Few figures in the history of consumer software have lived as strange a second act as John McAfee, and this documentary sets out to get close to the man behind the antivirus name.
What is Gringo: The Dangerous Life of John McAfee about?
The film follows a computer programmer who built one of the first widely used commercial antivirus companies and then walked away from that identity almost entirely, remaking himself first as a yogi and later as a fixture of tabloid headlines and fringe American politics. Director Nanette Burstein sits down with McAfee directly, letting him narrate his own version of events rather than filling the runtime with outside commentary. The documentary treats him less as a punchline and more as a puzzle, circling the gap between the public reputation and the account McAfee gives of himself, and asking what exactly he has kept hidden and why a software career gave way to such a different kind of life.
About the cast
Nanette Burstein directs the documentary and also appears on camera as its interviewer, building the film's account largely around conversations with John McAfee himself, with Allison Adonizio among the other voices included.
Context & significance
As a feature documentary, the film belongs to a genre built almost entirely from interview footage and archival material rather than dramatic reconstruction, a format that lives or dies on how forthcoming its subject is willing to be. McAfee's arc — from software entrepreneur to presidential-primary candidate for a minor American party — hands the film a subject whose public myth and private account rarely agree, and that gap is what the documentary spends its runtime working through.
Watching Gringo: The Dangerous Life of John McAfee on Ktime
Gringo: The Dangerous Life of John McAfee streams on K-Time, where the page itself is free to read and watching the documentary only requires logging into a free account. K-Time's Farsi interface makes it easy for Persian-speaking viewers to browse and settle on English-language documentaries like this one.