{ "id": "epjrapxnn6", "slug": "das-experiment", "title": "Das Experiment", "updated": "2026-11-01", "topic_path": [ { "id": "culture", "label": "Arts and culture", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture" }, { "id": "culture.performance", "label": "Screen and stage", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen", "label": "Film and television", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films", "label": "Films and standalone screen works", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works", "label": "Individual films by title and year", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.crime-thriller-mystery", "label": "Crime, thriller, and mystery films (individual works)", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.crime-thriller-mystery" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.crime-thriller-mystery.2000-2004-films", "label": "2000–2004 films", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.crime-thriller-mystery.2000-2004-films" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.crime-thriller-mystery.2000-2004-films.yr-2000-2002", "label": "Released 2000 to 2002", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.crime-thriller-mystery.2000-2004-films.yr-2000-2002" } ], "geo": [ { "id": "geo.weu.t2001.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.crime-thriller-mystery", "label": "Western Europe · 2001 to 2020: Crime, thriller, and mystery films (individual works)", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.weu.t2001.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.crime-thriller-mystery", "path": [ { "id": "geo.weu", "label": "Western Europe", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.weu" }, { "id": "geo.weu.t2001", "label": "Western Europe · 2001 to 2020", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.weu.t2001" }, { "id": "geo.weu.t2001.culture", "label": "Arts and culture", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.weu.t2001.culture" }, { "id": "geo.weu.t2001.culture.performance", "label": "Screen and stage", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.weu.t2001.culture.performance" }, { "id": "geo.weu.t2001.culture.performance.screen", "label": "Film and television", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.weu.t2001.culture.performance.screen" }, { "id": "geo.weu.t2001.culture.performance.screen.films", "label": "Films and standalone screen works", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.weu.t2001.culture.performance.screen.films" }, { "id": "geo.weu.t2001.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works", "label": "Individual films by title and year", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.weu.t2001.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works" }, { "id": "geo.weu.t2001.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.crime-thriller-mystery", "label": "Crime, thriller, and mystery films (individual works)", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.weu.t2001.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.crime-thriller-mystery" } ] } ], "excerpt": "Das Experiment (The Experiment) is a 2001 German psychological thriller, Oliver Hirschbiegel's feature debut, based on Mario Giordano's novel Black Box and the 1971 Stanford Prison Experiment, starring Moritz Bleibtreu as prisoner Tarek Fahd.", "snippet": "Das Experiment (The Experiment) is a 2001 German psychological thriller, Oliver Hirschbiegel's feature debut, based on Mario Giordano's novel Black Box and the 1971 Stanford Prison Experiment, starring Moritz Bleibtreu as prisoner Tarek Fahd.", "node": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.crime-thriller-mystery.2000-2004-films.yr-2000-2002", "markdown": "# Das Experiment\n\n**Das Experiment** (English release title: The [Experiment](https://www.edgepedia.org/experiment)) is a 2001 German psychological thriller directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel, in which twenty paid volunteers in a simulated prison study are split into guards and prisoners, and the role-play escalates into real violence. It was Hirschbiegel's feature debut after a career in television, and it is loosely based on the Stanford Prison Experiment of 1971 through Mario Giordano's novel *Black Box*.