THE STANFORD PRISON EXPERIMENT Was Freakin' Jacked-Up - Sundance 2015 Review
The Stanford Prison Experiment might be the most jacked-up movie that I've seen at Sundance this year. The thing that makes the film so compelling and disturbing is the fact that it's based on a true story. I wasn't aware that this ever happened, but it did, and it was pretty messed up.
The story is set in 1971, when a Stanford psychology professor named Dr. Philip Zimbardo puts together a prison experiment in which he recruits a group of young students to study the psychology of imprisonment. With the flip of a coin the professor decides which of the students will be prison guards, and which ones will be inmates. In the process we see how these people react and adapt to this situation. When you first meet everyone, they all seem like nice guys who would never really do anything too crazy — they seem like they all have good heads on their shoulders. Things take a very unexpected turn, though. The guards start to abuse their authority, and the prisoners are sadistically put through hell. It is fascinating to see how they treat each other, and things get insanely intense.
All the while, the professor and his study group are watching the madness unfold, and they are even encouraging it in a way. So not only are we watching how the students react to the study, but the reactions and thought processes of the people running it are equally fascinating. It is crazy how far they actually let the experiment to go before they stop it. It was supposed to last two weeks, but they end it on day six because of how scary things get. They shouldn't have let it go as far as they did, though. It is frightening to see how fast it escalated. At the end of the first day, prisoners were ready to break.
The movie has an incredible cast of actors, and everyone in it gives solid performances. The amazing ensemble cast includes Billy Crudup, Ezra Miller, Michael Angarano, Tye Sheridan, Johnny Simmons, and Olivia Thirlby.
In a way, the movie made me fear the society that we live in. It just goes to prove that people who are given power are most likely going to abuse it and use it to control people in ways that are unethical. This goes from small business managers all the way up to the high powers of government. I know not everyone abuses the power they are given like this, but you never know what to expect. In the experiment, everyone that came into the project were asked if they wanted to be a guard or a prisoner, and everyone chose prisoner. Yet almost everyone that was chosen to be a guard became violent and incredibly abusive.
It just goes to show you really have to be careful about the people you choose to put in leadership positions. Once they get a taste of what power is like, it could go their heads, and things could go badly. I've seen this happen with people I've worked with in my own life.
This is an incredible film, definitely one of the best that I've seen at Sundance. If the movie is ever released in theaters, it's one you have to go see! Here's the description:
It is the summer of 1971. Dr. Philip Zimbardo launches a study on the psychology of imprisonment. Twenty-four male undergraduates are randomly assigned to be either a guard or a prisoner. Set in a simulated jail, the project unfolds. The participants rapidly embody their roles—the guards become power-hungry and sadistic, while the prisoners, subject to degradation, strategize as underdogs. It soon becomes clear that, as Zimbardo and team monitor the escalation of action through surveillance cameras, they are not fully aware of how they, too, have become part of the experiment.
Based on the real-life research of Dr. Zimbardo (who was a consultant on the film), The Stanford Prison Experiment is a dramatic period piece that remains relevant over 40 years later. Along with an impressive cast, including Billy Crudup as Zimbardo, Kyle Patrick Alvarez (C.O.G., 2013 Sundance Film Festival) delivers an intense, visceral film about the role of power that plays to both chilling and exhilarating effect