Terrazza Sentimento
Netflix, 2025 — the Alberto Genovese case: drugging and sexual assault in Milan
Quick facts
What is the series about?
Terrazza Sentimento is a Netflix Italian docuseries that reconstructs the real criminal case of Alberto Maria Genovese, a prominent Milan tech entrepreneur who was convicted of drugging and sexually assaulting young women at his luxury penthouse apartment. Known internationally as Start Up, Fall Down: From Billionaire to Convict, the three-episode series premiered on 5 November 2025 and is directed by Nicola Prosatore. Each episode runs approximately 45 minutes, making the series a tight, focused account of one of the most disturbing Italian crime stories of the decade.
Netflix describes the series' starting point as the moment "one of Milan's most exclusive parties takes a dark turn" — a framing that captures the central tension of the Genovese case: the collision between a glittering world of start-up wealth and the criminal violence hidden beneath it.
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The Case
The Perpetrator
Alberto Maria Genovese was, until his arrest in 2020, a celebrated figure in the Italian technology and entrepreneurship scene. He was the founder of Facile.it, a leading Italian price-comparison platform, and Prima.it / Prima Assicurazioni, an insurtech company. His commercial success made him a fixture of Milan's elite social circuit and gave him access to — and the means to fund — the extravagant parties that would eventually destroy his public life and freedom.
Genovese's Milan penthouse, overlooking the city's iconic Duomo, became known by the name Terrazza Sentimento — literally "Sentiment Terrace" — a name that lent a poetic, almost romantic veneer to what prosecutors would later describe as a site of systematic abuse.
The Crime
The case broke publicly in October/November 2020 when an 18-year-old woman was found in a confused and disoriented state near Milan's Duomo. She had fled Genovese's penthouse after enduring what she described as hours of sexual assault. According to investigators, she had been drugged before the abuse took place.
The woman's report opened an investigation that quickly expanded. Authorities uncovered evidence suggesting a broader pattern: multiple young women had attended parties at the Terrazza Sentimento, where cocaine and other substances were allegedly used to incapacitate guests. The investigation implicated not only Genovese but shed light on the wider culture of impunity that can surround ultra-wealthy social circles.
Genovese was arrested in 2020 and charged with sexual assault, aggravated bodily harm, and drug-related offenses.
Trial and Verdict
Following criminal proceedings, Genovese was convicted in 2022 and sentenced to 6 years and 11 months in prison — a term widely characterised in media coverage as "nearly seven years." As of the series' release, he is reported to be serving his sentence at Bollate prison in Milan, where he is participating in a rehabilitation program.
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Production
The series was directed by Nicola Prosatore, an Italian documentary filmmaker. The three-episode format — compact by docuseries standards — suggests a deliberate editorial choice to stay close to the established facts of the case rather than expand into speculative territory. The title of the series is taken directly from the nickname of Genovese's penthouse, grounding the narrative in its physical and symbolic location.
The international title, Start Up, Fall Down: From Billionaire to Convict, signals the dual focus of the series: the meteoric rise of a tech entrepreneur and the criminal collapse that followed. NSS Magazine's coverage frames the documentary as a reconstruction of one of the most disturbing Italian news cases involving a celebrated businessman's downfall, noting the particular shock value of the contrast between Genovese's public image and the crimes he was convicted of.
The series draws on the criminal record, investigative reporting, and the public court proceedings that followed the 2020 arrest. The verified sources do not detail the precise access the production had to participants, survivors, or law enforcement, but the series is presented as a factual reconstruction of events rather than a dramatisation.
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Reception
The series premiered on Netflix on 5 November 2025 to an audience already broadly familiar with the Genovese case from years of Italian news coverage. The subject matter is inherently controversial: the series deals directly with sexual violence, drug-facilitated assault, and the exploitation of vulnerable young women by a figure of considerable economic and social power.
The IMDb listing for the series carries the title ID tt38856367, though a verified audience rating score was not available at the time of publication. Formal critical reviews and aggregate audience scores had not been widely published in the immediate days following the premiere.
The documentary's framing — placing the penthouse's glamorous nickname front and centre — has drawn attention in Italian cultural commentary, with observers noting the tension between the lifestyle imagery associated with Milan's tech elite and the gravity of the criminal acts at the heart of the case.
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The Case Today
As of November 2025, Alberto Maria Genovese is serving his prison sentence at Bollate, a facility in Milan known for its focus on rehabilitation and prisoner reintegration programs. His participation in a rehabilitation path has been noted in coverage surrounding the series' release.
The Genovese case has had a lasting impact on Italian public discourse about the culture of excess in entrepreneurial and celebrity circles, the vulnerability of young women at elite social events, and the systemic failures that can allow serial abuse to go unreported. The premiering of Terrazza Sentimento on one of the world's largest streaming platforms ensures that the case — and the questions it raises — will reach a global audience more than five years after the initial arrest.
For Italian society, the case remains a reference point in conversations about power, consent, and accountability. The Netflix docuseries arrives as a formal, structured account of events that many Italians followed in real time through fragmentary news reporting, offering for the first time a consolidated reconstruction of the full arc from penthouse parties to prison sentence.
