TRT: 70 minutes
YEAR OF RELEASE: 2008
Entheogens are psychoactive substances, often derived from plants, used in a religious or shamanic context. Easy to see then how apropos the title Entheo:Genesis for this strange and mind-expanding documentary from director Rod Mann.
At once unsettling and liberating, Entheo:Genesis is suffused with forbidden knowledge, techno-shamanism, modern science and far too much more to cover here.
Take a psychedelic cast featuring Stanislav Grof, Alex Grey, Ralph Metzner and the late Terrence McKenna, combined with rapid-fire editing, rare footage of remote mystic rites, and an intelligent narrative, cram it into a movie running just over an hour -- and you’ve found digital dharma at its best.
COMPLETED FEATURES
Entheo: Genesis
Other appearances include futurist Barbara Marx Hubbard, Dr. Marilyn Schlitz of the Institute of Noetic Sciences, Benedictine monk and professor of religion Brother David Steindl-Rast, PhD, plus boatloads of highly-credentialed psychiatrists and college professors.
Entheo:Genesis examines the re-emergence of archaic techniques of ecstasy in the modern world by weaving a synthesis of ecological and evolutionary awareness,electronic dance culture, and the current pharmacological re-evaluation of entheogenic compounds.
Topics explored directly or obliquely include Entrainment, Shamanism, Conscrescence, Disenchantment, Noosphere and Enantiodromia (transforming to one’s opposite). And that’s just for starters!
Visionary artist Alex Grey remarks on a wide range of subjects, including the new media, which he contends: “have been a great boon to humanity, but at the same time, there’s a great distancing between ourselves and reality.”
Psychiatrist and researcher Stanislav Grof, MD: “There are many ways you can induce these non-ordinary states... Psychedelics are not the only way. We can do it by fasting, by dancing, by sensory deprivation...”
Author and psychedelic advocate Daniel Pinchbeck: “Entrainment seems like a process of creating a global mind or a new spirit consciousness that may be part of an initiatory level toward the next step in human consciousness.”
And finally, from the late ethnobotonist and philosopher Terence McKenna (1946-2000): “When you are finally old enough to take psychedelics, you are old enough to step behind the cultural mask. You’re now learning that all those fascinating demons, spirits, and magical phenomena are in fact effects in the hands of technicians and theologians who are guiding society.”
Within a narrative framework that imagines consciousness itself to be evolving in our post-modern reality, Entheo:Genesis frames the following questions: How can a renewal of ancient initiatory rites of passage alleviate our ecological crisis? What do trance dancing and festivals celebrating unbridled artistic expression speak to in our collective psyche?
The filmmakers invite you to consider that the answers to these questions lie within the consciousness of each and every one of us, and are accessible if only we give ourselves permission to awaken to the divine within.
Since its release in 2008, Entheo:Genesis has been a favorite at regional film festivals throughout the U.S. At all venues, the film’s challenge to us is the same: “How do we re-invent ourselves in a disenchanted world from which God has long ago withdrawn?” OK, fair question. And a remarkable film.