The Experiment (2010)

This was an interesting one... The Experiment is based off of a real life experiment where psychologists created a mock prison and assigned people to roles as guards and prisoners.  It was pretty infamous for revealing just how far people will go when given enough power with no consequences. 

This is also a remake of the original German movie Das Experiment, which is considered to be a much more accurate and all around better account of what really went on.  From the very beginning you can tell this one is going to be chock full of Hollywood "improvements".  They cut out some extremely important parts of the original.   The psychologists have a brief cameo at the beginning, but from then on all you see of them is cameras.  The German movie actually had snippets of their responses to what was going on as they observed, which drastically helped the story feel more believable. Without this, the remake constantly leaves you wanting more information.  It's almost frustrating.

The whole thing gives you an interesting look into the minds of different types of people, but it just feels so inaccurate compared to the far superior Das Experiment.  The acting is excellent, and they definitely get you cheering for the prisoners by the end, but it's still just not worth it.  It's such an obvious cash in, you are really much better off picking up the old one.

The Experiment gets a 2/5 for being an awful rehash of what was originally an awesome movie.