A movie based on the Heaven’s Gate religious group is in the works. Collider reports that the film, dubbed The Leader, is set to be sold at the upcoming European Film Market. From writer-director Michael Gallagher, the film stars Vera Farmiga and Tim Blake Nelson as Bonnie Nettles and Marshall Applewhite, aka “Ti” and “Do,” the two leaders of the group. Gallagher will produce with Jana Winternitz, Michael Wormser, Joel David Moore, and Max Osswald, while Daniel Taborga, Rishi Bajaj, Evan Silverberg, and Cassian Elwes will executive produce.
Heaven’s Gate is very well known for the incident in 1997 that saw Applewhite and nearly 40 followers voluntarily ending their lives as part of a mass suicide. Nettles and Applewhite had previously spent years convincing their followers they were from the “evolutionary level above human,” claiming that others could ascend to this “next level” by overcoming their humanity.
After Nettles’ passing in 1985, Applewhite preached that she’d be coming back for them in her new form on board a spacecraft, and the arrival of the Hale-Bopp comet in 1997 was seen as a sign of her arrival. Just ahead of the comet’s arrival in April, Applewhite and most of his Heaven’s Gate followers died by suicide in late March, believing they’d all reawaken on board a spacecraft with Nettles.
The story has been often referenced in pop culture. While it inspired the TV movie Mysterious Two in 1982, The Leader will be the first scripted film to actually depict Nettles and Applewhite along with what happens with Heaven’s Gate. Though, the story has been subjected to numerous documentaries over the years. That notably includes the 2020 docuseries Heaven’s Gate: The Cult of Cults, which can be found streaming on HBO Max, which was among just the latest of many.
The Leader does not yet have an official release date.