A thriller about the true story of the 1972 Andes plane crash could be one of the best films of the year, already! Well, that’s what streaming columnist NICK OVERALL reckons. 

NETFLIX is straight out of the gate in 2024 with what could shape up to be one of streaming’s best films of the year.

It’s very early days to be making such a call, but a watch of Society of the Snow will reveal why.

This thriller is about the true story of the 1972 Andes plane crash, in which a Uruguayan rugby team along with their families and supporters had to fight for survival after becoming lost amongst the freezing cold mountain ranges of Argentina.

The plane crashed at an elevation of 3500 metres, where temperatures could plunge to negative 30 degrees celsius overnight. Many of the players on the team, who were en route to a competition in Chile, had never even seen snow before.

Combine the icy, deadly climate with limited food and severe injuries from the crash and the passengers on board Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571 would eventually become part of a story known both as the “disaster” and “miracle” on the Andes.

“Society of the Snow” tells that story.

“Human beings undergo a transformation in cases like this,” a real-life survivor of the disaster Roberto Canessa told “Time” magazine in a fascinating interview on the film.

“There is a real metamorphosis from being a rugby player to becoming a survivor of a plane crash. I believe people have that potential.”

The film comes from Spain and features a cast composed of mostly unknown Uruguayan and Argentine actors who truly sell the terrifying situation the passengers found themselves in.

Viewers have the option of watching the film in its original language with subtitles or with an English dub. As far as dubs go, this one is pretty convincing but for those who are happy to read subtitles watching it in Spanish is still the best way to experience it.

Those familiar with the Andes plane crash might know Society of the Snow isn’t the first film to tell this story, either.

In 1993 “Alive” hit cinemas, adapted from the book of the same name, which dived into the gripping survival tale.

That film can be rented on Apple TV Plus and Amazon Prime Video but Netflix’s new version is a deeper, more character-driven exploration of the events, one able to make viewers question just how far they would go to survive.

Two years ago the true-crime series Dr Death hit screens, piquing morbid curiosity around the world with the haunting true story of Christopher Duntsch, a neurosurgeon who was convicted of murdering his patients.

The series was such a hit that viewers now have a second season on their hands, this one diving into an entirely different, but no less terrifying real-life tale.

Enter Paolo Macchiarini, an Italian surgeon and regenerative medicine researcher who became famous after being the first to successfully transplant a synthetic organ – replacing a patient’s windpipe with a plastic tube.

While the achievement made Macchiarini famous, it was later revealed he was illegally experimenting on dozens of healthy patients without any medical basis, many of whom would later die as a result of his gruesome procedures.

The eight-episode season, now streaming on Stan, tells the story of how this deranged doctor was also able to manipulate the medical world into believing he was a pioneer of research and how his ex-fiancee, investigative news producer Benita Alexander, would eventually help bring him down.

Venezuelan actor Edgar Ramírez and singer-songwriter Mandy Moore take on these two central roles, together putting on suitably chilling performances that make for a strange and intriguing relationship to watch unfold.

While not quite hitting the heights of the first season, the new instalment of this creepy anthology series still offers a disturbing story to get caught up in.

For true-crime buffs who can stomach it, it’s just what the doctor ordered.