Flight from Death

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Flight from Death
Theatrical poster for Flight from Death
Directed by	Patrick Shen
Produced by	Patrick Shen Greg Bennick
Written by	Greg Bennick Patrick Shen
Release date(s)	September 6, 2006
Running time	89 min.
Language	English
IMDb profile

Directed by Patrick Shen, and narrated by Gabriel Byrne, Flight from Death is a documentary that investigates the relationship of human violence to fear of death, as related to subconscious influences. The film describes death anxiety as a possible root cause of many human behaviors on a psychological, spiritual, and cultural level.

Flight from Death is a seven-time Best Documentary award-winning film.

1 Summary
2 Studies and research
3 Recognition and awards
4 References
5 See also
6 External links

[edit] Summary

The film's purpose is to investigate humankind's relationship with death, and is heavily influenced by the views of cultural anthropologist Ernest Becker. In addition to interviews with a number of contemporary philosophers, psychiatrists and teachers such as Sam Keen, Robert J. Lifton, Irvin Yalom, Merlyn Mowrey and Daniel Liechty, the film introduces the viewer to a group of social psychologists, who conduct research in support of what they call Terror Management Theory (terror in this case not being terrorism, but rather emotional and psychological reaction to mortality awareness). Over the last twenty-five years, proponents of terror management theory have conducted over 300 laboratory studies demonstrating that subtle reminders of death on a subconscious level motivates a statistically significant number of subjects to exhibit biased and xenophobic type behaviors, such as gravitating toward those who they perceive as culturally similar to themselves and holding higher negative feelings and judgments toward those they perceive as culturally dissimilar to themselves.

[edit] Studies and research

In a recent study, the research team discovered that reminding Palestinians of their own death through subconscious means inspired conscious shifts in opinion towards wanting to become suicide bombers.^{[citation needed]} This subconscious death reminder inspired the subjects to act aggressively against differing others, even at the risk of losing their own lives. Terror is the result of deep psychological forces;^[1] the research described in Flight from Death suggests that these forces can be explained, yielding information about personal anxiety and the motivation of social violence.

[edit] Recognition and awards

Beverly Hills Film Festival - Audience Choice Award for Best Documentary (2003)^[2]
Ohio Independent Film Festival - Best Documentary (2003)^[3]
Silver Lake Film Festival - Best Documentary (2003)^[4]
Malibu Film Festival - Best Documentary (2004)^[5]
Northern Lights Documentary Film Festival - Best Documentary (2004)
Northwest Film Forum - Best Documentary (2004)^[6]
Rhode Island International Film Festival - Best Documentary (2004)^[7]