Waiting for John (2014)
Vanuatu, the Pacific island nation spread across more than eighty individual islands, has long occupied a curious space in the anthropological imagination. Its history of colonialism (it was jointly administered by Britain and France under the peculiar arrangement known as the New Hebrides Condominium until independence in 1980) left behind layers of cultural disruption that are still being worked through today. It is also home to one of the most genuinely strange religious movements of the twentieth century: the John Frum cargo cult, centred on the island of Tanna, where a messianic belief system grew up around the figure of a mysterious American, the promise of material abundance, and the strange theatre of wartime supply drops. Cargo cults as a phenomenon are well documented in anthropology, but John Frum's followers represent something rare in that the movement is still active, still practising, and still waiting. For a point of comparison on documentary filmmaking that immerses itself in communities holding fast to their own distinct cultural identities against considerable outside pressure, it is worth having a look at Leitis in Waiting, which covers similarly fertile ground from a very different corner of the Pacific.
Jessica Sherry is not a household name in documentary circles, and Waiting for John, released in 2014, was a relatively modest production with no major studio backing. At just seventy minutes, it sits closer to the length of a long television documentary than a theatrical feature, which shapes expectations from the off. Sherry brings a broadly observational approach to her filmmaking, following the John Frum believers on Tanna as they carry out their rituals and reflect on a belief system that outsiders tend to find baffling. The subject matter alone guarantees attention: the collision between American military culture and isolated island communities during the Second World War produced some of the most peculiar chapters in modern religious history, and Tanna's version of that story is among the most enduring. For another documentary that finds its subject in a community's relationship with an outside cultural force arriving, transforming, and then departing, Once Upon a Time in Uganda makes for an interesting pairing, though its tone is considerably lighter.
The three principal on-screen presences are Glenn Allen, James Gillies, and Cromerty York, all of whom are members or associates of the John Frum community rather than professional performers or journalists. Their participation gives the film an access that a more formally constructed production might have struggled to achieve, even if it means the film leans more towards gentle portraiture than rigorous interrogation. There is something honest about that approach, even when it leaves questions unanswered. Sherry herself remains largely behind the camera, letting the community speak for itself, for better and for worse.
A tiny island in Vanuatu waiting for a white American soldier to drop consumer goods from the sky is a premise that sounds like the setup for a Monty Python sketch, but it is the very real foundation of the John Frum movement.
Jessica Sherry’s 2014 documentary Waiting for John Frum takes a look at this phenomenon, and while the core concept is undeniably fascinating, the actual execution is a bit of a mixed bag.
I’ll admit, the film has its moments of genuine intrigue. The standout element for me was the inclusion of some cracking archival footage from an older documentary about the Cargo Cult, which even featured a young David Attenborough, no less. It grounds the modern-day footage in a rich historical context and reminds us that this isn't a new obsession. The premise itself remains captivating: an entire community clinging to the belief that "John Frum" will eventually return, bearing the miraculous fruits of American capitalism, from radios to canned goods.
However, as a piece of documentary filmmaking, it is relatively basic. Sherry doesn't really dig deep enough into the socio-political mechanics of why this belief system persists, opting instead for a fairly surface-level observation. What is interesting, and where the film briefly finds its footing, is the suggestion that John Frum might never have actually existed at all. The idea that he could simply be a collective spiritual hallucination, perhaps induced by the heavy, traditional consumption of Kava leaves, is a brilliant angle. It also draws some unavoidable, striking parallels to mainstream Christianity, highlighting the universal human tendency to wait for a messianic figure who promises a land of endless plenty.
Waiting for John is an interesting curiosity rather than a definitive piece of journalism. It’s a harmless, mildly engaging watch that will certainly spark a few dinner table conversations about faith, colonialism, and the power of myth, but it lacks the rigorous investigative bite to be considered a truly great documentary. It’s a perfectly fine, if somewhat lightweight, exploration of a uniquely bizarre cultural phenomenon.
Waiting for John sits comfortably alongside a strand of Pacific-focused documentary work that values proximity to its subjects over analytical distance, a polished but unremarkable entry in a genre that rewards ambition. The John Frum movement genuinely deserves a feature-length treatment with the kind of historical rigour and investigative resource that a broadcaster commission might provide, and this film makes that absence felt even as it offers something warm and watchable in its place. Still, for anyone curious about faith, myth-making, and the peculiar long shadow that American power cast across the Pacific, it is a reasonable starting point. Sometimes a film's greatest service is simply pointing you towards a question worth asking.
Rating: ★★★ | Year: 2014 | Watched: 2026-07-27
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