criminal's identity comes as a shocker to Kirat as well as the real Bobby. The real Bobby's recounting is also heart breaking. His online images were stolen so he was as much of a victim as Kirat. Imagine his plight when an unknown hysterical woman starts accusing him of stuff he never could comprehend doing?

The elaborate scheme is pretty shocking. The bright lighting, screen-grabs of Facebook profiles, messages, enactments, conversations, photos stored by Kirat as evidence, intimate chats with Bobby, who insisted she keep the Skype call open while they slept, give us a pretty rounded picture of how it all took shape.

At 82 min, this true crime documentary is fairly compelling. There may be gaps in the information provided and the logical flow may seem a little off at times but that may well be because of legal compulsions. Kirat's state of mind and vulnerabilities regarding companionship and marriage are well established. Of course, there are still many questions that go unanswered. Why was Kirat chosen as the victim in the first place? That's not very clear because this is entirely from Kirat's frame of reference. The resolution involves Kirat filing a civil case against the perpetrator which was eventually settled out of court in 2022. Kirat was in a relationship with a man who never really existed. It wasn't about scamming for money it was about wanting to inflict emotional pain on a person and that certainly was a nightmare scenario for Kirat to face up to and overcome. Hopefully, the podcast and this documentary would have given her the avenue to help herself deal with the pain and loss of years.