The Sacrament

Episode Transcript
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Ashley (00:08):
Welcome to Criminal Adaptations, the show where we
take a look at some of yourfavorite movies and the true
crime stories that inspired them.
I'm Ashley.
I'm a clinical psychologist andforensic evaluator in the state
of Oregon.

Remi (00:21):
And I'm Remy.
I spent over a decade workingin the film and television
industry in Los Angeles,California.

Ashley (00:28):
And welcome back everyone.
Welcome to a CriminalAdaptations Monday.
Remy, how are you doing today?

Remi (00:36):
I am doing A-OK.
How are you doing today, Ashley?

Ashley (00:41):
I'm doing good.
I'm excited to do our annualswitcheroo episode, so that
means I watched the film forthis and Remy had to do all the
research about the real case.
And this was a doozy for you,wasn't it.

Remi (00:56):
You literally took the words right out of my mouth.
I was about to just use theword doozy as well.
It was a doozy.
We are discussing Jim Jones andthe Jonestown Massacre and the
People's Temple.
It is a lot of stuff, a lot ofinformation, way more than I
think I initially realized whenI agreed to do the switcheroo

(01:17):
for this episode.
But I feel well-versed andwell-knowledged on the subject
now and I am ready to fill ineveryone on the staggering
amount of information that Ihave been able to gather about
this man, jim Jones.
But had you heard of theJonestown Massacre or Jim Jones
or any of this stuff before wedecided to do this podcast?

Ashley (01:40):
I think everyone has heard of Jim Jones.
It would be pretty hard to nothave heard that name at some
point in your life.
I know the general story aboutwhat happened in Ghana and to
the People's Temple, but I don'tknow anything about him, how he
came to be a cult leader orwhat he was even really like.

Remi (02:01):
And that is exactly why I had wanted to do the switcheroo
for this episode.
Actually, I didn't know muchabout Jim Jones either, but it
is a historical eventperpetrated by someone who
managed to control hundreds ofpeople through his words, and
that sort of person is veryfascinating to me.

(02:21):
I'm always curious how someonelike that got into power and was
able to garner this muchcontrol over this many people
with ideas that sound pretty outthere if you are just reading
through them, like I was forthis podcast, but I do feel like
I know a lot more of how he gotto where he did, and it is a

(02:42):
interesting story.
I think it's so fascinatingfinding out the history behind
some of these monstrousindividuals.

Ashley (02:50):
And for everyone out there who is looking at the
title of this episode andthinking the sacrament, what the
fuck is that?
It is a movie that is looselyinspired by the Jonestown
Massacre.
We were kind of holding outhope that down the line there
would be a movie about Jim Jones.
There was one that's been indevelopment with Amazon for a

(03:10):
really, really long time whereLeonardo DiCaprio was set to
play Jim Jones, which would havebeen amazing.
But the last time we checkedit's kind of in development hell
, and I think Amazon hasinformally said it's scrapped,
which is a shame.

Remi (03:26):
Yeah, add that to the list of horrific people of history
that Leonardo DiCaprio did notend up playing, because he also
didn't end up doing the Devil inthe White City, where he was, I
believe, going to play HHHolmes, the man who literally
built a hotel to murder peoplein.
So I think he is primarilysticking with playing a good guy

(03:48):
for the most part.

Ashley (03:49):
He was listed in that role for a while and then I
think he backed out and opted tobe an executive producer.
And for a little bit KeanuReeves was rumored to have been
attached and then he withdrew,so I think that's another one
that's kind of languishingaround.
I know Martin Scorsese wasattached as director.

Remi (04:08):
Well, who ended up actually playing him in the
movie we're discussing today,Because I know the actor's face
If anyone has seen no Countryfor Old Men.
There is a scene where thevillainous Anton Sugar makes a
store clerk at a gas stationpick heads or tails when he's
flipping his coin and the storeclerk is very nervous and

(04:29):
there's a lot of tension and youdon't really know what's going
to happen and it's a reallymemorable scene.
And that store clerk is the manwho's playing the character
based on Jim Jones in this film,I believe.
I don't know the actor's name,though.

Ashley (04:40):
His name is actually Gene Jones.

Remi (04:42):
What a coincidence.
We had a similar thing not toolong ago in the Chapter 27 film
that we covered, but I had neverheard of this film before you
suggested it.
I have never seen this film.
I've still never seen this film, but I do know the director
whose name is.

Ashley (04:59):
Ty West.

Remi (05:01):
Who has gotten a little bit of a name for himself,
making the X trilogy with X,maxine and Pearl Really loved X.
Pearl was pretty good.
Maxine was probably my leastfavorite of the three, but I had
no idea he directed this film.
I thought X was his featurefilm debut, so how was his
directing in this movie?

Ashley (05:23):
I had actually seen this movie, the Sacrament before, I
think.
I just stumbled upon itrandomly and put it on, having
no idea what it was about orwhat I was expecting from it,
and I actually really, reallylike it.
It's definitely a very smalltime budget, low publicity type
movie, but it's really good andI would highly recommend people

(05:47):
to watch it.

Remi (05:48):
It's a found footage film right.

Ashley (05:50):
Yes, well, with that, let's just get into the
Sacrament, shall we?

Remi (05:54):
You said it again, let's do it, ashley.

Monster Trailer (05:57):
Welcome to Eden Parish you guys built all this.
Father had a vision and webuilt heaven here on.

Ashley (06:04):
Earth.
All this Father had a visionand we built heaven here on
earth.
The Sacrament is a 2013 fauxdocumentary style horror film
written, directed and edited byTy West, who we introduced
earlier.

Remi (06:15):
Wow, he wrote, directed and edited it, so this is a 100%
Ty West film.
This is his baby.

Ashley (06:22):
The plot of the Sacrament is inspired by the
1978 Jonestown Massacre, ahistorical event that always
interested West, and it'sparticularly focusing on the
last 24 to 48 hours of thePeople's Temple.
Aj Bowen and Joe Swanberg staras journalists for Vice who
document their co-worker'sattempt to locate his addict

(06:45):
sister after she joins areligious commune located
somewhere in the South Americanjungle 2013 was kind of the
height of Vice's power andpopularity.
Prior to the sacrament.
Ty West's directorial creditsinvolved the House of the Devil,
cabin Fever 2, spring Fever,the Innkeepers and a skit in

(07:05):
2012's VHS.
I know we've seen VHS.
I don't know what one hedirected, but have you seen any
of his other movies?

Remi (07:12):
I believe I've seen Cabin Fever 2, but I might be getting
it confused with Cabin Fever 3.
I saw whichever sequel takesplace at a senior prom.

Ashley (07:22):
I have not seen Cabin Fever 2 or any of these movies
other than VHS, but I'm fairlycertain that Eli Roth, who is
tied to this film, the Sacramentas well, worked with West on
the Innkeepers and maybe Houseof the Devil, but the House of
the Devil is one he cited asthat kind of got his eye on Ty

(07:43):
West.

Remi (07:44):
Eli Roth is a big horror movie guy.
He is the quote-unquotemastermind behind the Hostel
films, at least Hostel 1 and 2,and the original Cabin Fever.
He's kind of fallen off in thepast decade or so but back in LA
I worked for a cafe in BeverlyHills for a little while to

(08:05):
supplement my income, as manypeople in LA are forced to do,
and he was a regular customer.
He always tipped great.
He complimented my latte art.
He posted a couple photos tohis Instagram.
Really cool dude.
I really like him.
His films are definitely notfor everyone and some of the
newer ones are definitely not mytaste, but he is a powerful
name in the horror community.

Ashley (08:27):
Although West wasn't quite ready to break away from
the horror franchise, he wantedto create something more
realistic, grounded in realityand socially relevant compared
to his past works.
After the movie was finished,he later described the Sacrament
as his most horrific horrorfilm to date.
West sat down to write thescript in mid-2012.

(08:49):
He wrote the characters withall the main actors who
portrayed them in mind, exceptfor the Jim Jones character, and
that's because he was actuallyfriends with all of them and
they've worked together before.
It sounds like they're all kindof actors, directors, camera
people and they just reallyliked working together.
So he wrote each of the fourmain characters with his

(09:11):
specific friends in mind.

Remi (09:13):
That is very common.
Most directors have their go-toactors that show up in a lot of
their films.
Leo and Martin Scorsese isprobably the biggest example.

Ashley (09:26):
Leo and Martin Scorsese is probably the biggest example,
and West actually said when hewas developing the characters he
actually based it on hisfriends' strengths and their
tone and how they carriedthemselves.
Is that pretty common too?
When writing roles specificallyfor people, it can be.

Remi (09:38):
Yes, I feel like you can write these characters with a
specific actor in mind, and indoing so, you will be playing to
their strengths.
You're envisioning them in thispart, and I assume it's because
you've worked with them and youthink that they are capable of
pulling this off.

Ashley (09:53):
Wes called AJ Bowen, who plays the main Vice reporter,
to tell him about the idea forthe movie on June 20th 2012.
He told Bowen to watch all theVice travel videos he could find
and, as you pointed out, remyVice was really just getting
started at this time, so it'snot like it is now when there's
thousands upon thousands, uponthousands of Vice videos.

Remi (10:14):
Yeah, the Vice videos.
Now is basically people going.
I took LSD and went to a dogshow.
Here's the story.
So it's not really the caliberthat it was when it first came
out.

Ashley (10:26):
Well, after he watched all those videos, Wes wanted him
to actually create his own inthe same style.
The sacrament was actuallygreenlit three or four days
after this call and a full monthbefore the script was even
finished.
Wes finished the script by theend of July and used Bowen's
fake travel video to attractfinancial investors.
Eli Roth signed on to producethe film in September and gave

(10:49):
West full creative control,calling the Sacrament the
director's first mainstreammovie Set.
Production got underway inSavannah, Georgia, in late
August.
All the buildings depicted inthe movie were built as fully
functional cabins in a privatelyowned field.
The cast was rounded out whenGene Jones signed on to play

(11:09):
father slash Charles AndersonReed just as filming began in
October.
Although Jones is best knownfor his role in no Country for
Old Men, his work in a verydifferent project is what caught
Wes's attention.

Ti West (11:22):
There was an episode of Louis and he played a
pharmacist and he was askingthis old woman about her bowel
movements and I was like that'sthe guy.
And, um, and it's true, I meanthat sounds like a fake story
but it's real.
And then I, we tracked him down.
I just thought he had amazingscreen presence, remembered him
from no Country for Old Men.
He did an audition, which helikes to say is terrible.
Of course it's not.
It's because you've seen themovie and he's like the glue
that holds the movie togetherand yeah, you just, I mean it's

(11:45):
like, thank God I was watchingLouis that night.

Remi (11:49):
That is hilarious.
I think I have actually seenthat episode of Louis back in
the day, when it was on FX, Ithink.

Ashley (11:57):
Wes provided additional details about his idea for Gene
Jones's character.
He wanted the cult leader toseem like a genuine well-meaning
person who was driven to evilby his paranoia.
In turn, jones didn't see theneed to do research into Jim
Jones and instead played thecharacter like a grandfather,
someone so nice that you wouldfollow him anywhere.
The title of the antagonistalso has multiple meanings.

(12:21):
Not only does father havereligious connotations, but it's
what Jim Jones insisted hisfollowers call him before and
during their time in Guyana.

Remi (12:31):
Including his wife, had to call him father as well.

Ashley (12:41):
Gene Jones' big moment in the movie turned out to be
the first scene.
He shot an 18-minute monologueinterview scene that ended up
being cut to about 12 minutesfor the movie.
Although they did multipletakes for the scene, the one
that they ended up using in themovie was the first time he
delivered the lines.

Gene Jones (12:54):
The first scene is the interview and it was 18
pages of script and about 18minutes long.
The film version cut it down to12 minutes but it started out
18 minutes and I did the.
I memorized the whole thing andwe did it in one take.
What you see in the sacramentis pretty much the first take.

(13:18):
That really set it afire for meand for Ty, the director and
everybody else, was thecongregation and we started
about 10 o'clock at night andthe congregation had been on the
set all day, very long day forthem.

(13:39):
But as I threw them in theystarted wanting to respond to me
and say something back to me.

Remi (13:49):
And when that started coming, boy did I catch fire
where a director makes someonedo quite a few takes and then at
the end of the day goes withthe first one, because sometimes
the first one, before they'reoverthinking it and when they're

(14:09):
really just in the zone, thatcan be the most natural
performance.

Ashley (14:13):
I just can't imagine memorizing 18 pages of text.
It is an interview scene, so AJBowen's character is asking him
questions, but they're reallyshort.
Most of this 12 minutes in themovie is just Gene Jones talking
.

Remi (14:27):
Well, I actually know a little trick that actors do when
they are memorizing lines,because they have those little
breaks where the interviewer isasking questions.
They will basically go chunk bychunk, so memorize the first
chunk, then interview question,memorize the second chunk, so
you're going chunk by chunk bychunk through all the 18 pages.
It is still a staggering amountto memorize, but those little

(14:52):
breaks in there probably helpedhim with the memorization.

Ashley (14:56):
Although West originally intended for much of the
dialogue to be improvised,everyone liked what he wrote so
much that they ended up stickingpretty much exclusively to the
script.
The only exception to this wasthe crowd's reaction to Gene
Jones's monologue scene.
There were about 200 extras onsite, two of which were retired
Harlem Globetrotters, which Ithought was pretty fun, but none

(15:18):
of the extras had read thescript beforehand.
As Gene got in his groove, thecrowd started responding back to
what he was saying, sayingthings like yes, father, you
know things like that, and thatcaused Gene to interact back.
So that's really the onlyscenes in the movie that is
improvised.
It's the crowd responding tohim.

Remi (15:38):
Well, I'm glad they did that, because that was
definitely the type ofatmosphere that Jim Jones had at
the real Jonestown.

Ashley (15:45):
And that's kind of how they described it Like the crowd
was just so transfixed with himthat they just responded.
It just came out and it justseemed natural and really went
with the vibe that Ty West waslooking for.
And, lastly, the film was shotin chronological order, which we
know is pretty rare, andwrapped in two months in
chronological order, which weknow is pretty rare and wrapped
in two months.

Remi (16:05):
Two months is longer than I would have expected for this
film.
Actually, for a found footage,low-budget film like this, I
would have expected it to beshorter.

