Product Details

• Actors: Powers Boothe, James Earl Jones, Ned Beatty, Rosalind Cash, Brad Dourif
• Format: Color, DVD, NTSC
• Language: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: Unrated
• Studio: Alpha Home Entertainment
• DVD Release Date: February 26, 2008
• Run Time: 240 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B0013XZ71K
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #14,383 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• For more information about "Story of Jim Jones - Guyana Tragedy" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

Editorial Reviews

JIM JONES STORY/GUYANA TRAGEDY - DVD Movie

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Video quality not that bad 5 stars for the movie 3 for dvd., November 27, 2008

By 

Bucksix (Anaheim CA, Home of the world champ ANGELS) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Story of Jim Jones - Guyana Tragedy (DVD)

The above reviewer lambastes the DVD quality. I bought this anyway. Although a far cry from hi def, the video was more than watchable. The movie itself is so riveting the you get lost in it and don't notice any flaws in the DVD. Powers Boothe gives a performance of a lifetime (although just about everything he does is a performance of a lifetime). It is impossible to watch this without being touched deeply.
Aristotle said that the purpose of tragedy is to produce a catharsis in the viewer. This movie does that and then some.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Great movie, but needs remastering and restoring, January 14, 2011

By 

Matt Tawesson (Macomb, IL, USA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Story of Jim Jones - Guyana Tragedy (DVD)

This is an excellent movie. However, the quality of the video is questionable, with bits of specks and those "cue blips" in the upper right corner of your screen (color is not bad, but needs to be touched up). The audio sounds okay, but it could use a remastering. Actually both the video and audio need to be cleaned up so that it will look and sound a lot better. This movie is worth watching, though, and you get so into the movie that you just tune out the visual imperfections. My mom and I have this movie on a VHS tape that we recorded from Encore's Movie Plex channel some years ago on LP mode, and the picture and sound quality is sharper. A+ for an excellent movie and the actors, but the quality of the picture and sound get a C+. To whoever released this movie, please work on improving the sound and picture.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars 30-years later and I still won't drink purple Kool-Aid!, July 24, 2010

By 

J. Johnson (Gainesboro, TN USA) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Story of Jim Jones - Guyana Tragedy (DVD)

This is a made for TV movie true story of a preacher that had a cult following that later committed mass suicide by drinking what everyone thinks was purple cyanide-laced Kool-Aid but it was actually a brand called Flavor-Aid.

To this day you might here someone say something like "He's drinking the purple Kool-Aid" when talking about a blind following of another person's sayings or teachings.

This might be the reason the Kool-Aid man is red and not purple. You have to feel sorry for Kool-Aid. It wasn't even their product in the movie or real life!

Made for TV in the late 70s early 80s three-channel days was in many ways much less restrictive that it is today. The N-word and F-word (the three-letter one) are used in serious context several times.

This was a powerful TV broadcast in its time. Right up there with "Roots". Powers Boothe looked exactly like the real Jim Jones when he put those sun glasses on.

Had Powers Boothe chosen to use his powers for evil instead of good he could have had the same cult church following. To say Powers Boothe was convincing in the role of Jim Jones is an understatement. He was Jim Jones. Boothe won an Emmy Award for this. He deserved to win every TV and movie award out there.

The 2008 DVD release from Alpha Home Entertainment is the most horrible quality DVD I have ever bought. It's also edited and missing SIX-MINUTES of content. It's dollar store DVD quality.

I also own the 1986 unedited release from VCII Home Video and its a much cleaner and brighter copy of the film on two VHS tapes that runs the full 3-hours and 10-minutes. Watch that version if you can find it.