Why Netflix’s French docuseries Cocaine Air is a must-watch if you love true crime

If you love the high-stakes drama of true-crime docuseries or the underworld allure of stories like Narcos, you’ll definitely want to check out Cocaine Air: Smugglers at 30,000 Ft., a new Netflix docuseries from France. It follows a real-life drug bust that’s so wild, it’s a little hard to believe it actually happened: Basically, Dominican authorities in 2013 stopped a private jet about to leave for France and found 26 suitcases holding over 1,500 pounds of cocaine.

The weird part is that the passengers included two respected French pilots with military backgrounds.

So begins the real-life saga depicted in the Netflix series by journalist-filmmakers Olivier Bouchara and Jérôme Pierrat. Cocaine Air stands out from other true-crime series by, instead of offering a clean answer, it asks viewers to decide for themselves: Did pilots Pascal Fauret and Bruno Odos know what was in the 26 suitcases? Or were the lawyers for both men correct — were they simply flying the plane, and unaware of what they were transporting (sort of like taxi drivers, who don’t really know who or what is getting into their cab)?

Adding to the uncertainty: Both men had clean records as well as military credentials, having once transported nuclear weapons. After their 2013 arrest in the Dominican Republic, they used a boat to escape two years later. They were convicted in 2019 but then acquitted in 2021. “When you’re innocent, you almost turn yourself in,” Odos says at one point in the series, per Time magazine, by way of attempting to convey his innocence.

For what it’s worth, both men were viewed in France as veterans and family men. Not drug mules. Protestors even came to their defense. 

Nevertheless, investigator Christine Saunier-Ruellan saw red flags in things like texts that read “nature of cargo confirmed,” plus Google searches about drug laws and a suspicious flight history. Still, there was no smoking gun.

Image source: Netflix

“What she had were indications,” Cocaine Air co-director Olivier Bouchara told Time. Adding to just how bizarre this whole story is, even former French president Nicolas Sarkozy makes an appearance at one point. That’s because his phone was tapped during the probe as a result of past flights on the same plane.

For their part, the filmmakers claim to remain unsure about whether the pilots were involved or merely duped. As Bouchara puts it, “Sometimes, we’d think, ‘Maybe they knew.’ Other times, we doubted everything.” Which is to say: Cocaine Air doesn’t wrap things up tidily. Its thriller-worthy plot leaves you guessing the whole time, the rare docuseries that doesn’t tell you what to think. No wonder that, as of this writing, it’s #2 on the Netflix weekly Top 10 list of the most-watched non-English series.

More French true-crime to stream on Netflix

After you finish Cocaine Air, if it leaves you wanting more French true-crime tales, Netflix actually has a solid lineup to explore. The Outreau Case: A French Nightmare revisits one of the most disturbing judicial scandals in France’s recent history. Lords of Scam dives into a wild tax fraud scheme with characters straight out of a noir thriller, while The Masked Scammer tells the story of a con artist who fooled French high society with flair.