Ashley (16:25):
Well, let's get into the sacrament.
We open with some text thatdescribes Vice as a multimedia
company focused on internationalnews, arts and culture, known
for covering provocative andcontroversial stories usually
overlooked by the mainstreammedia.
Sam Turner, played by AJ Bowen,is a vice reporter and

(16:47):
introduces freelancephotographer Patrick, played by
Kentucker Adley, who has a storySam knows he needs to document.
Through text we learn Patrick'ssister left New York to join a
sober living community in ruralMississippi, but he has since
become worried about her afterreceiving a mysterious letter in
the mail.
Patrick opens the letter andreads his sister's account about

(17:10):
how she is helping build acommunity where people can live
free, like God intended.
She calls it the most beautifulplace she has ever seen, lists
a phone number and invites himto visit the movie.
Cuts to text again as it'sexplained that the number in the
letter belongs to some randomdude who said Patrick's sister
moved out of the country withthe rest of the religious

(17:30):
community.
Although the man can't disclosethe commune's exact location,
he gives instructions of whereto fly and how to find the
helicopter that will takePatrick the rest of the way.
Seeing this as a potentialdocumentary opportunity, sam
convinces Patrick to let him andphotographer Jake Williams,
played by Joe Swanberg, to tagalong.

(17:51):
A travel montage is played overthe opening credits and
heartbeats by the knife, a songI absolutely love but feels a
bit out of place.

Remi (18:03):
Blaze.
I do really like that song aswell, but I can honestly say it
wasn't in my head when I wasreading through the true story

(18:26):
of Jonestown.

Ashley (18:28):
Well, side note the shooting of the scene that the
song is playing over.
It's just like a montage ofthem traveling to the different
airports in the airplane andgetting to the rural South
American jungle.

Remi (18:41):
It's a good montage song.

Ashley (18:43):
But for shooting that it primarily involved the actors
flying from Savannah to Atlanta,to JFK and back again.
The biggest concern was thattheir backpacks were just filled
with random junk to make themlook full, leading them to worry
about security, flagging themfor suspicious behavior.
A helicopter lands in anabandoned field at 1 15 pm.

(19:06):
The pilot says he'll be back at8 am tomorrow.
He agrees to wait one hourbefore leaving, with or without
his passengers.
While walking along a deserteddirt road, two locals approach
the trio, asking for Patrick,after radioing, to get
permission to bring the othertwo unexpected guests to the
compound.
They climb to the bed of aninsanely rusted truck for the

(19:29):
two kilometer, which is about1.2 mile drive to the only way
in and out of Eden Parish.
Their expectations of a hippiecommune are dashed when they are
greeted by two men holdingmachine guns who try to get them
to turn over their passports,give a monetary donation and
stop filming.
Just as tensions are peaking,jake's sister, caroline, played

(19:58):
by Amy Semites, warmlyapproaches and assures the
reporters that the guns are justa security precaution.
Caroline leads the reportersinto a large field surrounded by
huts.
Almost immediately, father'svoice bellows through the
loudspeaker, announcing thevisitors and encouraging the
residents to show themhospitality.

Here we are.
Welcome to Eden Parish.
What do you think?
It's great, right.

Gene Jones (20:19):
Children.
We have some special visitorsto the parish today.
Let's show them our hospitalityand represent ourselves in the
way the Lord has taught us.
You guys built all this.

Oh yeah, we're really hard workers.
I don't think that we sleptmore than three hours a night
for six months when we werebuilding it, but Father had a
vision and he was, of course,right, and we built heaven here
on earth.

Remi (20:47):
That is actually the first clip I've seen other than stuff
from the trailer and I gottasay the vibe and the mood of it
is kind of what I picturedJonestown to be like.
I think they did a good jobwith the found footage thing of
making it kind of feel likeyou're there, you're entering
into this community.
It was pretty cool to see.

Ashley (21:08):
actually, Caroline hypes up the commune while walking
the crew to a bare-bones cabinfilled with bunk beds for Sam
and Jake, she departs to themain house with Patrick, leaving
the other two to unpack.
Sam and Jake go out and try tointeract with the residents,
most of whom completely ignorethem.
They finally come across fivepeople who agree to brief

(21:30):
interviews.
The first is 75-year-oldLorraine Davis.
She met father while he wasrecruiting residents in her
small town through churchsermons.
She was immediately drawn tohim and invited to be a member
of Eden Parish, opting to leavethe country as she's a widow and
had nothing holding her back.
Next up is 23-year-old SarahWhite from Melbourne, australia.

(21:51):
She was an artist living inBrooklyn when she met father.
When asked if her family knowswhere she is, she says Eden
Parish is her family now andfather has given her more than
she could ever have dreamed of.
Next up is 41-year-old WendyJohnson, the head nurse of the
teeny, tiny two-bed medicalcenter.
Wendy informs Sam of the numberof children and elders at the

(22:14):
parish, how most of the medicalsupplies were brought by
residents when the commune wasestablished and mentions that
each person here sold everythingthey owned and donated all the
profits to the church beforemoving.

Remi (22:27):
That is accurate.

Ashley (22:29):
The last interviews are with brothers Andre and Robert
Evans, aged 19 and 23.
They came to Eden Parish withtheir mother and sister and
praise it for providing them asupportive environment free from
violence.
After playing a game ofbasketball with the brothers,
sam and Jake seem skepticalabout the sustainability of the
community, but they do praise itfor being self-sufficient and

(22:52):
rooted in spirituality andprogressive politics.
Back at their cabin at 520,they notice a little girl
staring at them through thescreen door.
Savannah's mother grabs her,says she's mute and declines to
talk to the outsiders.
Sam and Jake join Caroline andPatrick in the pavilion and
learn that father has agreed tosit for an interview at 745

(23:14):
Sharp 30 minutes before thegathering, an event he is
throwing to celebrate theirarrival.
Before leaving, caroline handsSam a document that summarizes
the values and mission of EdenParish.
In essence, it says thecommunity strives to live as God
intended and distance itselffrom the evils of society like
imperialism, violence, povertyand racism.

(23:38):
Sam spends the next few hoursdrafting questions for the
interview with Father, which heis surprised to learn will be
done in front of the entirecongregation.
When father makes his grandentrance right on time, everyone
erupts into applause while hehugs, waves and embraces those
within his path to the stage.
What follows is the 12-minuteinterview slash monologue scene

(24:01):
I mentioned earlier.
Sam starts with some softballquestions about how father got
his name and his idea behindEden Parish, to which father
basically just regurgitates whatwas written in the document
provided by Caroline.
Things do start to get a littletense when Sam asks whether
isolation is necessary toachieve togetherness, followed
by questions about the machineguns and the residents turning

(24:24):
over their life savings.
I'm not going to get intoeverything Father said, but
here's a clip that should giveyou the gist of it.

Gene Jones (24:30):
America's coming apart, as it seems, because of
the way it's being run and thevalues it instills.
Your government is failing,friend.
Now, before you call me acommunist or socialist or
whatever word you use forsomebody who tries to help his
fellow man, let me remind you ofone thing All the great leaders

(24:53):
who have tried to achieve whatwe have here were struck down
and killed.
That's right.
Malcolm X, martin Luther Kingoh my God, jfk, rfk.
Well, I'm willing to die forwhat I believe in.
But why die fighting when youcan remove yourself from the

(25:14):
fight altogether and createsomething new?

Remi (25:19):
I have to say he definitely is more grandfatherly
than I ever pictured the realJim Jones or he seemed in any
interviews I've seen.
But what he is saying heredefinitely 100% seems like
something that Jim Jones wouldbe saying.
They did a very good job ofwriting this character.

Ashley (25:39):
Well, originally Ty West imagined this as a miniseries
and I couldn't find why that wasabandoned.
But Gene Jones did say if itwould have been a miniseries
then it would have been moretied directly to the Jonestown
Massacre and for that he wouldhave done a lot of research into
Jim Jones.

Remi (25:57):
After doing the research that I needed to do for this
episode, I think a miniseries isthe only way you could tell
this full story.
There is so many things thatwould be impossible to fit into
a two and a half three hourmovie.

Ashley (26:13):
With about five minutes left in the interview, father
commandeers control by askingSam about his personal life.
Using his love for his wife andunborn child to illustrate his
points.
Using his love for his wife andunborn child to illustrate his
points.
He abruptly elicits an end tothe interview by asking the
congregation if it's time toparty.
Caroline walks him off stage,leaving a befuddled-looking Sam

(26:34):
in his wake.
Although Sam and Jake aredisappointed with how the
interview went, they have ablast singing, dancing and
listening to music at thegathering, so much so that they
say they're fully convinced ofthe wonders of Eden Parish by
1130 at night.
Their enchantment is interruptedby Savannah, who gives Sam a
note reading please help usbefore running back to the

(26:56):
pavilion where the party hasshifted to more somber hymns.
After noticing the machine gunwielding security guards
patrolling the perimeter, theydecide it's time to find Patrick
.
The first place they checkturns out to be an office with a
slightly ajar safe filled withpassports.
They run into Caroline as theyare exiting and demand a speech

(27:18):
of Patrick.
He is having a father-approvedthreesome and lets slip that.
Her real plan for bringingPatrick here is to recruit him
as a member in an effort to gainfinancial support from their
parents.
Just as Sam and Patrick realizethat Caroline seems a little
intoxicated on something, fatheropens the door to a nearby

(27:39):
house and summons her,suggesting the relationship is
more than plutonic.
Coincidentally, one of JimJones' mistresses had the very
similar name of Carolyn.

Remi (27:51):
You're treading into my territory.
Watch out, Ashley.

Ashley (27:55):
A few moments after Sam and Jake get back to their cabin
, savannah makes anotherappearance, causing the men to
leave the cabin in search of her.
They follow her to a group ofscared women who beg to go with
them because this place is notas it seems.
Sam and Jake seem a bitconfused, but the fearful mother
lets them know that all theresidents they spoke to earlier

(28:16):
were specifically chosen byfather, with everyone else being
instructed to avoid thevisitors.
She also says that they areessentially being held captive
and that the congregation iskept in line by brainwashed
residents like Caroline, whoaren't above using violence to
maintain order.
Savannah's mom then revealshorrific scars across the nape

(28:38):
of her daughter's neck, which isthe reason she no longer speaks
.
As Savannah's mother is beggingSam to take her daughter with
him when he leaves tomorrow, thegroup is scared off by the
sounds of armed guardsapproaching.
They question what Sam and Jakeare doing with Savannah and
insist they will make sure shegets back to her mother.
Once back inside their cabin,father comes over the

(28:59):
loudspeaker and summons thecleanup crew and nurse Wendy to
the pavilion.
Meanwhile, sam and Jake packtheir things and plan to get the
hell out of Dodge as soon asthe helicopter returns in eight
hours.
However, they're unable to getany sleep as the cleanup crew
spends all night setting upsomething in the pavilion.
Come daybreak, sam and Jakenotice members of the

(29:21):
congregation are alreadystarting to gather outside.
As they approach, they notice aton of people have packed their
bags and are demanding to leave, while the Brainwaff's
residents, including Caroline,try their best to maintain order
.
As Sam and Caroline argue aboutthe ethics of forcing people to
stay who clearly want to go,savannah's mother returns and

(29:41):
again begs him to take herdaughter away from this place.
Sam instructs Jake to go to thehelicopter and radio back if
the pilot says they can fit oneextra person on the chopper.
As Jake hops into the back ofthe rusty truck, an angry
Caroline accuses them of wantingto destroy everything father
has built.
Just like he predicted beforethey arrived, jake arrives at

(30:02):
the airfield at 7.50.
His argument with the pilot isdisrupted by machine gun fire,
which hits the pilot in theshoulder, causing Jake to flee
for his life.
He sprints through the woodsand hides behind a log,
overhearing his assailantsdiscuss father's orders of
preventing anyone from leavingEden Parish alive.
Before making his way back tofind Sam and Patrick.

(30:24):
He checks on the pilot, who iscovered in blood but miracish
alive.
Before making his way back tofind Sam and Patrick, he checks
on the pilot, who is covered inblood but miraculously alive.
He agrees to wait a bit longerto give Jake time to find his
friends, cut back to absolutechaos at the pavilion.
People are screaming, cryingand shoving each other.
When a man with a machete grabsSam from behind, causing him to
drop his camera as he is beingpulled away.

(30:46):
Father slowly approaches andinstructs Caroline to keep
filming because what is about tohappen is important.
Over the loudspeaker heinstructs everyone to hurry to
the pavilion because he hassomething very important to say.

Remi (30:59):
One of the most chilling facts about this is that he
really did record what is aboutto happen next in real life.

Ashley (31:09):
Well and that was one of the cool things that I read in
an interview Ty West wanted tomake sure that there wasn't a
point in the movie where someonewould say why are these people
filming still?
So that's why he has both ofthe vice reporters drop their
cameras at one point.
So earlier in the scene whenJake is running, there's like
the camera hiding behind a logand you think he's there, but

(31:31):
the men with guns find thecamera and he's not there, but
they leave it and he goes backand retrieves it.
So it's things like that andeverything.
Basically, with this camerathat's left, it's all Caroline
filming.
It changes hands at differentpoints.

Remi (31:45):
Jim Jones recorded a lot of what he did.
Most of it was audio recordings, but I do firmly believe if
this had happened later in time,he would have been videotaping
everything.

Ashley (31:58):
Once everyone has taken their seats, father launches
into a speech accusing thevisitors of trying to destroy
everything they have worked for,stressing that if they don't
take drastic matters fast, thegovernment will come to burn
their houses down, steal theirchildren and kill everyone left.
To avoid this fate, heinstructs everyone to accept the
dixie cups full of potion thatwe see being mixed with some

(32:21):
sort of white powder.

Gene Jones (32:23):
We can't go back.
There's nowhere to go back to.
So our time is up, don't beafraid.
Don't be afraid.
It's just stepping over to theother side.
That's all it is.
Let's show the world that theonly peace left for us is in

(32:45):
death.
We're going to a better placenow.
Let's all go together.

