The Beloved

Directed by Joseph London

Commune or cult? This epic documentary illuminates the Rajneesh sannyasin movement in 1980s Fremantle, as told by those who lived through it. If you lived in the Fremantle of the early 1980s, it was not uncommon to see the so-called “Orange People”: members of the Rajneesh sannyasin commune. Surrendering themselves to the spiritual guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, adherents were promised enlightenment and revolution, but required to live by significantly modified social structures and identities. Like so many living experiments dedicated to a higher consciousness, the movement seemed to have all the trappings of a cult – and its notoriety has lingered in the city in the four decades since.