Jonestown: The Life and Death of Peoples Temple (2006)

We’ve all heard of Jonestown, the 1978 mass suicide by way of cyanide laced Kool-Aid that killed over 900 members of the cultic Peoples Temple Agricultural Project in Guyana. However few of use are likely to know much about that event, or the man behind it, beyond those few details. That is where this PBS produced documentary proves its worth. It’s a darkly fascinating story that centers of course on Jim Jones, the People’s Temple founder who as a small town kid in 1930's Indiana liked to kill small animals so he could hold elaborate funeral services for them in his fathers barn. Jones was attracted to minorities (adopting three non-white children) and charismatic religious services, this lead to his development of a kind of progressive Pentecostalism, a movement, centered on him, that eventually made it headquarters in California and attracted thousands of followers.

Jones started the compound in Guyana to get away from an increasingly quizzical press, and the families of members who were raising alarm about his cult of personality, and the dictatorial control he held over members (who would often deed him their property, and with whom he could apparently have sex at will, both male and female). Eventually a Congressman (Leo Ryan) came down to Jonestown to investigate the compound, some members expressed a desire to return to the United States with him, and all hell broke lose, Ryan and nearly a thousand others lost their lives. There’s of course much more to this story, much human cost vividly evoked by the stories of surviving members, many of whom still hold a certain fondness for the sense of community they felt as members of Peoples Temple. I learned a lot from this fascinating little expose of a hunting tragedy. 3 1/2 out of 5