Ashley (32:54):
And this scene is a pretty tough watch.
It shows the fear in everyone'seyes and there's several
different shots of childrendrinking this.
There's a shot of mothersfeeding it or injecting it into
their infants.
It's sad.
As all this is going on, fathercontinues to assure his

(33:16):
congregation that what they'reabout to do isn't suicide.
It's a way to prove their loveto God by offering their bodies
as a living sacrifice, the lastsacrament.
One by one, the congregationstarts to drink their medicine,
just as they've rehearsed.
Despite his promises of apainless death, it isn't long
before the crowd starts vomiting, foaming at the mouth, falling

(33:38):
to the ground and screaming inagony.
At 8.15 am, caroline walks intoan office where Patrick is
bound and gagged.
Since he refuses to drink thejuice.
She uses a syringe to injecthim in the neck and holds him as
he cries and begs her to lethim go until he dies.
Back at the pavilion, anyonewho is still alive and trying to

(33:59):
make a run for it are eitherforce-fed the juice or gunned
down, all while father continuesto stress that this is the only
humane way for his people to go.
Jake makes his way onto theeerily silent compound at 825,
quickly noticing the mass bodycount scattered around the
pavilion.
As he's walking past the cabins, he notices more people dead in

(34:21):
their beds and runs into19-year-old Andre, the only
person who tried to protestdirectly to father in the
earlier scene.
Andre collapses into Jake'sarms and asks if he and his
family are going to heavenbefore he dies.
As he continues his search forSam, he finds Savannah and her
mother huddled in the corner ofa cabin.
In the corner of a cabin, jaketries to get them to hide under

(34:46):
the bed with him, but the womanseems to know that the plan
won't work and cuts herdaughter's neck with a large
knife while promising she won'tlet anyone murder her.
Jake watches in horror fromunder the bed while this unfolds
and when a gunman findsSavannah's mother and shoots her
before departing.
Once the coast is clear, patrickspots Caroline, follows her
into the house and quicklyrealizes Patrick is dead.

(35:06):
He tries to stop her whileshe's pouring gasoline over
everything in sight, by assuringher that it's not too late to
leave.
But Caroline says there'snothing left for her to go home
to because these people were herfamily.
She tells Jake where he canfind father and Sam, pours
gasoline over her head and setsherself on fire.
Jake finds a bleeding and tiedup Sam in the house with Father

(35:29):
sitting calmly in the corner.
He goes on a diatribe about howhe couldn't let his
congregation live like thisanymore and gave them all a way
out, a new beginning.

Gene Jones (35:39):
Here we are, three of us all that's left.
We couldn't live this wayanymore, but I couldn't let them
go.
I tried, god knows I tried.
I gave them all I could and Igave my way out.

(36:01):
We were doing something greatdown here.
We were going to change theworld.
This was only the beginning.
Why couldn't you leave us alone?

Ashley (36:17):
After accusing Sam and Jake of bringing violence to the
compound and demanding theytake responsibility for what
unfolded, father does a line ofwhat I'm assuming is cocaine and
shoots himself in the mouthwhile yelling take me, lord.
Jake frees Sam and they try toescape the compound but are
forced to hide in the pavilionfrom one of the machine gun
wielding madmen.

(36:38):
Just as their days are numbered.
The other security guard killshis comrade and yells at Sam and
Jake to get the hell out ofDodge.
They make it out and thehelicopter lifts off at 9.07am.
According to the filmCommentary in the original
ending the pilot wasn't shot,but just as they reach altitude
he yells we must follow father'sorders.

(37:00):
And crashes, killing everyoneon board.
This alternate ending wassimilar to one of the many plans
Jim Jones had to commit suicide.
He had one of his mistressestake flying lessons and get her
pilot's license, in case he everwanted to fill a plane with
members and crash it in the nameof the cult.
Before the final credits we getthe following message 167

(37:22):
people died in the massacre atEden Parish.
It was one of the largest masssuicides in recorded history.
Filmmakers Sam Turner and JakeWilliams are the last known
survivors.
This documentary is the onlyfirsthand account of the events
at Eden Parish, and that is TyWest's the Sacrament.
What did you think, remy?

Remi (37:42):
Surprisingly more on point than I was expecting.
Actually, I am pleasantlysurprised at how many cues from
the real story the film seemedto take.
Of course liberties were taken,but from the clips that you
showed me and the descriptionyou gave, I think if Ty West had
wanted to tweak a few thingsand turn this into a miniseries

(38:06):
about the real Jim Jones, Ithink he could have done a
really good job.

Ashley (38:10):
It's a very unique horror movie.
It's not one with zombies or alot of violence outside of the
mass murder scene, but it doesleave you incredibly unsettled,
especially knowing that it isinspired by something that
really happened.
The Sacrament premiered at theVenice Film Festival in

(38:32):
September 2013.
It was available via video ondemand in May 2014 and had a
limited theatrical release inJune.
The movie grossed a measly$9,221 against its $4 million
budget.
Even though virtually no onesaw this movie, it currently has

(38:55):
a 65% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, with a critical consensus that
reads Although the Sacrament isa far cry from an Academy
Award-winning movie, it did winthe Sci-Fi Jury Prize, the I

(39:17):
Horror Award for Best SleeperHorror and, my personal favorite
, the Best Supporting ActorAward at the Blood Guts UK
Horror Awards.

Remi (39:26):
Ah yes, the prestigious Blood Guts Award.

Ashley (39:29):
Never heard of any of these, but they are clearly just
for horror movies.

Remi (39:34):
I'm curious what the Blood and Guts Award looks like.

Ashley (39:39):
And that is the sacrament.
So now I am ready to sit backand relax while I learn all
about Jim Jones and the People'sTemple.

Remi (39:49):
Yes, it is time for my 18 page monologue and I want to
throw out a little warning aheadof time.
There are some graphic detailsof children dying, so I just
wanted to give a warning toeveryone.
If that makes you uncomfortableor if that's not something you
want to hear, I would definitelytune out before the ending

(40:10):
portion of my section if you'restill curious to hear the
beginning portion of my section.

(40:32):
If you're still curious to hearhands, goby dooby doo, welcome
to you, welcome, welcome on you,glad you are with us.
Shake hands, goby dooby doo,welcome to you.
James Warren Jones was born onMay 13, 1931, in the rural town
of Crete, indiana.

(40:53):
In the rural town of Crete,indiana.
His father, james Thurman Jones, was a disabled World War I
veteran who suffered from severerespiratory issues due to
injuries he sustained during achemical weapons attack.
Due to James' illness, he wasprimarily unable to work,
leading to financial strugglesand marital strife between James
and Jim's mother, lynettePutnam.

(41:13):
In 1931, during the GreatDepression, the Jones family was
evicted from their home afterfailing to make their mortgage
payments.
Luckily, the family's relativesprovided them with a small
shack, lacking plumbing andelectricity, in the nearby town
of Lynn, which is where littleJim Jones spent his formative
years.
Growing up, jim's family oftenstruggled to afford basic

(41:37):
necessities, relying onfinancial assistance from
extended family members, andeven resorted to foraging
through the forests and fieldsto supplement their diet.
Though both of Jim's parentswere neglectful towards him,
jim's mother, lynetta, inparticular, was described as
having absolutely no naturalmaternal instincts whatsoever.

(41:58):
Left largely unsupervised,little Jimmy would regularly
wander the streets of Lynncompletely naked and alone.
Eventually, a group ofsympathetic women in the
community took notice and beganproviding him with food,
clothing and other small gifts,just to get by.

Ashley (42:16):
Can you imagine just seeing a naked child wandering
the streets?
That would be so alarming.

Remi (42:28):
It seems like he was literally just left to fend for
himself and he didn't know whatto do.
He's a small, small child whenthis is happening and it is a
travesty how this child wastreated.
One woman in particular whotook a shining to little Jimmy
was Myrtle Kennedy, the wife ofthe local Nazarene church pastor
.
The two quickly formed a closebond, with Myrtle gifting him a

(42:49):
Bible and encouraging him tostudy the scripture, along with
the holiness code of theNazarene church.
As Jim grew older, he developeda fascination with religion and
would often attend numerousservices at various churches
across Lynn.
This kind of reminded me of thebook Life of Pi, where the
little boy was fascinated withreligion and he was going to

(43:10):
services all over town justhearing the different types and
kind of soaking it all in.
Little Jimmy was even baptizedmultiple times across several
different denominations.
This early exploration of faithis what inevitably led to Jim's
desire to become a preacher,and he soon began practicing his
own sermons in private.

(43:30):
Locals would later describe Jimas an unusual child with an
intense obsession with religionand death.
Neighbors reported that Jimwould conduct mock funerals for
roadkill he had collected andsupposedly he even stabbed a cat
to death once for such a ritual.

Ashley (43:47):
Red flag.

Remi (43:48):
Yes, that is a surefire sign of a psychopath if they are
a child murdering small animals.
Whenever Jim couldn't convincethe other children to attend one
of his makeshift funerals, jimwould still proceed with the
ceremonies undeterred andwithout an audience.
On one occasion, jim claimed topossess supernatural powers and
insisted that he could fly, soleapt from a rooftop, only to

(44:12):
fall like a bag full of rocks,resulting in a broken arm.
Despite this very publicfailure, jim nevertheless
continued to assert that he hadthe ability to perform miracles.
Jones would claim later in lifethat as a boy, he had engaged in
a variety of sacrilegiouspranks, which included stealing
a Pentecostal minister's Bible,then smearing cow manure over

(44:34):
Acts 2.38, and replacing theholy water in a Catholic church
with a cup of his own urine.
What a little scamp young Jimmywas.
Aside from his antics in church, jim frequently stole candy
from local merchants, oftenresulting in a savage beating
with a leather belt at the handsof his mother in response to

(44:56):
his misbehavior.
Jim was also known for hisvulgar language and commonly
greeted neighbors and friendswith phrases like Good morning
you, son of a bitch, or Helloyou, dirty bastard.

Ashley (45:10):
It sounds like terms of endearment.

Remi (45:13):
Despite his rebellious nature, jim was an avid reader
and immersed himself in thewritings of Adolf Hitler, joseph
Stalin, karl Marx and MahatmaGandhi.
Some of those don't fit with theothers nation with the

(45:38):
pageantry and unquestionedloyalty of the Nazi party and
began to emulate them bycommanding groups of local
children to goose-step information, while physically
punishing those who disobeyedhim.
As a result of thisincreasingly disturbing behavior
, many parents around town beganforbidding their children from
associating with Jim, and by thetime he had entered high school
, jim was a complete socialoutcast who was widely disliked

(45:59):
by his peers and other membersof the community.

Ashley (46:02):
Where's Myrtle?
Why isn't she helping guidethis kid in a better direction?

Remi (46:07):
Myrtle could only do so much, I think.
Though Jim was a strong studentwho enjoyed debating his
teachers, he continued todevelop several peculiar social
habits, such as refusing torespond to anyone unless he had
initiated the conversationpersonally and dressing in
formal church attire whilecarrying his Bible every day of

(46:29):
the week.
Jim's unwavering religiousfanaticism only isolated him
further from his peers, as hewould openly condemn his other
classmates for drinking, smokingand dancing, and would even
interrupt social gatherings tolecture his classmates on their
waning morality, while demandingthat they cease their sinful
ways and read the Bible with himinstead.

Ashley (46:52):
I'm assuming by this time he stopped pissing in the
holy water, stealing candy andcalling everyone bitches and
bastards.

Remi (46:59):
That was little Jimmy.
This is teenage Jim.
Though Jim's father hadoriginally been a member of the
Ku Klux Klan, jim himself held adeep-seated aversion towards
racism, brought on by anincident he had witnessed at a
baseball game in Richmond,indiana, where the African
Americans in attendance were metwith unjust cruelty from his

(47:20):
fellow Caucasians.
In 1945, jones's parentsfinally divorced, forcing Jim
and his mother to relocate toRichmond, indiana, where he
attended Richmond High Schooland graduated early, with honors
, in December of 1948.
To support himself during thoseyears, jim took a job as an
orderly at Richmond's ReedHospital in 1946 and began

(47:44):
dating Marceline May Baldwin,who was a nurse in training
there.
In November of 1948, jim movedto Bloomington, indiana, to
attend Indiana University,bloomington, where he first
began openly expressing hissupport of communism and other
radical political views.
Jim and Marceline continuedtheir relationship while Jim was

(48:05):
away at college and on June 12,1949, the two were legally
married, despite Marceline beinga devout Methodist, which
frequently led to heatedarguments over Jim's opposition
to the Methodist church's racialsegregation policies.
Throughout their turbulentrelationship, jim subjected
Marceline to various forms ofemotional and physical

(48:26):
manipulation, includingfabricating the sudden death of
one of her close friends orfamily members, only to reveal
that it had been a lie.
After consoling her while shewas breaking down crying, jim
would additionally pressure hiswife to abandon her faith and
embrace atheism, even thoughthey both still attended church

(48:46):
regularly.

Ashley (48:50):
These religious cult leaders are able to convince
themselves that the evils theyare doing are somehow in line
with the teachings of God, whenthey're clearly not.

Remi (49:06):
Yes, a lot of what he's doing does not follow all of
these different religions.
But if you pick and choosecertain aspects from a bunch of
different religions and combine,them it can make what you're
doing perfectly okay in the eyesof God.
In 1951, the couple moved toIndianapolis, where the now

(49:26):
20-year-old Jim Jones beganattending meetings of the
Communist Party USA and grewincreasingly frustrated with the
persecution of communists inAmerica, fueling his desire to
merge his political beliefs withreligious influence.
By early 1952, Jim announced tohis wife and her family that he
had decided to become aMethodist minister to put real

(49:49):
socialism into practice.

Ashley (49:52):
The religion that he forced his wife to give up.

