Well, Saturday afternoon, we watched the
Going Clear documentary. Lucky they happened to be playing it during free HBO weekend. (Well, it probably wasn't luck so much as a sure-fire way to pull in more subscribers. But whatever the case...)
While my husband really liked it, my feelings about it were mixed. Here is my rather rambling take on it (if anyone cares)
It was very professionally done. Great film quality. There were a lot of good interviews, and I was especially glad to see Hana Whitfield, among others. Unfortunately, some of the more interesting parts of their stories were left out - though of course time constraints would have been an issue.
Gibney had managed to track down some quotes from Sara Northrup (Hubbard's second wife, the girl whose affections he stole from Jack Parsons) and also had some freaky film footage of Northrup and Jack Parsons which I'd never seen before . However, the documentary failed to mention that Hubbard was already married with children by that time and was committing bigamy at that point. It did give some small amount of information about Hubbard's time in Cuba, after he'd taken his and Northrup's daughter. That was new.
This omission of Hubbard's bigamy (as well as some other odd omissions) made me raise my eyebrows a bit, and made me wonder if Gibney was skirting certain issues for legal reasons, rather than simply time constraints.*
Also impressive was the inclusion of the film of David Miscavige's speech when he announced that L .Ron had gone "exterior" to do research, ie died. I'd often heard of this speech but never seen it. I was also glad to see more footage and photographs of Marty Rathbun as the fearsome, cold-eyed "inspector general" of the church, as opposed to only the "nice guy" image he presents today.
Also, regarding Marty, I do believe he was (again) dissembling about the scheme to gain IRS tax exemption. Not that I blame him for not admitting more than he has to, but the true story of how that exemption was gained is pretty much the holy grail of the anti-Scientology movement. The bit of the story he told was probably factual, mind, I'm just saying it probably doesn't even scratch the surface.
There were mentions of The Hole, the musical chairs incident, etc. Lots about Tom Cruise, yada yada, but no mention of Operation Snow White, which was a shocking omission, IMO. (you'd think the tale of a government infiltration would weigh a little heavier than finding a girlfriend for Tom Cruise, but I suppose this is television, after all.) No mention of Lisa McPherson and the "introspection rundown" either.
The biggest flaw in the documentary, to me, though, was that it didn't really give a good impression of why someone would join Scientology in the first place, why it can be so compelling. It just seemed like some weirdness that no one would touch with a ten-foot pole. I'm not sure what Gibney's aim was in telling the story, however. Perhaps he didn't want to show the compelling side of it.
tl;dr version:
Worth watching, nice visuals, a fair primer on Scientology and the effects it's had on some members. However, a person who wants a real grasp on the subject would do better to watch the videos made by Sheila Huber, Tori Chistman, Hana Whitfield, Arnie Lerma, Rathbun and Rinder, et al.
*Afterwards, I spoke to someone who was involved with the film, and have even more reason to believe this is true. The filmmaker must have been very careful in what he included and how, and this may be why the COS hasn't sued...yet, anyway. (I don't know this for sure, only making an educated guess - so don't quote me on that.
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