Belief: The Possession of Janet Moses

What an extraordinary documentary, what a complicated situation, how belief and faith can at the same time emanate so much strength and so much pain, love and hate, life and death, I was able to feel very sorry for this family, it seemed impossible, unlikely, but they killed for love to think that they were saving the, so much so that the sentence of the condemned family was social services, revolting what the church and certain sects can cause...

I really don't understand the harsh reviews! In my opinion, this is a beautifully done film. It is a heart breaking story, but also such an interesting insight into Maori culture and spirituality. I thought the actors did an amazing job with the dramatic reenactments. Give it a watch, it's worth it!

This documentary only gets 5.3 stars on IMDb, I give it 9 stars. It is probably one of the best and most disturbing documentaries I've ever watched.

There is a lot of very good reenacted scenes, not easy to do unless you have superb actors and a great director. Which this movie has an abundance of.

It also has a lot of footage of the actual people who were involved in the investigation and trial of this tragic event. Their incite is very important and is well balanced.

This was not sensationalized but really digs into what happened. It is hard to watch for sure, but without really getting a sense of what Janet really endured, along with this poor family, it would not serve any of them well.

I encourage you to try to not jump to quick judgment on these folks, that is what most of us do when we do not understand cultures different than our own, or people we really no little of.

Just watched this for the second time because even after several years, I still find myself thinking of it often. It's a really nuanced topic - not defending the family's actions, but there are so many components at play. I'm glad they had experts/prominent figures on who came it at from different angles but all remained respectful of general Maori beliefs. It would have been easy to neglect that area and I do think that if this had been made outside of NZ, it wouldn't have upheld that level of respect and insight. The creators of this did a really great job.

Even just on a visual level, it's striking and immersive. Something about it also really brings forward the humanity of the people involved - they never come across as cardboard cutouts, which is a downfall of a lot of similar films and documentaries.

It's uncomfortable to watch and it's bleak. It will most likely stick with you. But it's a well made piece on a terribly sad story and if you're up to it, it's definitely worth watching.

Ratings on IMDb have always been a mystery to me, and I don't think this is ever going to change, I wasn't going to watch this documentary because as always I trust the ratings -although I know I shouldn't- but they kind of give me an idea on how good or bad a movie is, specially when the number of voters is very few as in this case, but I couldn't resist watching it because the plot is so real and I've heard about hundreds of incidents of that kind all over the world, so I watched it and I wasn't disappointed, and I think you should too. These kind of things happen everywhere and in every religion, some people only believe what they believe in and they blindly act upon it not giving any attention to science or medicine. In my opinion this documentary should be watched by everyone because it's educational in the first place, I don't care if it's reenactment and I am not gonna say that the actors did deliver an amazing performance, because it doesn't matter, the message from this document is what matters, it's critical and it could save someone's life one day. P.S. If the documentary makes you angry at what the family did, do not take it out on the documentary! Rating it low is unfair and it'll result in a lot of people missing out on watching it. Also people who say the documentary are forcing you on believing in superstitions, that's not true, they're just telling the story as it happened and as it was told, you have a brain to think for yourself what's wrong and what's right!