‘The Remarkable Life of Ibelin’ tells the story of Mats Steen and the online friendships he made all around the world

On Monday morning, Netflix released the trailer for the documentary “The Remarkable Life of Ibelin”, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year.
The documentary was created by Norwegian filmmaker Benjamin Ree, who also directed the film “The Painter and the Thief.”
“The Remarkable Life of Ibelin” tells the story of Norwegian quadriplegic gamer Mats Steen. He passed away from a degenerative disorder at 25 years old, according to Netflix.
During the Sundance Film Festival in January, Ree spoke about Steen and the documentary.
“So when Mats passed away, his parents thought that he had lived a very isolated life without any friends,” Ree told the Deseret News. “After his passing, the parents received emails from all over the world talking about how he was their best friend.”
As his avatar named Ibelin, Steen had built a community of friends through the online multiplayer game “World of Warcraft.” The documentary shows the online life that Steen had built as Ibelin and the lives he impacted.
“The grieving process of Steen’s parents is paired with a dynamic integration of Steen’s personal blog, text messages between friends in the gaming community, and archives of his ‘World of Warcraft’ campaigns to share a life that had been hidden away in the virtual world,” per Indie Wire.
Ree knew Steen personally, which is what inspired him to create this documentary.
“I met him as a child, but I spent the last four years exploring who he was and to retell his story, who really was and what he meant for his friends,” Ree said.
One thing Ree hopes this film shows is what Steen was able to do for his friends online and how he did that.
“He did two things. He asked his friends, ‘how are you doing?’ And he prioritized to listen afterwards,” Ree said.
At the 2024 Sundance film festival in January, “The Remarkable Life of Ibelin” received the audience award for the World Cinema Documentary category, per Indie Wire.
“The Remarkable Life of Ibelin” will be available to stream on Netflix starting Oct. 25.