Gloriavale

It was like a dream...the start of Gloriavale.

– Sharon Ready remembers the high hopes she had for her religious community

There's a community of 600 people where the women are living in servitude.

– Ex-Gloriavale member John Ready describes the gender roles enforced at Gloriavale

Being conditioned for so many years to submission, submission, submission, when you’re in a crisis you don’t act. She kept looking at me and I said ‘I know, Mummy doesn’t know what to do.'

– Sharon Ready on the day her daughter Prayer died at Gloriavale, The Sunday Star-Times, 10 July 2022

When we met Sharon she was a very different person to the person she is now. We have seen her just grow in confidence and find her own voice, which has been just amazing to see.

– Co-director Noel Smythe on longtime Gloriavale resident Sharon Ready, The Sunday Star-Times, 10 July 2022

I have seen so much sorrow and so much pain from families being torn apart ... my children with their whole families leaving the community ... I can’t just walk away from them when they were such in turmoil over the uncertainty they faced starting a new life on the outside and I couldn’t leave the community to go with them.

– Gloriavale member Sharon Ready on the dilemma facing members and ex-members of the sect, The Sunday Star-Times, 10 July 2022

Enlightening, heartrending, rage-inducing...

– Stuff writer James Croot in a four star review, July 2022

Directors, Fergus Grady and Noel Smyth made great use of the West Coast's beautiful landscape, with moody drone shots often setting the scene for what came next.

– Harry Bartle, in a review of the film, Regional News, 13 September 2022