Product: Jonestown - The Life & Death of Peoples Temple (2006)
Rating: 3.0
Rather tepid, considering its subject matter....
It's hard to believe that you can make a tepid documentary out of the Jonestown massacre, but that's exactly what we have here. The film is interesting solely because of its subject matter, not because of its presentation. The documentary ends up being very superficial, covering things in a very quick, piecemeal way, and there is precious little new information that I haven't read and/or seen before. The only thing that I didn't know was that Jones's church was one of the most integrated churches during its time (with a mostly black congregation), and this caused much consternation during Jones's time in Indiana. The interviews are interesting and sad (many of the subjects lost relatives in the massacre), but there's nothing particularly new here, and for such a fascinating, tragic subject, you'd figure the filmmaker could come up with more material. There's a better film to be made out there about Jim Jones, Jonestown, and the People's Temple.