When allegations surfaced that former Smallville actor Allison Mack had been recruiting women as sex slaves for the NXIVM cult under the guise of a female empowerment programme, the world’s collective jaw hit the floor.

Shocking and harrowing, the case that has been playing out since 2018 has garnered much attention in part because of Mack’s celebrity status and all-American image, and also, because of the terrifying nature of cults and the secrecy surrounding them that automatically piques a level of morbid fascination in most.

So it’s no surprise, really, that the story is now being turned into a film, following a string of other real life cult dramatisations due to hit cinemas this year, such as Once Upon a Time in Hollywood and Charlie Says, which both dramatise the lives of the Manson Family cult.

The NXIVM sex cult is becoming a film