rating:
(out of
4 stars)Germany; 2001
Directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel; produced by Marc Conrad, Norbert Preuss, Fritz Wildfeuer; screenplay by Mario Giordano, Christoph Darnstädt, Don Bohlinger
Starring Moritz Bleibtreu, Christian Berkel, Oliver Stokowski, Wotan Wilke Möhring, Stephan Szasz, Polat Dal
Below you will find a temporary review for this film. The real (better, more complete) review will be online very soon.
'Das Experiment' is a great German movie, loosely based on the Stanford
Prison Experiment. Twenty people are selected for an experiment. Eight of
them become prison guards and twelve become the prisoners. For two weeks the
professors watch all this with security cameras.
May be everything you expect will happen. The guards take their roles a
little too seriously, especially Berus (Justus von Dohnanyi), and become a
little sadistic and the prisoners feel like mice in a trap. One of them is a
little rebellious. His name is Tarek Fahd (Moritz Bleibtreu) and he has a
reason to act like he does. Another one is a Major in the army (Christian
Berkel). He is a quiet guy and tries to observe what is happening.
Although we all know that things will probably go out of hand the movie
still has an impact. The cruelty of the guards is sometimes even a little
shocking. The fact that everything happens so fast is taken from the
Stanford Prison Experiment which was ended after six days. Things like this,
giving people too much power, can lead to horrible events. Of course we have
seen that a lot in the past, especially in Germany, but to be reminded of
that once in a while is not a bad thing.