Remi (50:00):
Yes, practice the religion that he forced his wife to give
up.
Yes, there is quite a bit ofhypocrisy in Jim Jones, You'll
come to see.
Surprisingly, Jim was offeredthe opportunity to start his
ministry by the Methodistdistrict superintendent shortly
after, despite Jim'scontroversial beliefs in
communism.
In the summer of 1952, Jim washired on as a student children's
pastor at the SomersetSouthside Methodist Church,

(50:23):
where he spearheaded a projectintending to build a playground
open to children of all races.
However, in early 1954, Jim wasdismissed from his position for
allegedly stealing church funds, though Jim would later claim
that it was because the churchleaders had refused to allow
African Americans into theircongregation.
In 1953, Jones attended aPentecostal ladder reign

(50:46):
movement in Columbus, Indiana,where a woman prophesied that he
was destined to be a greatprophet with a powerful ministry
.
Though skeptical of the woman'sprophecy, Jim decided to just
roll with it and took to thepodium to deliver a sermon in
front of the entire audience.
This experience convinced Jimthat the racially integrated and

(51:09):
rapidly expanding Ladder Reignmovement could expedite his goal
of becoming a preacher.
So Jim manipulated his wifeinto leaving the Methodist
church and joining the latterrain movement, which sought to
restore the practices andbeliefs of early Pentecostalism.
That same year, Jim beganpreaching at a Pentecostal

(51:29):
Assemblies of God church inIndianapolis known as the Laurel
Street Tabernacle.
Between 1953 and 1955, Jonesheld healing revivals at the
church while also traveling tospeak at other latter rain
congregations, including one inDetroit.
Unfortunately, Jim's time at theLaurel Street Tabernacle would

(51:51):
come to an end in 1955 when theAssemblies of God assigned a new
pastor who strictly enforcedthe denomination's ban on
healing revivals.
We will get into the details ofwhat a healing revival is in
just a bit.
Unwilling to conform, Jim leftand established his own church
called the Wings of Healing,which would later be renamed the

(52:13):
People's Temple or justPeople's Temple.
I call it the People's Temple,but it is just called People's
Temple.
But it sounds weird if I justcall it People's Temple.
You know what I mean.
Initially, Jim's new churchattracted only about 20 members
who had followed him from theLaurel Street Tabernacle.
So Jim took a part-time jobselling pet monkeys in order to

(52:35):
raise additional funds.

Ashley (52:38):
Where did he get these monkeys, and were they like the
little ones that like sit onyour shoulder?

Remi (52:42):
Yeah, they were the tiny monkeys.
It didn't really go into wherehe got the monkeys from, but
it's an interesting way tosupplement your income.
Jim also recognized the needfor greater publicity, so
actively sought ways to grow hisministry and recruit more
followers.
Jim soon forged a closerelationship with a network of

(53:03):
churches that embraced thelatter reign movement known as
the Independent Assemblies ofGod, which was known for minimal
requirements for ordainingministers and fully embraced
divine healing practices.
Ministers and fully embraceddivine healing practices.
By June of 1955, jim held hisfirst joint meeting with a
renowned healing evangelistnamed William Bram, who was a

(53:23):
prominent figure in the globalhealing revival movement and had
gained notoriety for hisuncanny ability to tell church
attendees their names, addressesand reasons for seeking prayer
before inevitably declaring themhealed.
So these are the type of thingswhere people go and they have
something wrong with them, likethey are blind or they can't

(53:44):
walk or something like that, andthe minister heals them right
then and there.
These are largely known as asham, and that's why a lot of
churches don't allow this sortof thing to occur.
Well, jim was, of course,captivated by Bram's methods and
quickly began learning how toreplicate these telepathic

(54:04):
tricks himself.
In 1956, jim was officiallyordained as a minister in the
Independent Assemblies of God byJoseph Mattinson Bowes, who was
also a prominent leader in theLatter Rain movement.
Wasting no time at all, jimsoon organized a major healing
convention, scheduled for June11th through the 15th at the

(54:27):
Indianapolis Cattle Tabernacle.
To draw in larger crowds, jimarranged for William Bram to
share the pulpit with him again,resulting in their second joint
meeting attracting an audienceof over 11,000 people for their
first campaign.

Ashley (54:44):
Holy shit, that is a ton of people 11,000?
.

Remi (54:49):
It is staggering the amount of people that are
involved with this the crowds,the influence.
It's crazy.
I had no idea this many peoplewere involved in this sort of
thing.
During the convention, brampublicly endorsed Jim Jones and
prophesied that God was usingthe event to launch a great new

(55:10):
ministry.
By the end of the convention,many of the attendees had been
convinced that Jones possessedsupernatural abilities and, with
Bram's backing, regularattendance at the People's
Temple soon surged to over athousand due to the convention's
widespread publicity.
Quite a jump 20 to a thousand.
Jim was particularly effectiveat recruiting African American

(55:33):
attendees, which only expandedhis church's influence within
the community.
Following this success, jimrenamed his church the People's
Temple Christian Church FullGospel, which was later
shortened to just People'sTemple.
Jim participated in a series ofmulti-state revival campaigns
alongside Bram throughout thelate 1950s, allowing him to

(55:56):
establish deeper connectionswithin the latter reign movement
.
One aspect of this movementwhich Jim was particularly
fascinated by was the beliefthat certain individuals could
become direct manifestations ofGod, thus possessing
supernatural abilities.
Followers saw these gifts as asign of the second coming of
Christ and believed that thoseendowed with them would usher in

(56:18):
a millennial age of heaven onearth.
Jim adapted this doctrine tosupport his own vision of a
utopian society and by the late1960s, jim was declaring that he
himself was a divinemanifestation of Christ.
The Revolution, which furtherreinforced his growing influence
over his loyal followers.
Many of Jim's most effectiverecruitment tactics were

(56:42):
borrowed directly from WilliamBram, including his claims of
being the reincarnation ofElijah, the prophet, the voice
of God and a manifestation ofChrist.
Jim's entire ideology andministry were also heavily
influenced by Bram, includinghis various doctrines, methods
and style, as well as theapocalyptic belief that the end

(57:04):
of the world would soon be athand.
However, Jim did eventuallydistance himself from the latter
reign movement following abitter dispute with Bram, which
culminated in Jim prophesyingBram's death.
It has been theorized that thedisagreement may have stemmed
from Bram's racial teachings orhis increasingly vocal
opposition to communism.

(57:27):
Around this time, jim alsobecame aware of an
African-American spiritualleader of the international
peace mission movement namedFather Divine, who would soon
become another key influence ofJim Jones's ministry.
Divine's claims of divinitywere often criticized by
Pentecostal ministers, and whileJim publicly disavowed Father

(57:48):
Divine's teachings, he secretlybegan adopting many of Divine's
practices, particularly thoserelated to communal living.
Divine additionally inspiredJim to introduce social outreach
programs within the People'sTemple, including a soup kitchen
, free groceries and clothingdistribution to those in need.

(58:08):
By 1958, jim was graduallyexerting greater control over
his followers' lives and beganimplementing disciplinary
measures within the People'sTemple that closely mirrored
those used by Divine's peacemission.
In 1960, jim Jones aligned hisPeople's Temple with the
Disciples of Christ denomination, after church leader Archie

(58:30):
James assured Jim that hispolitical beliefs would be
tolerated.
In 1964, jim was formallyordained as a minister within
the denomination and thePeople's Temple remained
affiliated with the Disciples ofChrist until its tragic end in
Jonestown.
So he is just hopping from onereligion to the other.
Oh, you guys don't like whatI'm doing here.

(58:51):
Oh well, hop over here, they'reokay with it.
Oh, you guys don't like thataspect of it, I'll go over here,
maybe these guys will.
He's picking and choosing whatworks for him, which is not how
religion works.
I think that same year,indianapolis Mayor Charles
Boswell appointed Jim the newdirector of the city's Human

(59:11):
Rights Commission, which Jimused to amplify his own views
through local radio andtelevision programs.
During his tenure, jim played asignificant role in integrating
various institutions throughoutIndianapolis, including
churches, the telephone company,the police department, a
theater and an amusement park.
Jim even set up stingoperations to expose restaurants

(59:33):
that were refusing service toBlack customers.

Ashley (59:36):
It's kind of crazy that I'm saying this, knowing
everything that this man becomesand aspects about him thus far
that are less than ideal, but asfar as him being elected as
someone to be involved in humanrights, he's actually not the
worst choice.

Remi (59:58):
I don't disagree with you.
It is surprising that this is avery evil man, and it is clear
that he is cultivating power andfinding things that work
directly with what he believes,and all of that.
But it does seem like he did dosome legitimate good for the
community as far asdesegregation goes.

(01:00:19):
In fact, in 1961, jim wasbriefly hospitalized and, due to
a clerical error, was placed inthe Black Patients Ward, but
rather than move to the WhiteWard, he instead chose to stay
and assisted the Black patientsby making their beds and
emptying their bedpans.
The political pressuregenerated by Jim's actions

(01:00:40):
during this situation is whateventually led to the Indiana
University Health MethodistHospital's desegregation.
As a result of Jim's activism,the People's Temple became a
target for white supremacists,leading to the church being
vandalized with a swastika and adead cat being thrown at Jim's
home following a threateningphone call.

Ashley (01:01:02):
In his mind he's like yay time for another funeral.

Remi (01:01:06):
I was just going to say.
I do not know if he held afuneral for the cat that was
thrown at his house or not.
By the end of 1961,indianapolis had made
significant progress towardsracial integration, and the
publicity surrounding Jim'sactivism only helped further
expand his growing congregation.
Jim also extended hiscommitment to racial diversity

(01:01:28):
into his personal life, as heand his wife Marceline adopted
multiple non-white childrenthroughout the years and would
commonly refer to theirhousehold as a rainbow family.
They began by adopting theirfirst child, agnes, who was part
Native American, in 1954,followed by three
Korean-American children namedLou, stephanie and Suzanne in

(01:01:50):
1959.
That same year, marceline gavebirth to their only biological
child, stephen Jones.
Then, in 1961, they became thefirst white couple in Indiana to
adopt a black child, who wasnamed Jim Jones Jr.
They later adopted a white sonnamed Tim, whose birth mother
was a temple member, and Jimwould go on to father yet

(01:02:12):
another son, jim, john or Kimo,with a different temple member
named Carolyn Layton.

Ashley (01:02:18):
Carolyn Mentioned her.

Remi (01:02:21):
Jim soon began claiming to have received visions of an
impending nuclear attack onIndianapolis.
In January of 1962, jim read anEsquire magazine article that
identified South America as oneof the safest places to escape a
potential nuclear war andbecame convinced that the
People's Temple needed torelocate.

(01:02:43):
Jim soon traveled to SouthAmerica in search of a new home
for him and his followers, butfound the language barrier to be
extremely challenging.
No duh, jim.
In mid-1963, jim moved hisfamily to Rio de Janeiro where
they worked closely with thepoor in the slums and favelas.
However, jim was still unableto find a suitable location for

(01:03:06):
the People's Temple andeventually became overwhelmed
with guilt for abandoning thecivil rights movement back in
Indiana.
During Jim's absence, regularattendance at the People's
Temple also dwindled to fewerthan 100 members and was on the
verge of collapsing.

Ashley (01:03:22):
Is that because he wasn't there?

Remi (01:03:24):
He was in Rio de Janeiro working with the poor for about
a year.
Jim finally returned to theStates in December of 1963, but
continuous financial strugglesand low attendance forced Jim to
sell the original churchbuilding and relocate to a
smaller space nearby.
To maintain his followers'commitment, Jim preached that a

(01:03:46):
nuclear war would devastate theworld on July 15, 1967, leading
to a socialist paradise afterthe fallout, and began urging
his congregation to relocate toNorthern California with him.
This led to Jim and about 140of his most loyal followers
moving to Redwood Valley,California, in July of 1965,

(01:04:08):
while the rest of hiscongregation stayed behind in
Indiana.
Once there, Jim took a job as ahistory and government teacher
and an adult education school inthe nearby town of Ukiah to
recruit new members for hispeople's temple.
He achieved this by subtlyintegrating Marxist ideologies
into his lessons and plantingloyal temple members in his

(01:04:30):
classes to assist withrecruitment.
Within the first few months,Jim had gained 50 new followers
and by 1967, an additional 75members from the Indianapolis
congregation were convinced tomove to California.
In 1968, the California branchof the People's Temple was
formally admitted into theDisciples of Christ denomination

(01:04:51):
, which Jim used to boost hischurch's credibility and
promoted the temple as part ofthe 1.5 million member
denomination.
This worked like a charm and by1969, the People's Temple
membership in California hadgrown to over 300 members.
Throughout the years, Jimcombined influence from William
Bram's Latter Rain Movement,Father Divine's Economic

(01:05:13):
Socialism, along with his owncommunist belief, into a
hodgepodge theology he calledapostolistic socialism.
By the early 1970s, Jimrejected traditional Christian
teachings, publicly declaringthat Christianity had a false
understanding of God byreferring to Christianity's
concept of God as a sky god whowas no god at all.

(01:05:36):
Instead, Jim proclaimed his owndivinity and would assert that
he alone was the one and onlytrue God.

Ashley (01:05:45):
Just breaking another 10 commandment right there.

Remi (01:05:48):
No, he's picking and choosing.
He took part of the religionthat allowed people to say that
they're God, and he incorporatedit into his new one, so all
this is okay by his rules.
Jim additionally dismissed KingJames VI as an alcoholic and a
slave trader while circulating apamphlet Jim had authored,
titled the Letter Killeth, whichharshly criticized the King

(01:06:12):
James Bible.
Unsurprisingly, jim theninsisted that he was the true
prophet and the only one capableof properly interpreting divine
teachings.

Ashley (01:06:23):
How convenient.

Remi (01:06:25):
Jim would also frequently use scare tactics to maintain
his followers by warning them ofan impending nuclear race, war,
apocalypse where Nazi whitesupremacists would imprison
people of color in concentrationcamps.
And the only way to survive thiswas to follow Jim Jones's
teachings.
Jim continued by promising hisfollowers that they would later

(01:06:48):
emerge from the ruins of thispost-apocalyptic wasteland and
rebuild a utopian communistsociety where the old world once
stood.
In the meantime, jim continuedto reinforce fear and loyalty
amongst his followers withregular prophecies of fires, car
accidents, injuries and deathtowards anyone who dared stray

(01:07:10):
from his teachings.
And keep in mind, all of thesepeople have seen Jim Jones
supposedly see the future, sothis reinforces the fear that
they would have if he's sayingyour car is going to explode or
you're going to die if you leave.
They've been just brainwashedto take all of this at face
value.
Jim even created his ownbaptismal formula and began

(01:07:34):
baptizing converts in the holyname of socialism.
Now I bet you're all wonderingdid Jim Jones really believe all
of this, or was he just sort ofsome exceptionally manipulative
con man?
Well, believe it or not, manyhistorians remain divided on
this subject.
But in a 1976 interview, jonesdid openly identify himself as

(01:07:58):
being an atheist.
So make of that what you will.

