The Experiment

[MidnightSensi2]

This movie peaked my interest due to a documentary I saw on the Stanford Prison Experiments a long time ago. For those who don't know, Stanford conducted physiological experiments where people were randomly selected to play the role of prisoners and guards.

This movie is largely based off that, but takes something that was interesting enough as a true story, and takes it way over the top. While an great concept for a movie, I ultimately felt it was poorly executed.

Nevertheless, if your in a pinch for a rental, it's decent. Although, be aware, it is rather brutal.

Sound quality is moderate. It didn't suffer from any direct issues other than I thought the soundtrack could have been very immersive but wasn't. Picture quality was good. It was expectedly highly stylized but I thought it was nicely done. Sort of gritty but saturated at the same time... worked for the movie at least.

 

[jostenmeat]

The famous experiment that I knew of took place at Yale, AFAIK, about a decade earlier than the Stanford experiments.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment

Easily arguable as unethical, but sociologists look at the experiment as a rare gem to learn from, since the odds that anything like it will be replicated in the future are so slim (and perhaps for good reason).

From what I remember reading about it many years ago was that those who were "tortured" weren't tortured, but would scream as if they were in agony, or even just go dead silent as if they died. I think those who were giving out the "punishment" suffered the most traumatic stress, IIRC. Yet, they followed orders.

 

[skizzerflake]

The famous experiment that I knew of took place at Yale, AFAIK, about a decade earlier than the Stanford experiments.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment

Easily arguable as unethical, but sociologists look at the experiment as a rare gem to learn from, since the odds that anything like it will be replicated in the future are so slim (and perhaps for good reason).

From what I remember reading about it many years ago was that those who were "tortured" weren't tortured, but would scream as if they were in agony, or even just go dead silent as if they died. I think those who were giving out the "punishment" suffered the most traumatic stress, IIRC. Yet, they followed orders.

The other half of the conclusion was about ethnicity. Milgram started out wanting to prove that Germans were intrinsically more authoritarian and would deliver torture when ordered more than other groups. As it turned out most of EVERY group were willing to "follow orders". Apparently moral weakness is well distributed.

 

[Alex2507]

Apparently moral weakness is well distributed.

There's moral weakness and then there are those of us who just like all the screaming.