[1](https://www.filmportal.de/film/das-experiment_e389f8a8b73d494c9717b72e117dbd80) • [2](https://www.kinoeye.org/03/06/hantke06.php)\n\n| Key fact | Detail |\n|---|---|\n| Director / debut | Oliver Hirschbiegel, a Grimme Prize-winning television director making his first theatrical feature[3](https://www.artechock.de/film/text/interview/h/hirschbiegel_2001.html) |\n| Source | Novel *Black Box* by Mario Giordano, a fictionalized account of the 1971 Stanford Prison Experiment; Giordano also co-wrote the screenplay with Christoph Darnstädt and Don Bohlinger[2](https://www.kinoeye.org/03/06/hantke06.php) • [1](https://www.filmportal.de/film/das-experiment_e389f8a8b73d494c9717b72e117dbd80) |\n| Premise | Twenty men volunteer for a two-week study at 4,000 DM per person; a computer assigns eight as guards and twelve as prisoners in an underground mock prison[4](https://www.filmstarts.de/kritiken/27244.html) • [5](https://fest.afi.com/2001/international-competition-2001/the-experiment-das-experiment/) |\n| Lead cast | Moritz Bleibtreu as Tarek Fahd (Prisoner No. 77), with Christian Berkel, Oliver Stokowski, Wotan Wilke Möhring, Justus von Dohnányi (Berus), Edgar Selge (Professor Thon), Andrea Sawatzki (Dr. Grimm), and Maren Eggert (Dora)[1](https://www.filmportal.de/film/das-experiment_e389f8a8b73d494c9717b72e117dbd80) |\n| Release | German theatrical release 8 March 2001; rated FSK 16; running time listed as 114 minutes by filmportal.de and AFI, 120 minutes by some German sources[6](https://www.fbw-filmbewertung.com/film/das_experiment_1) • [5](https://fest.afi.com/2001/international-competition-2001/the-experiment-das-experiment/) |\n| Awards | Best Director at the 2001 Montreal World Film Festival and the Bavarian Film Awards; German Film Awards in Gold for Best Actor (Bleibtreu), Best Supporting Actor (von Dohnányi), and Best Art Direction; Germany's official entry for Best Foreign Language Film at the 2002 Academy Awards[7](https://www.aboutfilm.com/movies/d/dasexperiment.htm) • [2](https://www.kinoeye.org/03/06/hantke06.php) |\n| Box office | 1,634,607 admissions in Germany (figure as of 2016, per FFA)[8](https://www.filmportal.de/node/48511/availability) |\n\n## Spoilers\n\n### Plot and premise\n\nTaxi driver Tarek Fahd answers a newspaper advertisement for a scientific study and signs up, seeing a chance to work as a journalist again. Twenty men are paid 4,000 marks each to spend two weeks in an underground prison wing, divided into guards and prisoners and monitored on closed-circuit television by the scientists Professor Klaus Thon (Edgar Selge) and Dr. Jutta Grimm (Andrea Sawatzki). The rules are strict: guards must maintain order without using violence.[4](https://www.filmstarts.de/kritiken/27244.html) • [2](https://www.kinoeye.org/03/06/hantke06.php)\n\nTarek, assigned as Prisoner No. 77, deliberately provokes the guards to make his undercover story more explosive, carrying a hidden camera disguised as a pair of glasses. As the guards begin punishing rule-breaking harshly, the simulation turns into a cycle of humiliation, abuse, and rebellion that the scientists fail to stop. Tarek escapes the pressure in fantasies about Dora (Maren Eggert), a woman he met briefly before the study, who searches for him from outside. In the climax the violence spills out of the prison wing: guards assault Dr. Grimm and shoot Professor Thon in the face with a gas pistol, and an altercation between a guard and a prisoner leaves both men half dead.[2](https://www.kinoeye.org/03/06/hantke06.php) • [7](https://www.aboutfilm.com/movies/d/dasexperiment.htm)\n\n## Basis in the Stanford Prison Experiment\n\nThe film's chain of derivation runs from a real study to a novel to a screenplay. In the summer of 1971, the psychologist Philip Zimbardo of Stanford University ran a simulated prison with male student volunteers divided into guards and prisoners; the study was ended early, after six days of a planned two weeks, as the students playing guards became abusive and those playing prisoners became distressed.[9](https://www.spektrum.de/magazin/das-experiment/827339) • [10](https://apnews.com/article/af0ce3eb92b8442adbe7a40f5998e25f) Mario Giordano processed the events in his novel *Black Box*, and the film relocates the story to a present-day German university, with the experiment conducted in Cologne.[11](https://www.choices.de/film/das-experiment/filmkritik) • [2](https://www.kinoeye.org/03/06/hantke06.php)\n\nThe film departs from the historical record in its escalation. According to a summary of the original study, no actual physical violence occurred, whereas the film builds an ever-spiraling sequence of abuse and retaliation culminating in a prisoner rebellion.[12](https://search.worldcat.org/title/Das-Experiment/oclc/52634796) The real experiment's results are themselves disputed; reviewers note it is unclear how much of the guards' behavior was authentic or encouraged, and later replications and archival studies have challenged Zimbardo's account.[13](https://www.framerated.co.uk/das-experiment-2001/) • [14](https://time.com/7175067/stanford-prison-experiment-docuseries-real-story/)\n\n## Production and direction\n\nHirschbiegel came to the project when the producer Nico Hoffmann first offered it to him; after that arrangement fell through, he found other producers and worked on the screenplay with two co-writers. He cited [Howard Hawks](https://www.edgepedia.org/howard-hawks), Alfred Hitchcock, and [Rainer Werner Fassbinder](https://www.edgepedia.org/rainer-werner-fassbinder) as influences, and said the stylized spaces and reduced aesthetic of the film owed much to Japanese cinema, particularly [Akira Kurosawa](https://www.edgepedia.org/akira-kurosawa) and Takeshi Kitano.