“My Scientology Movie” allows us to get some insight into the bizarre and scary world of Scientology. The style of this documentary is quite unusual and in a way, I found that a little distracting when you are already deal with a subject matter that is so strange.

BBC’s Louis Theroux tries his best to understand more about Scientology. Unable to actually get to properly speak to anybody still working within the cult, Theroux is forced to meeting with ex-members and also tries to hire actors to recreate alleged incidents of mistreatment within Scientology. Theroux is also faced with the hostilities of Scientologists that want to stop his project.

Louis Theroux does not interview politicians or celebrities, he instead interviews the freaks and misfits of society, ranging from racists to pornographers. He often remains quite calm as he tries to get his interviewees to relax but this unorthodox method for a serious journalist makes all the encounters even stranger than they otherwise would be. Marty Rathbun is a prominent ex-Scientologist and he helps Theroux but his help does not always seem appreciated as in one scene, Theroux appears quite rude to him. The whole thing with hiring actors to play individuals such as Scientology’s leader, David Miscavige, felt a weird route to go down.

Scientology is fascinating because it seems to behave so obviously like a cult and like a corrupt organisation. Scientology was of course invented by science-fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard and has many celebrity members including Tom Cruise (“Top Gun”) and John Travolta (“Broken Arrow”) but while much of this movie is interesting, it feels a little late. There is a great episode of “South Park” that shed a lot of light on the group and I have seen other documentaries on television that just seem to beat this film to the punch.