An explosive new documentary on the 1MDB-fund scandal debuted in New York on Friday featuring previously unseen footage of Jho Low, the mysterious international playboy-turned-alleged fugitive fraudster at the center of the Malaysian money mystery.
“The Kleptocrats” premiered just days after Low was indicted by the Justice Department for his alleged role in laundering billions from the Malaysian fund.
In hiding, Low has maintained his innocence. But the new film — executive-produced and written by Louise Story, who broke the 1MDB scandal for The New York Times and has since joined The Wall Street Journal as a senior editor — tracks Low’s rise from mild-mannered Malaysian student at top British boarding school Harrow to the purported billionaire known for partying with the likes of Leo DiCaprio and Paris Hilton.
The allegedly dirty money funded purchases of luxury real estate and art, and allegedly backed Red Granite Pictures, which ironically made the financial-fraud film, “The Wolf of Wall Street.”
![Gigi Hadid and Mr. Jho Low in 2014.](https://vip.nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2018/11/gigi-hadid.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&w=300)
“Kleptocrats” includes footage of Red Granite’s over-the-top Cannes launch, where Pharrell Williams, Jamie Foxx and Kanye West performed, as well as a secret recording of a Red Granite exec allegedly telling a Hollywood player who taped their talk, “You don’t realize the people I have behind me.”
A rare clip of Low shows him at the mic at a St. Tropez club ordering 100 bottles of Cristal. “We got a lot of s–t coming from Saudi and Malaysia!” he yells.
The film, directed by Sam Hobkinson, deftly details how 1MDB invested a cool $1 billion in PetroSaudi.
The late Robin Leach said a Low birthday bash was “the most expensive party that Las Vegas has ever seen.”
Story told us, “When I began to look into him in 2013, there was not much you could find on him.”
Since Low was never tagged in any party pics, the film team searched endless images to ID him themselves.
The film’s playing DOC NYC, and is repped by Dogwoof.