When a young journalist decides to follow up on his sister, whom he hasn’t seen since she joined a suspiciously cult-like group, one that – of course – swears it isn’t a cult, he brings along a small documentary crew. The group and their charismatic leader, “Father” (Gene Jones), have built a seemingly paradisical village of their own in some unidentified corner of the world. Of course, beneath the surface this paradise isn’t all that it seems to be.
Ti West’s 2013 found-footage opus The Sacrament is indebted in pretty much equal measure to three sources: the events at Jonestown, Guyana; Kevin Smith’s 2011 horror-drama Red State; and the style of those VICE documentaries which were all the rage a decade ago. The latter, West absolutely nails down to the small details – it’s unusual, though perhaps unsurprising, that VICE allowed this film to use their actual name and branding rather than the more conventional Bland Name Product approach. With regards to Red State, this is another story about three arrogant, feckless, yet somehow likeable youths getting in over their head with a terrifyingly charismatic cult leader, inspired by real-life events; and with regards to the Jonestown thing, well, watch the film and it’ll become clear.
Some may find the way the film repurposes a horrifying incident from real history as entertainment, but Ti West is neither dumb nor callous, and the film is an unflinching, and morally serious, work that sets out to investigate the real psychology that allows people to give themselves up wholeheartedly to what – to outsiders – is clearly, clearly a cult. Gene Jones carries much of this; his Father character moves seamlessly from soft-spoken good humour to end-of-the-world rhetoric and at times it’s easy to imagine oneself gladly following him. The showstopper scene here is an unbroken seventeen-minute scene in which our intrepid reporters attempt an interview with Father. I say “attempt”, because Father ably demonstrates the politician’s magic of answering questions without answering them at all, of turning even the most straightforward enquiries into an opportunity to showcase his virtuoso yet meaningless rhetoric, such that the interview winds up being more another of Father’s sermons. It’s electrifying, to the point that you never notice that the scene is the length of an entire “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida”. The whole film is a brisk 100 minutes, so it’s 17% of the entire runtime.
The film’s other showcase scene is its nightmarish ending, in which the tension, horror and tragedy simply does not let up until the credits roll. Personally, I was left breathless for some minutes afterwards. Of course, in time a few little niggles occurred to me, as with anything, but honestly they’re insignificant niggles in a film this accomplished. One other praiseworthy thing remains, which thoroughly deserves to be noted – this is one of the few found-footage films which makes it plausible that our imperilled heroes don’t simply put down the camera, both on the level of pure plot and on an emotional level – the characters as established would respond to peril this way; it’s logical given the personalities demonstrated. Now that’s rare.
Second Sight’s release gives some insight into the indie film-making process, something that feels doubly appropriate given that this is a low-budget film imitating the style of something even lower-budget (a three-man VICE documentary). There are twenty-minute-ish interviews with actors AJ Bowen (“Indie Guys at Heart”), Joe Swanberg (“The Best Pathway”), Amy Seimetz (“An Ecstatic State”) and, best of all, Gene Jones (“The Itch to Act”), who was a film producer until, late in life, he took up acting basically on a whim. We also hear from producer Peter Phok in “A Wild Ride”; additionally, there is a short making-of, “We’re Not Sinners Here” and, a Second Sight staple, academic Alexandra Nicholas-Heller giving a video essay. Her theme this time is “Truthiness”, the Stephen Colbert buzzword that was everywhere when The Sacrament released. In common with most of ANH’s work, “Truthiness” may feel like it’s reaching at times, but it’s intelligently and compellingly argued. Overall, aspiring indie filmmakers are as well-served simply watching the features on this and similar releases as they might be spending thousands on film school.
★★★★★
Second Sight’s The Sacrament is released on 24th June.