(The Experiment)
Germany 2001
Written by Mario Giordano, Don Bohlinger and Christoper Darnstadt
Based on Giordano's novel, "Black Box"
Director Oliver Hirschbiegel
English Trailer
(full film w/subtitles posted below)
How to describe this film... It's not quite a horror film and not quite a full-blown suspense thriller and yet it captures every essential element of both those genres. Loosely based on social researcher Philip Zimbardo's Stanford Prison Experiment of 1971, this film brings to life the understanding of the limitless nature of human social interactions and more shockingly our capacity to override our own social mores given the right set of circumstances. In essence, this is a film about the battle of good versus evil that is played out all the time in the hearts and minds of men.
Without giving away the entire film, the plot centers around a group of men recruited to participate in a "social science study" at a German university wherein half the subjects will become prison inmates while the other half become their guards. As we humans typically do, in short order, and left to their own devises the "prisoners" and the "guards" soon develop a pecking order and the phenomena of the "cult of personality" soon takes the "experiment" to levels the researchers never imagined or intended.
This film was remade as a 2010 American release (The Experiment), starring Adrien Brody and Forest Whitaker. And while the American version is a "good" film, it pales in comparison to the German original. The German film possesses a taut psychological grip that's just not there with it's American counterpart. I think part of the reason the German film trumps the later American film is that the German actors perhaps have a more realistic understanding of human nature as it relates to the ability of absolute power to corrupt absolutely... Afterall, Germany experienced the effects of the "cult of personality" with Adolph Hitler who led a nation of otherwise normal people to acts that are still difficult to reconcile with our understanding of human decency and good versus evil.
"Das Experiment" definately earns 5 out of 5 stars for superb story telling, great production values and powerful performances from all the actors. The film has received numerous awards from film festivals around the world and was well received by film critics everywhere.
The film is available from Netflix and the full film (below) is currently posted to YouTube
"Fear Eats the Soul"
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