Ashley (01:08:02):
What do you think?

Remi (01:08:04):
I think that a real religious person would not be
picking and choosing differentaspects of all the religions
that fit what they wanted tocreate their own.
That's not something that Ithink people who actually
believe what they're doing woulddo.
So I am of the mind that Idon't think that he believed any
of this.
I think he saw this as a meansof building his congregation,

(01:08:26):
building his followers, buildinga humongous group of people
that hung on his every word, andthat seems to be something that
he loved.
He was someone who wasneglected as a child and gained
a fascination with being thecenter of attention, giving
speeches, having people hangingon his every word, but I don't
think the subject matter behindwhat he was saying really

(01:08:48):
mattered to him.

Ashley (01:08:49):
It sounds like to me thus far he believes fully in
the righteousness of hissocialist political views and is
using religion to gain massfollowers Because as a child
he's going around at all ofthese different churches and
seeing the power that thedifferent priests and pastors

(01:09:11):
have over their congregation.
So I think that seed was builtin him from a very young age.

Remi (01:09:18):
I believe he was passionate about his political
movements, but the religiousstuff, yeah.
I think he was just utilizingthat To maintain control over
his growing congregation.
Jim established a planningcommission composed of his most
trusted lieutenants to managethe temple's communal lifestyle.
New members were required toturn over all of their assets to

(01:09:42):
the church in exchange for freeroom and board, while members
who worked outside the templewere ordered to donate the
entirety of their income to helpfund the community.
To generate additional income,jim assigned groups of his
followers to work on variousprojects and established an
agricultural operation inRedwood Valley to grow food for
temple members To enhance thegroup's public image, the temple

(01:10:02):
also organized large-scalecommunity outreach projects and
would commonly perform volunteerwork across the region.
However, jim's behavior began tobecome increasingly paranoid
and erratic and it continued toescalate after moving to
California, which was onlyexacerbated by Jim developing a

(01:10:23):
dependency on illegal drugs inorder to continue functioning.
In time, jim began exertingeven more control over nearly
every aspect of his followers'lives, including their personal
relationships and sexuality.
This included demanding sexualfavors from both male and female
members of the temple, whilecoercing others into getting

(01:10:45):
abortions.

Ashley (01:10:46):
It wouldn't be a cult story if there wasn't some sort
of sexual misconduct involved.

Remi (01:10:52):
It does seem like every cult leader ends up having sex
with all of their followers.
At some point it always gets tothat level of abuse of power.
Those who refuse these sexualinteractions would often face
severe consequences, such asreduced food rations, extended
work schedules, publichumiliation or even physical

(01:11:13):
violence.
With membership still growingexponentially, Jim informed an
armed security force to helpmaintain control over his
expanding legion of followers,while additionally ensuring his
own protection.

Ashley (01:11:25):
Do you know anything about the background of the
members that are joining at thispoint?
I see the members that havejoined at the beginning being
brainwashed enough to stick init, but the fact that people are
joining now, when he is clearlytipped over the edge at this
point, how are people beingconvinced to come and join this

(01:11:46):
group?

Remi (01:11:55):
different branches of his church going on right now, and
it seems like most of what'sgoing on with the control over
his followers is occurring inCalifornia.
So there's still recruitinggoing on in other areas, but I
feel like the people who are inCalifornia are the ones who have
already been indoctrined andthey're ready to move out and
give everything to this cause.

Ashley (01:12:13):
Okay, so if people are continuing to join the
California base, they'reprobably from his outside sex.

Remi (01:12:20):
Yes, if you're moving to California, you're at the I'm
turning over all of my financialaspects.
You're giving up an absurdamount of control over your life
if you're taking that step intoCalifornia.
But there are still a lot ofpeople that are in the other
branches that are following hiswords, but they haven't made
that leap yet.
So once you move to California,those are the true diehard

(01:12:41):
believers.
Jim firmly believed that majorcities would provide greater
opportunities for recruitmentand political influence, so the
temple's headquarters waseventually moved to San
Francisco and continued byestablishing two new branches of
the church in San Fernando andLos Angeles, so expanding all
over the West Coast.

(01:13:01):
In 1970, jim and 150 of hisfollowers held a lively faith
healing revival at SanFrancisco's Missionary Baptist
Church, accompanied by a soulfulperformance from the People's
Temple Choir.
I feel like that song capturesthe mood of his type of church

(01:13:36):
services.
They were lively, they were fun.
People were singing and dancingand shouting Praise God.
It was a fun church service.
So you know, you hear all ofthese things happening later on,
but initially, coming tosomething like this, it would be
a blast.

Ashley (01:13:51):
I think they're pretty good.
That is the type of music thatwas played in the movie, just
this upbeat, everyone's dancingand clapping and just having a
great time, and it's what ledthe vice reporters to be like
well, this seems like a greatplace to be.

Remi (01:14:09):
During the service, jim wowed his audience by appearing
to miraculously heal a man ofcancer right there on the spot,
though Temple insiders lateradmitted that the healing was
staged in order to attract newmembers.

Ashley (01:14:23):
Shocking.

Remi (01:14:25):
Despite this, jim's staged healing revival was a massive
success, resulting in about 200new recruits for the People's
Temple.
Because of this, jim continuedto perform even more healing
revivals across the state ofCalifornia for the next several
years, and here's a little clipfrom one of our sisters blind

(01:14:59):
from her childhood.

Jim Jones & Congressman Ryan (01:15:00):
It could be hysterical blindness,
whatever, we're not concerned.
She was blind and could not see.
Now look at my face.
I'm going to hold up somefingers.
You concentrate hard.
I love you, the people love you.

(01:15:20):
Most importantly, christ lovesyou.
What do you see?
How many fingers?
Three.

Ashley (01:15:44):
Okay for those of you at home, jim Jones is on the stage
and the woman he is talking to,who is supposedly blind and
cured, is far, far, far awayfrom him.
So you're telling me thesehealing rituals were just him
saying trust in God, trust in me, you're cured.
He didn't touch them, he didn'tlike pour water on them or cast
demons out of them.
He was just like meh repent tome and you can see.

Remi (01:16:00):
No, not even repent.
Look at me and you will see.
And that is just a small clipof the video.
The whole video is full ofmiracles.
He's doing them one after theother.
This isn't just a section ofthe sermon, this is the whole
sermon.
So once this lady leaves,someone else comes up and it

(01:16:23):
just goes on and on like that.
So all of these people arewitnessing this guy just doing
miracle after miracle aftermiracle, and it's all people who
are not repenting.
They're just looking at him.
They're looking at his face andhe's saying we love you and all
of these things.
I can understand why a normalperson in the audience would be
like, wow, this is kind ofamazing and we didn't have this

(01:16:43):
in our clip.
But at the beginning of theservice, before he starts, he
has everyone in the audiencestand up, hug their neighbor and
give them a kiss on the cheekbefore he even starts to do
anything, just to get up andlove your neighbor for a minute.
So on the surface again, Idon't buy into this healing
stuff at all, but if you were to, I can understand how someone

(01:17:05):
would see this and be very wowedand in awe of this sort of
thing.
Jim additionally cultivatedalliances with journalists from
the San Francisco Chronicle andother media outlets in an
attempt to garner positivepublic press.
However, jim's faith healingclaims began facing media
scrutiny in October of 1971,after a news report exposed one

(01:17:30):
of Jim's alleged miracle healingservices in Indianapolis,
leading to an investigation bythe Indiana State Psychology
Board in 1971.
One doctor accused Jim Jones ofquackery and challenged him to
provide tissue samples of theso-called cancerous material
that had supposedly beenexpelled by Jim's followers

(01:17:52):
during some of these revivals.
So I don't know if people haveseen this sort of thing or not,
but this was something thatoccurred in the 60s and 70s
during healing revivals, wherethey would cure people of cancer
and the person would literallycough up something that was
supposed to be the cancer thatwas inside of their body, like a
little chunk of something, andthat would be the cancer being

(01:18:15):
expelled and they were cured soa visual representation of them
being cured of cancer, basically, it was later revealed by
Temple Insiders that thesealleged cancerous tumors had in
actuality just been chickengizzards all along.

Ashley (01:18:31):
Gross, so those people just had to hold gizzards in
their mouth until they wereallowed to cough them up.

Remi (01:18:36):
I think they had them in their hands and then, when the
time came, they put them intheir mouth and coughed them up.
They had a similar scene likethis in the film man on the Moon
with Jim Carrey, where he'slooking for alternative medicine
to help cure his cancer and hegoes to one of these doctors and
he witnesses them fakingremoving cancer from his body.

(01:18:56):
Temple members would alsogather personal information
about potential recruits throughinquisitive phone calls under
false pretext, giving Jim theillusion of clairvoyancy when he
would later reveal thesedetails to them during one of
his services.
So he would have his followerscall people and say like would
you like to take a survey orwe're confirming your

(01:19:18):
information for your bill,things like that, in order to
get any information from themthat they could, that he could
later use Sneaky.
In September of 1972, journalistLester Consolving ran a series
of articles in the San FranciscoExaminer lambasting Jim's
claims of divinity and exposinghis miracle healings as simple

(01:19:40):
parlor tricks.
Despite this, by 1973, thePeople's Temple had surged to
over 2,500 members, along withanother 36,000 subscribers to
the Temple's fundraisingnewsletter.
With his temple's rapidexpansion and the press now
closing in around him, Jimbecame fearful that he may lose

(01:20:02):
control over his followers, sobegan planning to relocate the
people's temple in an effort toescape the public scrutiny and
allegations he had become sosynonymous with.
Jim would eventually chooseGuyana for this purpose, since
the government was open tooutside groups settling there
and the country had justrecently undergone a socialist
revolution which alignedswimmingly with Jim's rhetoric.

(01:20:26):
On December 13, 1973, Jim wasarrested and charged with lewd
conduct for allegedlymasturbating in front of an
undercover LAPD officer in amovie theater restroom near
MacArthur Park.
Remarkably, the charge wasmysteriously dismissed only a
week later, on December 20th.
But the details of thisdismissal remain unclear, since

(01:20:48):
the court file was sealed andall records were destroyed under
the judge's order.
Is that a common thing?
Records were destroyed underthe judge's order.

Ashley (01:20:58):
Is that a common thing?
The judge orders that therecords be destroyed.
I don't think so.
It sounds like maybe the judgewas a part of the people's
temple in some way, or someonedid some sort of bribery.

Remi (01:21:07):
I don't know if he was a part of it, but Jim did have a
lot of connections, so I feellike that had to have played a
factor in this connections.
So I feel like that had to haveplayed a factor in this.
That same month, jim and one ofhis key advisors traveled to
Guyana in search of land for thetemple's relocation, and by the
summer of 1974, supplies hadbeen purchased, fields were
cleared and a power station hadbeen installed.

(01:21:30):
By that December the first 50settlers had arrived, while Jim
Jones remained in the UnitedStates to continue his futile
battle against the mountingnegative press he had been
receiving.
By the mid-1970s, jim Jones hadleveraged his growing
congregation to establish strongpolitical connections and

(01:21:50):
played a key role in GeorgeMoscone's mayoral election win
in 1975.
Played a key role in GeorgeMoscone's mayoral election win
in 1975.
As a sign of gratitude, thenewly appointed mayor rewarded
Jim by appointing him chairmanof the San Francisco Housing
Authority Commission and evenbrought Jim along with him to a
private meeting with vicepresidential candidate Walter
Mondale, resulting in Mondalepublicly praising the temple

(01:22:13):
mere days before the 1976election.

Ashley (01:22:17):
So much for separation of church and state.

Remi (01:22:21):
First Lady Rosalind Carter also met with Jim Jones
multiple times during thisperiod and even spoke at the
grand opening of the People'sTemple headquarters in San
Francisco, where Jim received alouder ovation than she did.
Finally, in March of 1977,another expose was published in
New West Magazine, written byMarshall Kuldiff, which detailed

(01:22:42):
accounts from former templemembers describing the physical,
emotional and sexual abuse theyhad experienced at the hands of
Jim Jones.
During this time, the templecontrolled over $10 million in
assets and, realizing that thetime to flee may soon be at hand
, Jim quickly began moving thetemple's financial assets
overseas, while selling offproperties in the United States.

Ashley (01:23:05):
And none of that property that he's selling can
be taxed, because religiousorganizations are tax-exempt.

Remi (01:23:12):
Exactly, are tax-exempt.
Exactly, jim then urged hishundreds of followers to move
down to Guyana to be part of awondrous new socialist paradise
free from media scrutiny, whichJim boasted as the purest
communist community to have everexisted.
Less than two months later, inMay of 1977, jim Jones finally

(01:23:33):
arrived in Guyana along with 600of his followers to continue
the development of Jim's newutopia, which he called
Jonestown.

Ashley (01:23:43):
God, so he was only there for like a year.

Remi (01:23:47):
He had sent a lot of people there to set up things
and, yeah, he stayed in Americapulling political influence and
it seems like he had almostcreated this as like a last
resort escape type thing Ifthings really got bad in America
.
He did have this set up down inGuyana.
Jim even produced promotionalvideos for Jonestown featuring
interviews with residentsclaiming that they would never

(01:24:10):
even consider returning toAmerica, even if given the
opportunity.

Jim Jones & Congressman (01:24:14):
That's right to get myself straight.
Kevin Grubbs looks after thebananas.
Do you want to go back to theStates, kevin?
No way Can't get you to go back.
What about you, vincent?
You won't even be here a day.
How do you feel about it?
No, I wouldn't want to go back.
And I see that Tommy.
He looks like he's verycontented.
Do you want to go back?
Well, you're all happy.
You here, you happy, tom?
Yeah, oh, that's good, david,he's doing a good job.

(01:24:37):
He's in charge of the pig race.

Ashley (01:24:39):
Two observations.
One he's sporting thesunglasses that Gene Jones is
wearing in the movie theSacrament.
These like aviator-styleglasses.
He's always wearing thesunglasses.
Jim Jones loves his sunglasses.
Second observation is it's somanipulative that every single
person he is asking in thatvideo if they want to leave are

(01:25:01):
children.

