Considering you spend around half of your life sleeping, it’s important to make sure your bed is of decent quality and comfortable, right? Well, one man from Los Angeles, California, wanted to be so comfy that he spent around $1 million total on a bed. This luxury bed enjoyer was no average Joe, but Carl Erik Rinsch, the director of the infamous 47 Ronin with Keanu Reeves. Considering how 47 Ronin was a massive flop, you might wonder where Rinsch had the money to live in luxury. That’s because he had some disposable cash of $11M, which he scammed from Netflix.
When you hear “Netflix” and “scam,” something as bad as The Witcher Season 4 might come to mind, but Rinsch’s case was much worse than that. According to reports, he asked Netflix for $11M to finalize production of a sci-fi show called White Horse, which never came out. It never came out because those funds were used by the director to buy five Rolls-Royces, one Ferrari, luxury watches, and clothes brands. Rinsch also spent $638,000 on two fancy mattresses and $295,000 on bedding. Talk about treasuring your sleep time.
That said, unfortunately for him, Rinsch did not get away with cheating Netflix out of several million dollars. He was recently convicted and charged with fraud, among other things, and will be sentenced next year in April. At least he got to temporarily live out a life that a successful and wealthy director would have lived, had he made an actually good movie out of 47 Ronin. Yet, he didn’t, and the 2013 film’s reviews are clear evidence of that.
“Netflix will probably make a documentary about it,” jokes a Redditor, pointing out how Netflix could potentially make back some of the millions lost if they market off of Rinsch’s crime story. “600k for mattresses really gets me,” remarks another. “This guy went on a shopping spree and never finished the show. I wonder what he was thinking!!??” Clearly, Rinsch was thinking he could live out a cushy life he didn’t deserve. But come next April, he might come to realize that scamming Netflix might have been a poor decision.
