Wormwood trailer: Netflix documentary will explore CIA's attempts to use LSD for mind control

Errol Morris' docu-series will explore the circumstances behind the death of CIA employee Frank Olson

Netflix is set to release one the most mysterious, deeply intriguing documentaries of the year.

Acclaimed documentarian Errol Morris, behind The Thin Blue Line and The Fog of War, has created Wormwood, where documentary meets scripted miniseries in an attempt to explore the murky history of Project MKUltra and the death of Frank Olson.

Olson, a bacteriologist and CIA employee, was covertly dosed with LSD by his supervisor. Nine days later, he plunged to his death from the window of a New York City hotel room. The US government ruled the death a suicide. Others think differently.

One of those individuals is Olson's own son Eric, who has spent the last 60-plus years trying to uncover the truth about his father's death, convinced it was a cover-up connected to the CIA's MKUltra experimentations. More than two decades after his death, his family was awarded a $750,000 settlement from the CIA. Eric still has questions.

The MKUltra project attempted to uncover how mind control could be achieved through certain drugs, namely LSD, which could then be used in interrogations and torture by the agency. Some subjects were willing, others were illegally tested upon.

Wormwood includes both interviews, including with Eric Olson, alongside dramatic reenactments starring Peter Sarsgaard (as Frank Olson), Molly Parker, and Bob Balaban.

The series will arrive on Netflix on 15 December.

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