Remi (01:25:02):
Well, about 400 more settlers arrived in Jonestown
following this video.
In the coming months, Life inJonestown turned out to be no
picnic whatsoever, with membersbeing required to work six days
a week from 6 30 am to 6 pm,with only an hour for lunch.
Luckily, by mid-1978, Jim'shealth had deteriorated, so his

(01:25:27):
wife took on more managementresponsibilities, reducing the
work week to just five days.
During the evenings, Templemembers were ordered to attend
mandatory meetings in thecentral pavilion, where they
would participate in hours uponhours of socialist teachings and
activities, primarily led byJones himself.

(01:25:47):
Over time, Jim Jones and hisleadership began implementing
sophisticated mind controltechniques inspired by communist
regimes such as North Korea andMaoist China.
By controlling all theinformation his followers
received During these communalmeetings, Jim would read the
news and portray the UnitedStates as an evil imperialist

(01:26:07):
force, while glorifying leaderslike Kim Il-sung and Joseph
Stalin, further reinforcing hisidea that Jonestown was truly
the last refuge from the corruptand crumbling world that they
had all escaped from.
Jim's control and influenceover his followers soon began
extending even further intotheir personal lives by forcing

(01:26:28):
every single temple member topublicly declare that they were
homosexual, while Jim claimed tobe the only true heterosexual
amongst them.
In reality, Jim Jones wasbisexual and would use his
unmitigated authority toregularly coerce both male and
female followers into sexualrelationships with him.

(01:26:49):
Among those brought toJonestown was a child named John
Victor Stoen, whose birthcertificate listed Timothy and
Grace Stoen as his biologicalparents.
However, Jim, who at one pointhad a sexual relationship with
Grace, claimed that he wasactually John's biological
father, and when Grace left thetemple in 1976, Jim ordered that

(01:27:11):
the child be taken with him toGuyana to avoid a custody battle
.

Ashley (01:27:16):
And the mom just let him take her kid.

Remi (01:27:19):
Yeah, he had a lot of control over these people.
Even after Timothy Stonedefected in 1977, jim still kept
the boy and refused to let thechild leave Jonestown.
In response, timothy Stone andother defectors formed a group
called Concerned Relatives, whowere determined to free their

(01:27:39):
loved ones from Jonestown, whomthey claimed were being held
against their will.
In April of 1978, the ConcernedRelatives compiled numerous
documents, letters and swornaffidavits detailing the
abhorrent human rightsviolations occurring in
Jonestown.

Ashley (01:27:56):
Are any of these defectors people that were in
Guyana and left?

Remi (01:28:01):
Yes, Timothy was in Guyana when he left, but it's one of
those situations where he'sleaving but there's hundreds of
people that are still theresupporting Jim Jones.
Is he going to demand that thechild is his in front of all of
these devoted followers?
It would probably be prettyintimidating, and Jim has his
security force now.
This information, compiled bythe concerned relatives, was

(01:28:25):
then mailed to the press alongwith members of Congress, and
soon caught the attention of aCalifornia congressman named Leo
Ryan.
Two months later, anotherformer Temple member named
Deborah Layton had escapedJonestown and provided her own
affidavit detailing chilling newallegations of horrific abuse,
control and the grim reality ofJonestown's substandard living

(01:28:49):
conditions.
According to Layton, Jonestownresidents were deliberately
undernourished and were forcedto survive on a meager diet
consisting of rice for breakfast, rice water soup for lunch,
then rice and beans for dinner,along with a sparse serving of
vegetables a few times a week,while elderly or enfeebled
members received only a singleegg per day.

Ashley (01:29:13):
Rice water soup.
So is that just the water thatthe rice was cooked in?

Remi (01:29:19):
I don't know for sure, but that is what I would imagine it
to be.
Yeah.

Ashley (01:29:23):
So just milky-looking water.

Remi (01:29:26):
Yeah, it's not going to be very flavorful or delicious, I
would imagine.

Ashley (01:29:32):
Or nutritious.

Remi (01:29:33):
No, and these people are working grueling schedules and
surviving on basically just rice.
Well, the residents were atleast given a break on Sundays,
because they were given theirown egg along with a cookie.
Well, jones himself typicallyate heartier meals, which
included meat under the pretenseof needing special food for his
blood sugar problems meat underthe pretense of needing special

(01:29:57):
food for his blood sugarproblems.
With the mounting accusations,this inevitably led to the US
Embassy conducting two welfarechecks in Jonestown, along with
the IRS starting aninvestigation into the Temple's
finances.
As Jonestown's conditionsworsened, jim's paranoia
spiraled out of control and hebecame convinced that the US
government was planning a raidon his commune.

(01:30:17):
To prepare for this, jim beganholding intense drills, which he
called White Nights, to testhis followers'.
Loyalty and readiness.
Drills would commence at randomwhenever residents would hear
Jim's voice echoing out ajarring alert over the
community's loudspeakers.
Residents would hear Jim'svoice echoing out a jarring
alert over the community'sloudspeakers.

(01:30:38):
On certain occasions, jim evenordered his men to open fire on
the trees from the surroundingjungle in order to simulate an
attack.
This would signal that allresidents were required to
gather in the central pavilion,surrounded by armed guards
carrying rifles and crossbows,while having absolutely no idea
if the drill was real or not.
One of the most intense drillslasted for nearly a week in

(01:30:59):
September of 1977 and becameknown as the Six Day Siege,
during which followers wereconfined to the pavilion,
deprived of sleep and forced toendure endless hours of Jim's
frenzied speeches.
By 1978, the white knightdrills had become even more
extreme, with Jim Jonesannouncing that he would be

(01:31:20):
distributing poison for everyoneto drink.
Fruit Punch was then served, asthe crowd sat in silence,
weeping and waiting to die.
After being made to wait anexcruciatingly long time in
terrified anticipation, jimfinally revealed that there was
no poison and it had just been atest.

Ashley (01:31:38):
They don't show this in the sacrament because it's just
the last 24 to 48 hours, but inhis final speech he does say
like drink just as we rehearsed.
So it's kind of alluding tothat they've already done these
sort of drills.

Remi (01:31:53):
That was going to be something I knocked the film for
, but okay, that's good to know.

Ashley (01:31:57):
It's very, very quick, but he does say that.

Remi (01:32:00):
Through these white knight drills, jim was able to
convince his followers that theCIA and other US intelligence
agencies were actively plottingagainst him, while conditioning
them to view suicide as theironly escape.

Ashley (01:32:13):
God, life on this compound was far darker than I
ever knew.

Remi (01:32:18):
I could not imagine the misery and fear that these
people were living in.
And you're there.
I'm sure a lot of them wereprobably thinking there's no way
out, like there's armed guardseverywhere, I don't have a plane
, he has all of my belongingsand I'm in another country.
Like, even if you wanted toleave at this point, you
couldn't.

Ashley (01:32:37):
Yeah, I mean, I understand how they think that
there's no way out for themBecause, in all honesty, for
most of them there wasn't.

Remi (01:32:46):
On at least two occasions, residents reached a
revolutionary suicide vote inthe pavilion where the entire
community rehearsed their masssuicide.
To ensure his influenceremained inescapable, jim Jones
had his sermons, rants,political ideology and
fear-driven propaganda played onan endless loop through the

(01:33:07):
loudspeakers across the commune,keeping the residents of
Jonestown in a constant state ofpsychological manipulation the
residents of Jonestown in aconstant state of psychological
manipulation, and that isliterally torture.

Ashley (01:33:18):
That's one of the methods that have been used in
war.
Torture is just playingsomething on a loop, non-stop.

Remi (01:33:25):
Punishments for disobedience were severe, with
some members being locked insidea coffin-shaped box and buried
several feet underground, whilebeing verbally abused and
berated by the other templemembers for disloyalty.
The majority of Jonestown'spopulation primarily consisted
of minors and the elderly, butdue to scarce health care,

(01:33:45):
minimal education and dwindlingfood rations, the situation had
become dire and the entirecommunity was suffering the
consequences.
Jim Jones himself was alsodeteriorating as his drug abuse
escalated and his physicalcondition worsened.
Jim suffered from convulsions,partial blindness and a
grotesque swelling in hisextremities, which Jim then

(01:34:08):
treated using a cacophony ofdrugs that included Valium,
quaaludes, stimulants andBarbiturates, causing Jim's
weight to decrease dramatically.
The situation inevitably reachedits boiling point in November
of 1978, when CaliforniaCongressman Leo Ryan organized a
fact-finding mission to Guyanato further investigate the

(01:34:30):
growing number of reported humanrights violations occurring in
Jonestown.
Ryan was joined by relatives ofTemple members, along with an
NBC camera crew and reportersfrom several newspapers.
On November 15th the grouparrived in Guyana's capital and
on November 17th they were flowndirectly into the heart of
Jonestown.
Realizing that barring thecongressman would only validate

(01:34:54):
Ryan's suspicions that Jones washiding something, jim decided
to host a welcoming receptionfor Ryan's delegation in the
Central Pavilion veiled underthe facade of normalcy, with
Jim's followers playing along bypresenting Jones Town as a
blissful paradise.

Ashley (01:35:11):
And that's how it is depicted in the movie.
The gathering is viewed as thisevent they host all of the time
, and so it's not unusual thatit's going on this night.

Remi (01:35:23):
Well, during the event, one temple member named Vernon
Gosney managed to covertly slipa note to NBC reporter Don
Harris, which was then given toCongressman Ryan.
The note read Dear CongressmanVernon Gosney and Monica Bagby,
please help us get out ofJonestown.
A nearby child happened towitness Gosney's act and quickly

(01:35:47):
alerted other Temple members.
Until he had received this note, the congressman had no reason
to suspect that anyone inJonestown were being held
against their will.
Here's a short clip ofCongressman Ryan confronting Jim
Jones with this new informationand the note he had just
received.

Jim Jones & Congressman Ry (01:36:06):
He's the one that I'm just talking
about.
Yeah, this is the man.
I want to leave his son here.
Doesn't it concern you, though,that this man, for whatever
reason, one of the people inyour group?
People play games, friend.
They lie, they lie.

(01:36:27):
What can I do about lies?
You people are going leave us.
I just beg you, please leave us, bill.
We won't bother nobody.
Anybody wants.
Please leave us, bill, we willbother nobody.
Anybody who wants to get out ofhere can get out of here.
We have no problem aboutgetting out of here.
They come and go all the time.
I don't know what kind of gamePeople like publicity, some
people do, I don't.
Some people like publicity, butif it's so damn bad, why is he

(01:36:50):
leaving his son here?

Ashley (01:37:01):
Can you?

Remi (01:37:01):
give me a good man.
I don't want to victim blamehere, but confronting him with
that note was a big mistake.
A lot of the discussion boardsthat I was reading online about
this were going over this exactthing.
Why would you directly confronthim like this?
And you can can tell by theinterview he's frazzled, it's
caught him off guard and I thinkthe congressman wasn't in fear
for his life at all and that'sthe only reason that he would do

(01:37:24):
something like this.

Ashley (01:37:26):
He came in here with eight other people, two camera
crews and as a congressman, sohe probably assumed that I am
here to find facts and this is afact.
And if I can catch this guy oncamera admitting to something or
seeming guilty to something,that's going to bolster his
evidence that he can then bringback to the United States to

(01:37:48):
elicit some sort of emergentresponse.

Remi (01:37:52):
And he had absolutely no reason to believe the tragic,
insane series of events which isabout to follow were going to
occur.

Ashley (01:38:02):
Yeah, that's something no one would predict.

Remi (01:38:05):
The following afternoon, on November 18th 1978, ryan and
his delegation, along with 15additional Temple members who
had expressed their desire toleave Jonestown prepared for
their departure.
Whispers of defection hadspread quickly throughout the
community and as tensionscontinued to rise, a temple
member named Don Slyunsuccessfully attempted to

(01:38:27):
attack Ryan with a knife beforebeing thwarted.
Though Jim Jones initially madeno attempt to stop the
defectors from leaving,internally, jim's rage was
quietly spiraling out of control.
In an effort to calm thecommunity, jim's wife, marceline
, broadcasted a message over thesettlement's loudspeakers,

(01:38:48):
claiming that everything wasfine and urged residents to
return to their homesimmediately.
Fine, and urged residents toreturn to their homes
immediately.
Congressman Ryan wanted theentire group to fly out together
, fearing retribution for anyoneleft behind, but that would
require a second plane, whichdelayed their departure.

Ashley (01:39:06):
So this is kind of like the scene in the sacrament when
Jake is basically telling Samlike we can't save these people,
we have to get out.
And Sam just cannot bringhimself to leave Savannah behind
.
So why he sends Jake to go tothe plane and to radio him back?
He just cannot bring himself toleave this little girl who has

(01:39:27):
scars on her neck, doesn't speakand a mother begging him to
take her.
So he opts to stay behind totry to rescue her, because he
knows if they leave, who knowswhat's going to happen to these
people that have now publiclyvocalized their dissent?

Remi (01:39:43):
Which is completely understandable.
You know that if you were toleave anyone behind, even if
it's for like an hour or two,those people are not leaving,
and I think the congressman wastrying to save as many people as
he could on this initial visit,knowing, or at least hoping,
that there would be more to come.
Little did they know thatbehind the scenes, jim's final

(01:40:05):
plan had already been set inmotion, with Jim's aides
preparing a large metal tubfilled with a lethal concoction
of diphenhydramine.
Large metal tub filled with alethal concoction of
diphenhydramine, promethazine,chloropromazine chloroquine,
chlorohydrate, diazepam, cyanideand grape flavor aid.

Ashley (01:40:26):
That's basically a mix of a shit ton of sedatives,
poison and flavored water.

Remi (01:40:31):
As Ryan and his delegation began boarding two planes at
the Port Ketayuma airstrip inpreparation for their departure,
jonestown's armed securityforce, known as the Red Brigade,
arrived on the scene in a dumptruck heavily armed and, without
warning, opened fire on thefirst plane, while one of the
supposed defectors inside thesecond plane, named Larry Layton

(01:40:53):
, pulled out his own concealedgun and began shooting at the
passengers.
Congressman Ryan, along withNBC journalist Don Harris,
cameraman Bob Brown, sanFrancisco Examiner photographer
Greg Robinson and Temple memberPatricia Parks, all lost their
lives during the brutal ambush.
Miraculously, some did survivethe attack, including a member

(01:41:17):
of Ryan's staff named JackieSpeer, deputy chief of mission
Richard Dwyer, nbc producer BobFlick, sound engineer Steve Sung
, as well as reporters TimReiterman, ron Javers and
Charles Krause.
Several defectors also managedto escape by fleeing for their
lives into the surroundingjungle.

