Surprisingly incoherent and boring

After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

It is both painfully honest and laugh-out-loud funny at the same time.

The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

This is an awesome film and Powers Boothe's performance is what makes it. When it was first broadcast on CBS-TV in 1980, Time Magazine even had an article on it. The magazine didn't think much of the film in general, but it said there is one unforgettable performance in it, "a young actor named Powers Boothe captures all the rage, power, evil and charisma of "Dad" Jim Jones. It was most unusual for them to cast a young unknown actor in such an important role, but Powers Boothe proved his worth in spades! He won an Emmy for his dynamite portrayal. There was an actor's strike at the time and he was one of the only ones who showed up to accept his award, "this may be the bravest moment of my career or the most stupid" he said. This film shows Jone's rise to power in the People Temple. Originally he was a good man of God who wanted to help others, but something went horribly wrong. Boothe captures the sinister evil that was Jim Jones, but also his charisma and charm as well. Debbie Layton was one of the few people who survived the massacre in Guyana. She knew Jones very well and said that Jones was evil but he was also very clever and good at fooling people. Jones appealed to poor blacks and people without a direction in life. He promised them a better life and a utopia in "Jonestown". The final scenes of the film detailing the horrible mass suicide in November 1978 are gut wrenching. Out of 913 dead, only Jones and his nurse had not taken poison. Boothe captures Jones rhythmic, haunting preacher cadences and his words to the dying are taken from Jone's actual words. He was recording himself at the time. We must never forget this evil man and the horror he perpetrated upon the world. Those who forget the mistakes of history are only doomed to repeat them. In Search Of...had a show on Jim Jones once and at the end the host Leonard Nimoy said that there are still people who venerate Jim Jones who sleep with his picture and who believe that he is the only person who ever loved them. That is truly sad indeed. By the way, it surprised me that Powers Boothe's career never took off the way it should have after he made this incredible debut. He beat out Henry Fonda and Jason Robards to win his Emmy. He played Phillip Marlowe in an HBO series of short films and was in A Cry For Love, Southern Comfort, Red Dawn, A Breed Apart, The Emerald Forest, Extreme Prejudice and Into The Homeland, but the only really good part he played that was close to this one was when he played Soviet spy John Walker in the 1990 tv film Family Of Spies.

I've seen this film literally over 100 times...it's absolutely jam-packed with entertainment!!! Powers Boothe gives a stellar performance. As a fan of actors such as William Shatner (Impulse, 1974) and Ron Liebmann (Up The Academy, 1981)I never thought an actor could capture the "intensity" like Shatner and Liebmann in those roles, until I saw Boothe as Jim Jones! As far as I'm concerned, Powers Boothe IS Jim Jones...this film captures his best performance!!!

As a big fan of knowledge on subjects such as serial killers and cult leaders, I was very excited about watching this movie about Jim Jones. I had expected too much I guess because all through watching the movie, the more I watched, the duller it became. There were some situations in the film that made you want to focus more on but the movie seemed to focus more on the bi-sexual affairs of Jones and his financial status that what we know of the person Jim Jones and what he did to those people in Jones Town. The most suspenseful part of the film I guess would be in the very beginning when there was a scare tactic in which Jones and all other cult leaders had used as a means to put fear into people and dominate and take control. The film left me to believe that Jones could have done alot of good during his lifetime helping the people instead of making a wrong decision and turning into a dominating and controling leader. Why Guyana? Why did these people follow him into a jungle where there is no excape except to be fed to the snakes? Also... I thought that the movie would be worth watching seeing that there were so many famous actors in it that we know of today, but unfortunately, they play very small roles and this left actors that are hardly known to play the much bigger roles.To finish off..... I liked the movie but it was not as great as expected and they could have done alot more to make this movie better. I give it a 5.

A well cast summary of a real event! Well, actually, I wasn't there, but I think this is how it may have been like. I think there are two typically American standpoints evident in the film: 'communistophobia' and parallels to Adolf Hitler. These should be evident to most independent observers. Anyway, Boothe does a great performance, and so do lots of other well-known actors. The last twenty minutes of the film are unbearable - and I mean it! Anyone who can sleep well after them is abnormal. (That's why it's so terrible - it all happened, and it probably looked just like that). But, actually, did that last scene on the air station really take place?