You may have heard the story before but I’ll summarize
it here to the best of my non-spoiltastic ability. Das Experiment
is based on the infamous 1971 Staford Prison Experiment performed
by Philip Zimbardo (If you’ve ever taken any psych classes
you’ll recognize this name.) I always thought he looked
like some old school horror villain. The real experiment was
supposed to last 2 weeks, but was terminated prematurely on
the 6th day due to the increasingly sadistic behavior of the
prison “guards” and the emotional instability
of the “prisoners.”
Of course the film goes much further than the real experiment
did, but it still adheres to the actually events fairly well.
The later part of the film takes its cues from the story,
The Black Box whose title refers to the sound and lightproof
box used for solitary confinement in the prison. As Philip
Zimbardo wouldn’t endorse this film, the tagline only
says it’s based on The Black Box. You may want to check
out the link to the original experiment’s web page at:
http://www.prisonexp.org .
The film actually does a wonderful job adapting the two sources
into a cohesive whole. The film stars the dude who played
Manni, Lola’s boyfriend in Run Lola Run, as Tarek, aka:
Prisoner #77. He answers an ad in the paper asking for volunteers
for a prison experiment. The experiment pays 4000 francs,
and being low on cash he answers the ad. To make a long story
short, Tarek goes undercover as a guinea pig in the experiment
in order to report the story for the local news and gain his
old job as a reporter.
Now the experiment is set up so that roughly half the volunteers
are guards and half are prisoners. The experiment is supposed
to last two weeks, but as in the real Stanford Prison Experiment
it only takes a few days for all hell to break loose. The
prisoners laugh and joke with the guards, who on the first
day don’t really take their roles too seriously but
by the second night the guards already resort to using humiliation
as punishment for unruly prisoners. As with the original experiment,
the methods of humiliation only become more and more perverse
and depraved and finally culminate in violence. This could
have been a standard prison exploitation flick, but it delves
much deeper into the nature of evil and the ease with which
it can seduce those in power.
I want to leave it at that. This film is such a visceral
experience that to say more could ruin the whole effect. I
haven’t seen a film that had me on the edge of my seat
in years. And that’s saying something.