Ashley (01:41:38):
And so there were some people on the plane that did
make it out.

Remi (01:41:42):
Only one person on the plane died.
Surprisingly, everyone elsefleed for their lives.
There's several differentaccounts of where people hid.
One man hid in a ditch for likeover a day.
People ran into the jungle andthere is no account of what
happened to them.
They literally just fleed fortheir lives and no one knows
what happened from there.

(01:42:02):
It was a situation of just runor die.
Back in Jonestown, Jim Jonesreceived word that his guards
had failed and some of Ryan'sgroup had survived the ambush.
Word that his guards had failedand some of Ryan's group had
survived the ambush, Fearingthat the US government would

(01:42:22):
soon send the military to seizeJonestown in retaliation.
Jim gathered his followers inthe Central Pavilion that
evening and informed them thatthe congressman was now dead.
Jim continued by warning hisfollowers that the US military
would inevitably lay siege ontheir community with intentions
of slaughtering every lastmember, and the only way to
escape this horrific fate was toinitiate Jim's plan of
revolutionary suicide.

(01:42:43):
Most disturbingly, a 44-minuteaudio recording of the event was
later discovered, offering aglimpse into Jonestown's
terrifying final moments, whichcan easily be found online in
its entirety and is mostcommonly known as the Jonestown
Death Tape.

Please , for God's sakes, let's get on
with it.
We've lived.
We've lived as no other peoplehave lived and loved.
We've had as much of this worldas you're going to get.
Let's just be done with it.
Let's be done with the agony ofit.
It's far, far harder to have towatch you every day die slowly,
and from the time you're achild to the time you get gray,

(01:43:25):
you're dying.
It's honest and I'm sure thatthey'll pay for it.
They'll pay for it.
This pay for it.
This is a revolutionary suicide.
This is not a self-destructivesuicide, so they'll pay for this
.
They brought this upon us andthey'll pay for that.

Ashley (01:43:44):
I leave that destiny to them again two observations of
this clip three I.
The first is this is incrediblydisturbing that this was going
on for fucking 45 minutes.
Second, how big of him to sayhe's not drinking this juice
because he wants to stay behindand make sure everyone gets to

(01:44:08):
where they need to go and thegovernment can just do as they
wish with him.

Remi (01:44:13):
I listened to a good portion of this video and it is
extremely disturbing If you wantto hear it.
It is out there.
It is even on the Wikipediapage for Jonestown.
But something that I foundreally unsettling was the cries
of the children that you hear inthe background throughout all
of it, and there's also portionswhere the audience does speak.

(01:44:34):
They talk about what should wedo?
Should we commit this act?
Should we do something else?
The congressman is dead.
They have an open discussionabout this for quite some time
and, in the end, this is thechoice that they all came to.

Ashley (01:44:49):
The other observation I have is he sounds so frenzied in
this, whereas in the sacrament,when James Jones is urging his
followers to drink the juice,he's very, very calm and just
saying like this is the mosthumane way to go.
This isn't suicide, we are justsacrificing ourselves.

(01:45:09):
It'll be, painless, whereashere James Jones is basically
saying drink it as fast as hecan with some sort of weird lisp
he's acquired.

Remi (01:45:18):
I firmly believe that Jim Jones was on a lot of
pharmaceutical drugs when thisoccurred.
You can tell he's kind ofslurring his speech in this clip
and in the earlier clip withthe congressman he wasn't.
So my assumption is he knewthis was coming so he just
loaded up.
So my assumption is he knewthis was coming so he just
loaded up on all the pills hehad and then went out to his

(01:45:40):
congregation.
Jim Jones had previouslyinstructed his medical team to
research alternative ways toexterminate the population of
Jonestown, since there wouldn'tbe enough bullets to kill
everyone.
Jonestown doctor Larry Scheidtwas the man who first suggested
sodium cyanide for this purpose,and since 1976, the temple had

(01:46:01):
been receiving regular shipmentsof cyanide acquired through a
jeweler's license obtained underthe pretense of using the
substance to clean gold.

Ashley (01:46:10):
Jesus, so he was planning this for a really long
time gold Jesus.

Remi (01:46:17):
So he was planning this for a really long time At least
two years, yeah.
Then, in May of 1978, drScheidt even suggested testing
the cyanide on a large pig inorder to gauge the poison's
effectiveness.
Though it is unknown if thistest actually occurred or not, a
paper trail was later uncoveredrevealing that Dr Scheidt had
ordered one pound of sodiumcyanide from the chemical
company in California that sameyear, which is roughly enough

(01:46:40):
poison to kill 1,800 people.
On the night in question,jones's aides carried a large
metal vat containing a darkpurple liquid that had been
prepared by Dr Scheidt into thepavilion, as a line of guards
armed with crossbows circled thepavilion, surrounded by another
ring of guards carrying guns.

Ashley (01:47:01):
I have a question Is there any evidence that Larry
Scheidt felt guilt or remorsefor helping to orchestrate this?
And I ask this because in themovie, when Jake is wandering
around trying to find Sam, hedoes go into the infirmary where
he finds Wendy the nurse who isclearly this Larry Scheidt

(01:47:23):
character dead in the bed with anote that she had written and
dropped before she died thatsaid God, please forgive me.

Remi (01:47:30):
As far as I could find.
No, this was this doctor's idea.
He performed tests.
He ordered it.
He was basically the personthat came up with this entire
thing, because Jim Jones askedhis team to think of
quote-unquote creative ways toexterminate the entire community
, because they couldn't usebullets.

(01:47:51):
Because they couldn't usebullets, mothers were then
instructed to bring their babiesforward, under Joan's directive
that the children would be thefirst killed.
Infants were then fed thepoison through syringes, and
those who refused had theirchildren taken by force.
The grape-flavored cyanide wasthen distributed to the
community, with anyone whorefused being forcibly injected

(01:48:14):
with the deadly poison.
In the ensuing moments, parentswatched helplessly as their
children began to scream out inagony from the effects of the
painful toxin, then, one by one,fell silent, only to be joined
moments later by their mourningparents.

Ashley (01:48:30):
That is so manipulative having the parents do this to
the kids first, because how areyou going to change your mind?

Remi (01:48:36):
I think that was by design .
He had been thinking about thisfor two years and I think that
he knew that if he started withthe children, the parents would
feel that they didn't have areason to stay.
As the population of Jonestownsteadily dwindled, the guards
themselves were ordered toimbibe the poison as well and

(01:48:56):
obediently followed suit, alongwith the rest of the community.
As fear and panic ran rampant,jim Jones looked on callously as
his loyal followers slowly diedoff in anguish, suffering and
screaming all around him, untilJones himself finally placed the
barrel of a .38 Smith Wesson tohis right temple and pulled the
trigger.

Ashley (01:49:17):
His decision to kill himself in this way just further
highlights how much of a cowardthis man is.
He's making his entirecongregation watch on as their
kids and loved ones die, and inan incredibly painful, painful
way, and he takes the easy wayout.

Remi (01:49:38):
I had to research the effects of cyanide for this
episode and I think a lot ofpeople think that it's a quick
death, like you pop a pill andyou're dead a minute later.
It is not.
It is a slow, painful,agonizing death, and I could not
imagine just the atmospheregoing on at this time.

(01:49:58):
It would have just been filledwith screams.
And the fact that this cowardwatched all of this and then
chose the easy way out after allof this is just so despicable.
In the end, a total of 909people tragically lost their
lives that day, including 276children, making Jonestown the

(01:50:21):
single greatest loss of Americancivilian life until the
September 11th attacks in 2001.

Ashley (01:50:28):
909 people.
That is insane.

Remi (01:50:32):
It is a staggering number.
I was shocked when I first readthat number.
I knew it was a lot of people.
I did not realize that it wasalmost a thousand people In the
movie it's 167.
You could not get 900 extrasand that's, in my opinion, why
they showed it at that level, inmy opinion, why they showed it

(01:50:59):
at that level.
167 is still horrific, but 909is something that I can't even
fathom.
85 members of the People'sTemple did manage to survive the
ordeal by escaping into thejungle as the horror unfolded,
Jim Jones's three sons, Jim Jr,Stephen and Tim Jones, also
survived, since they had been inGeorgetown with the People's
Temple basketball team duringthe time of the poisoning.

(01:51:20):
When the brothers heard what wasoccurring back in Jonestown,
they immediately drove to the USEmbassy to alert authorities,
only to be turned away byGuyanese soldiers who had just
learned of the initial airstripshootings.
So they were already focusingon the congressmen that they
didn't even have time to startlooking into this other thing

(01:51:40):
that was occurring.
By the time the Guyanesemilitary finally arrived in
Jonestown, they were greeted byhundreds upon hundreds of
lifeless bodies lying scatteredacross the vast commune
landscape.
Jim Jones was discovered with asingle gunshot wound to the
head in the central pavilion,with his official cause of death
confirmed to be suicide.

(01:52:00):
During the fallout, the USmilitary organized an airlift to
recover the multitude ofcorpses and return their remains
to the United States.
Meanwhile, Jim Jones's threesurviving sons, Tim Stephen and
Jim Jr, were all placed understrict house arrest and
interrogated for five days.

Ashley (01:52:20):
What happened to his other kids, because he had like
six, seven of them, so were theyall here.

Remi (01:52:26):
From the documentary that I watched on this.
He has four children thatsurvived this.
So these are three brothers,and there's one other one that
survived this.
So these are three brothers andthere's one other one that
survived this.

Ashley (01:52:35):
What about the?
I can't remember his name.
The kid that was left on hisown that he said was his, but
probably wasn't.

Remi (01:52:44):
He was not listed amongst the survivors.

Ashley (01:52:48):
That is so interesting to me because it sounds like
most of them were not atJonestown when this went down.
So I wonder if that was part ofthe plan, if he had them out of
the commune when he knewCongressman Ryan was coming, or
if it was just a coincidence.
Part of me really really thinksthat he purposefully made it so

(01:53:10):
they were away in case thisplan wasn't acted so they were
away in case this plan wasenacted.

Remi (01:53:21):
Part of me does think that it is very weird and
coincidental that his sons wereaway during this time, because I
do think that this plan was alast resort for Jim Jones.
I don't think this wassomething he was planning on
doing when the congressman came.
I think this was something thathe enacted because things had
gone so badly and thecongressman was dead and news of
what was going on there wasinevitably going to get out.
So he enacted this.

(01:53:41):
But I have to believe that inthe back of his mind he thought,
if things go sour, it would bebetter if my three sons were
away playing basketball ratherthan here during this.

Ashley (01:53:53):
That's what I think.
I don't think when thecongressman landed, jim Jones
thought it's going to end thisway, but I do think in the back
of his mind he knew there was apossibility of things not going
his way and if that was the casethings were going to end badly
for him, the congressman andeveryone in Jonestown at the

(01:54:15):
time.

Remi (01:54:16):
Jim's son, tim, and another Temple basketball player
named Johnny Cobb were takenback to Jonestown in order to
assist in identifying the bodies.
Stephen, jim's only biologicalson, on the other hand, he was
accused of being involved in thedeaths and was subsequently
imprisoned in Guyana for threemonths, while Jim Jones Jr

(01:54:37):
returned to the US under policesurveillance for several months
until eventually moving in withhis older sister, suzanne, who
had already distanced herselffrom the temple long before the
massacre.
So that's the fourth one.

Ashley (01:54:49):
It really sucks for those kids, but there's no way
the government can just be likeall right bye.
They would be under suchintense questioning.
There's no way you would thinkthat they had no idea that their
dad was going to do somethingthis terrible.

Remi (01:55:05):
And I don't go into detail on this because it's already a
very long episode, but Stephen,his biological son, probably did
some of the most helpful workafter this event took place.
He took it upon himself to helpsurvivors return to life.
He worked with anyone who hadbeen a part of the temple to

(01:55:27):
help them reintegrate intosociety.
He literally spent the rest ofhis life trying to make right
the horrific thing that hisfather did.
So Stephen is a good man.
I will say that.

Ashley (01:55:41):
I can't imagine being any of these surviving kids.
Your whole life is shadowed bywhat your father did.

Remi (01:55:49):
While searching through the chilling ruins of Jonestown,
federal investigators happenedupon the last will and testament
of Jim Jones' wife Marceline,containing a directive to
transfer any remaining templeassets to the Communist Party of
the Soviet Union.
It was later uncovered that themajority of the temple's money
had been held in foreign bankaccounts and had already been

(01:56:11):
electronically transferredbefore the massacre, including
$7.3 million into Sovietaccounts, which is the
equivalent of $35 million todaywhen adjusted for inflation.
Soon news of the horrific eventinevitably reached the media
and became commonly referred toas the Jonestown Massacre.

(01:56:32):
Concurrently, christian leadersacross America were quick to
distance themselves from JimJones by denouncing him as
satanic and asserting that hisideology had absolutely no
connection to traditionalChristianity.

Ashley (01:56:47):
How convenient.

Remi (01:56:48):
There's a lot of public figures that were scrambling to
cover their asses.
After this came out, a lot ofpeople had publicly endorsed Jim
Jones and this church, and itwas a very bad look for a lot of
people.
Even the Disciples of Christ,which had previously ordained
Jones as a minister, startedimplementing stricter ethical
guidelines and created a newprocess to remove ministers in

(01:57:12):
an effort to prevent anothersituation like Jonestown from
ever happening.
So, tightening those rules alittle bit, maybe we shouldn't
just allow anybody to be anordained minister just
willy-nilly.
Numerous political figures whohad once supported Jones and
spoken highly of him and hiswork in the past found
themselves in quite the pickleand scrambling for explanations.

(01:57:34):
Some admitted that they hadbeen deceived, only to realize
too late the extent of Jones'smanipulation.
The Jonestown Massacre exposedmany deep flaws in how cults
were being monitored.
After it was uncovered thatauthorities had received
numerous warnings and tipsregarding the dangers of the
People's Temple, yet no officialinvestigation was conducted

(01:57:56):
until the incident had alreadyoccurred.
Although the People's Templewas now only a memory, there
were still some individuals whocontinued to follow the
teachings of Jim Jones well intothe 1980s.
Many survivors struggled toreintegrate into society and
refused to speak publicly aboutthe incident for decades, due to
the public stigma surroundingJonestown.

(01:58:17):
Others, including Jim'sbiological son, stephen, spent
years rebuilding the remnants oftheir tattered lives, while
assisting other survivors in theprocess and sharing their own
experiences of Jonestown throughinterviews and various forms of
media.

Ashley (01:58:32):
I think both of these reactions are completely
understandable.
You have the one type of personwho is thinking I want to share
my experience to make sure thisdoesn't happen again.
And you have the other personwho just wants it all to go away
and not to have to constantlyrelive their trauma.

Remi (01:58:52):
And both sides are equally understandable, and the
documentary which I watchedabout this.
The majority of the interviewsin the film are from survivors
who are speaking of theirpersonal experiences.

Ashley (01:59:05):
And we'll have that documentary listed in the
episode notes if you areinterested in watching.

Remi (01:59:11):
Today, the infamy of Jonestown lives on in the form
of various documentaries, films,books, music, art and even this
very podcast.
Possibly the most disturbingimpact on society has been the
addition of the phrase drinkingthe Kool-Aid as a term
symbolizing blind obedience,despite the fact that Flavor-Aid

(01:59:32):
had actually been the beverageconsumed by the residents of
Jonestown, and that was the truestory of Ty West's the
Sacrament.
What do you think, Ashley?

Ashley (01:59:43):
Wow, I am kind of speechless over here.
I obviously knew thateverything that happened at
Jonestown was horrific and thatit wasn't this lovely, peaceful
community of happy residentsfrolicking in daisies and living
life at its fullest.
There's no way it would haveended like this if that's the

(02:00:04):
case, but I did not know orrealize how scary and horrible
it was for everyone that livedthere from the second they got
there horrible it was foreveryone that lived there from
the second they got there.

Remi (02:00:18):
I could not imagine the fear that the residents of
Jonestown were living in evenbefore this night where
everything happened the drillsthat they were forced to go into
, the manual labor, theshortages of food and
punishments.
You were given even less foodand you already weren't being
fed, and I just would be inconstant anxiety.
I would be constantly havingpanic attacks.

(02:00:41):
This would be the moststressful, horrific situation to
find yourself in and, to makeit worse, you are in another
country and you're stuck.
There's nothing you can doabout it, so you're just
subjected to this madman'slunacy on a loop for years.
There's no way it wouldn'taffect you.

Ashley (02:01:01):
And a madman who, when you first met him, didn't seem
like a madman.
He seemed like someone thatstarted with these ideas.
That seemed admirable Equaltreatment for everyone,
anti-racism.

Remi (02:01:17):
Those were admirable ideas .
His concepts of desegregationand stuff those were really
beneficial concepts to beintroducing to society.

Ashley (02:01:27):
The other aspect of this that shocked me was just the
intense preparations andplanning that he took.
I don't know why that shockedme, because to pull off
something like this, to have 909people die by drinking this
punch, that's obviously notsomething you can throw together
on the fly and implement.
But the amount of work he didand consultation that he did

(02:01:52):
with people that were there,that were his trusted colleagues
and probably esteemed membersof this community, is just so
tragic.

Remi (02:02:03):
I think that Jim Jones knew that the end was gonna come
.
I don't think he knew when, Idon't think he knew that this
situation with the congressmanwas gonna end how it did, but I
think he knew from when he senteveryone to Jonestown and he
stayed in America to keepnavigating things over there.
Things got worse for him.

(02:02:24):
The government was crackingdown on him.
He was under more and moreinvestigation.
The IRS was looking into hisfunds.
He knew that this was not goingto last much longer and I think
because of that, those coupleof years where Jonestown was set
up and he stayed in America, heknew that when he went down
there Jonestown was the lastresort and that's his last stand

(02:02:47):
.
And I think he knew that goingin.
But nobody else did.

Ashley (02:02:51):
This also makes me have a really weird idea, but I feel
like somewhere in the schoolingthat we get in the United States
, something like this should beincluded, because there has been
so many cults that have poppedup and ended badly, and I feel
like this is just such a goodexample of why people should be

(02:03:17):
hesitant and question whencertain leaders try to get this
all-encompassing authority andloyalty.

Remi (02:03:27):
My opinion is nobody should ever put 100% of their
faith and trust into one person.
Nobody is infallible.
Everyone has their secrets,Everyone has their side that
they're not showing people.
And Jonestown is really thecult story.
If you think of cults, youthink of Jonestown, you think of

(02:03:50):
Jim Jones and all of the cultsthat we've watched documentaries
of for years and years now.
They all have a very similarpattern as Jones Town, maybe
with a far less extreme ending,but they all start off as this
one man having this cause.
That seems like a good cause,seems like something that people
can get behind.

(02:04:11):
And just as time progresses itbecomes darker and darker and
darker, and by that time thepeople have been there so long
they've given over everything.
There's no turning back.
It's horrific.
I couldn't imagine being insuch a situation.

Ashley (02:04:26):
Well, I for one am very glad we opted to do this episode
.
We questioned whether we weregoing to do it for two reasons.
One, the movie is just sounknown.
And the second, we thought,well, everyone has already heard
about Jonestown, so hopefully,by listening to this, it does
two things.
It interests you in watchingthe Sacrament because it

(02:04:46):
actually is a very, very goodmovie.
It's well shot, well acted,well directed, and we hope that
we provided you with some newinformation about Jonestown.

Remi (02:04:55):
And I have to say I do wish that Ty West got the
opportunity to make thatminiseries Based on the
description of the film you gaveand the clips that you showed
me.
This movie is way closer toreality than I would have
expected.
But we'll hold off on that forthe time being, until our
verdict.
But for now let's jump into ourobjection of the week.

(02:05:19):
Your Honor, I object.
And why is that, mr Reed?

Because it's devastating, to my case,
overruled, good call.

Ashley (02:05:29):
And as a quick reminder, our objection of the week is
the most unnecessary change fromthe true life to the movie
adaptation, not necessarily thebiggest Remy.
Why don't you kick us off withyour objection?

Remi (02:05:42):
All right, this one was harder than I expected.
I know it's a pretty short filmand it's a long story and a lot
of the changes made were bigchanges and a lot of the changes
made were big changes.
So it would go against thespirit of this section of the
podcast if we went with likeVice News or something like that
.
So what I went with was thefact that nobody set themselves

(02:06:05):
on fire.
No point at Jonestown was thereany person that set themselves
on fire.
There was no fires.
That part was unnecessary.
I can understand it was donefor dramatic purposes but yeah,
nobody ever set themselves onfire in Jonestown.

Ashley (02:06:22):
The one I'm going to go with is that in the movie Father
didn't have a wife.
I think it actually would havebeen much more interesting if Ty
West would have included thatthere was a wife, but shown
Caroline showing the crew aroundand then going to father at the
late night scene when she'sintoxicated and it's clearly

(02:06:43):
alluded that she's being calledfor a sexual reason.

Remi (02:06:47):
I agree with you.
You got my vote on this one.
Poor Marceline, she was therethe whole time being
horrifically, mentally andemotionally manipulated, and
physically at times, I'm sure,being at Jonestown.
So, yeah, I agree.
I think that adding her to thefilm would have been very easy
and I think it would have addedmore to the character, knowing

(02:07:08):
that he had a wife there thatwas following along with him.

Ashley (02:07:13):
Yay, I'm so glad.
Usually you've been killing itthis season with the objections.
No, that was a good one.

Remi (02:07:18):
But now let's go into the main part of our podcast, our
verdict.

Narrator (02:07:25):
At the conclusion of each episode, our hosts will
deliver a verdict based on thefilm's accuracy.
If the film is an honestportrayal of the events, then it
will earn a not guilty verdict.
If the film is an honestportrayal of the events, then it
will earn a not guilty verdict.
If the adaptation is mostlyfactual but creative liberties
were taken for the sake ofentertainment, the film will be
declared a mistrial.
But if the film ultimatelystrays too far from the truth,

(02:07:48):
then it will be condemned asguilty and sentenced to a life
behind bars.

Remi (02:07:53):
Since I started things last time, I'm going to let you
start things this time, Ashley.
So what do you think?

Ashley (02:08:00):
Before I say my verdict, I just want to preface this by
saying the movie is depictingthe last 24 to 48 hours of the
people at Jonestown.
So, because of that, ourverdict is going to be based on
the last 24 to 48 hours of thepeople at Jonestown.
And I am shocked to say this.
I was convinced that when westarted this just because it was

(02:08:22):
a horror movie from 2013 thatmade so little money that no one
had ever heard of that it wasno doubt going to be guilty, but
my verdict is mistrial.
I am very surprised with howmuch, especially because it was
advertised that this movie wasloosely inspired by the

(02:08:44):
Jonestown Massacre.
I don't think this movie wasloosely inspired by the
Jonestown Massacre.
I think this movie was based onthe Jonestown Massacre.
There are so many similaritiesfrom just the timeline of it.
All these outsiders came, theywere introduced to this
community that, on its face,seemed like a lovely place for

(02:09:07):
people to live.
They get slipped a note andthen the curtains start falling
and the leader is scrambling toprevent the American government
from learning what is going on.
Has everyone drink juice,shoots himself in the head and
the big differences.
I see that Ty West took a lotof them are obviously because of

(02:09:30):
budgetary reasons.
He couldn't have 909 extras sohe scaled it down to 160.
He couldn't have the newsaffiliate that went in to this
place be NBC, so he picked ViceNews.
Even putting those aside, itprobably would have gotten a not

(02:09:51):
guilty verdict from me.
But the whole reason why thereporters go to Jonestown in the
first place aren't because acongressman is like
investigating human rightsviolations.
It's this guy who's like is mysister okay?
And then I think the otherreason why it gets a mistrial
for me versus a not guilty isjust really how the Jim Jones

(02:10:12):
character is portrayed in theSacrament.
He is a much more calm,soothing presence than Jim Jones
obviously was at the time andthat was by design.
That's how Gene Jones wanted toplay him and he achieved his
goal.
For all those reasons I amgoing to say Mistrial, but with
the caveat that this movie wassurprisingly close to getting a

(02:10:34):
not guilty verdict for me.

Remi (02:10:36):
And I am right there with you.
Surprisingly, I went into thiswith a guilty verdict and after
hearing you talk about theevents again, we're only
focusing on those two days,because that is what the film
focused on.
I was shocked at how manylittle things that it actually

(02:10:57):
carried over, from Jim Jones'ssuicide to the note to the
massacre occurring on the secondday.
There was a lot of stuff thatwas lining up way more than I
would have imagined, especiallyafter watching the trailer.
Again, I haven't't seen thismovie, but it seems to have
lined up in a lot of differentareas.

(02:11:18):
The framework is there, andthat is my definition for a
mistrial.
The framework is there.
That is the actual story,surprisingly, but because they
updated it, making it modern day, making it vice, not including
a congressman, the ending withthe woman setting herself on
fire, things like that kind ofgo into crazy town, in my

(02:11:41):
opinion, and not as on point.

Ashley (02:11:44):
And even the things like in the movie there's only one
dissenter and he is quickly shotdown.
Versus in real life it was moreof a conversation.

Remi (02:11:53):
But that's time constraints too.
I firmly believe that if tywest was given the opportunity
to turn this into a mini-series,actually basing it fully on jim
jones, he would have done areally good job.
Surprisingly, I'm amazed I'meven saying that like this was a
horror movie found footagething and I definitely went into

(02:12:15):
this thinking this is justgoing to be a cheesy horror.
There's no way.
But they actually aligned a lotof the details.

Ashley (02:12:24):
In all the interviews with him he does stress that he
was very fascinated by Jim Jonesand cults and that that's why
he chose this as his firstgrounded in reality movie, and I
think his interest and researchinto Jonestown really shines.

Remi (02:12:44):
You can definitely tell that this is someone that has
actually researched the realevents and that the real events
played a heavy, heavy, heavyinfluence on this story that he
created, and my hat's off to himfor the scenes I saw of the
dialogue.
It all seemed very in line withthe type of sermons Jim Jones

(02:13:04):
would have been saying and themood.
I know.
It's far less people.
It would have been hundreds ofpeople as opposed to less than
200 in the film, but from theclips I saw the atmosphere of
the landscape with theloudspeakers and it just
captured what in my head, Ithought Jonestown would have
felt like, and that in and ofitself is very, very admirable,

(02:13:30):
especially for a found footagehorror movie like this that's
produced by Eli Roth.
They definitely were not goingfor accuracy, but I think the
director included it justbecause it was something he was
interested in and I think if hewas given that opportunity to do
the full story he would havedone a great job.
So, yeah, surprisingly,mistrial all around on this one.

(02:13:51):
After giving Gucci a guiltyverdict last week, this movie
gets a mistrial.
I'm fucking flabbergasted,ashley.

Ashley (02:14:00):
Well, with that, hats off to you, ty West, remy, what
do we have coming next week?

Remi (02:14:06):
We will be discussing Aileen Wuornos and the film
Monster.

Ashley (02:14:12):
Yes, we are doing our single serial killer episode of
the season and we elected themost infamous, well-known female
serial killers, Eileen Wuornos.

Remi (02:14:26):
I've only seen this movie once in theaters, when it came
out many, many years ago.
I love Charlize Theron, I loveChristina Ricci and I am really
looking forward to revisitingthis.

Ashley (02:14:39):
And stay tuned at the end of this episode for a sneak
peek of the trailer.
But before we depart, thank youvery much for listening.
Please remember to like,comment, subscribe and we will
see you all next week forMonster.

Remi (02:14:56):
And until next time everybody court is adjourned.
So where?

Narrator (02:15:01):
are you headed?
Put the cigarette out.
You don't know me.

Monster Trailer (02:15:08):
Why is the thing so horrible?
You can't even imagine it.
It's usually a lot easier thanyou think.
Shelby that garble you to adick, right?
No, I know what I'm doing andyou're never gonna understand it
, all right, so you gotta trustme.
You never really know untilyou're the one standing there.
You think nobody ever talkeddirty to you before.
I just like to settle first youknow Me.

(02:15:28):
Who killed that man?
What do you think?
You can't kill people, says whoPeople kill each other every day
.
I think that all these peoplejust didn't know yet who I was
going to be, but one day they'dall see.

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