[3](https://www.artechock.de/film/text/interview/h/hirschbiegel_2001.html) He cast largely unknown actors alongside Moritz Bleibtreu, saying he feared that stars would have protected their images rather than made the story believable.[11](https://www.choices.de/film/das-experiment/filmkritik) The crew included cinematographer Rainer Klausmann, editor Hans Funck, and composer Alexander Bubenheim; production companies included Typhoon Networks AG, Fanes Film, Senator Film, and Seven Pictures.[1](https://www.filmportal.de/film/das-experiment_e389f8a8b73d494c9717b72e117dbd80) • [6](https://www.fbw-filmbewertung.com/film/das_experiment_1)\n\n## Reception\n\nThe film drew mixed-to-positive reviews from English-language critics. It scored 59 on the Metacritic scale from 20 reviews and 72 percent on the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer from 65 reviews, with an audience score of 88 percent.[15](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0250258/criticreviews/) • [16](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1116582-experiment) Roger Ebert of the *Chicago Sun-Times* praised how effective the film remained even though the outcome is a foregone conclusion, crediting the director and the casting; Carrie Rickey of the *Philadelphia Inquirer* found the confrontations between power and powerlessness dramatic but felt the film ends before its point becomes clear. More critical voices included Owen Gleiberman of *Entertainment Weekly*, who called it rigid and overly didactic, and A.O. Scott of *The New York Times*, who wrote that the strain for social importance undermines the picture.[15](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0250258/criticreviews/)\n\nGerman reception was warmer. The German Film Review Board (FBW) awarded the rating *wertvoll* (valuable), judging that despite implausibilities and some flat characterization the film sustains high tension over two hours, largely through Bleibtreu's performance.[6](https://www.fbw-filmbewertung.com/film/das_experiment_1) FILMSTARTS rated it 4.5 of 5 and called it one of the best German films of recent years.[4](https://www.filmstarts.de/kritiken/27244.html) The film drew about 1.63 million German cinema admissions.[8](https://www.filmportal.de/node/48511/availability)\n\nIts awards run included Best Director at the 2001 Montreal World Film Festival and at the Bavarian Film Awards, the Audience Award for Best Film at the German Film Awards, and German Film Awards in Gold for Bleibtreu as Best Actor, Justus von Dohnányi as Best Supporting Actor, and Andrea Kessler and Uli Hanisch for Best Art Direction. Germany selected it as its official entry for Best Foreign Language Film at the 2002 Academy Awards.[5](https://fest.afi.com/2001/international-competition-2001/the-experiment-das-experiment/) • [7](https://www.aboutfilm.com/movies/d/dasexperiment.htm) • [2](https://www.kinoeye.org/03/06/hantke06.php)\n\n## References\n\n1. [Das Experiment, filmportal.de](https://www.filmportal.de/film/das-experiment_e389f8a8b73d494c9717b72e117dbd80)\n2. [Steffen Hantke, \"German horror: Oliver Hirschbiegel's Das Experiment\", Kinoeye 3.6 (2003)](https://www.kinoeye.org/03/06/hantke06.php)\n3. [Interview: Oliver Hirschbiegel über Das Experiment, artechock (2001)](https://www.artechock.de/film/text/interview/h/hirschbiegel_2001.html)\n4. [Das Experiment, FILMSTARTS.de](https://www.filmstarts.de/kritiken/27244.html)\n5. [The Experiment (Das Experiment), AFI FEST 2001](https://fest.afi.com/2001/international-competition-2001/the-experiment-das-experiment/)\n6. [Das Experiment, Deutsche Filmbewertung und Medienbewertung (FBW)](https://www.fbw-filmbewertung.com/film/das_experiment_1)\n7. [Das Experiment (2001), AboutFilm.com](https://www.aboutfilm.com/movies/d/dasexperiment.htm)\n8. [Das Experiment, Verfügbarkeit und Besucherzahlen, filmportal.de](https://www.filmportal.de/node/48511/availability)\n9. [\"Kinofilm: Das Experiment\", Spektrum der Wissenschaft](https://www.spektrum.de/magazin/das-experiment/827339)\n10. [\"Stanford psychologist behind the controversial 'Stanford Prison Experiment' dies at 91\", AP News (2024)](https://apnews.com/article/af0ce3eb92b8442adbe7a40f5998e25f)\n11. [Das Experiment, Filmkritik, choices.de](https://www.choices.de/film/das-experiment/filmkritik)\n12. [Das Experiment, WorldCat.org summary](https://search.worldcat.org/title/Das-Experiment/oclc/52634796)\n13. [\"Das Experiment (2001)\", Frame Rated](https://www.framerated.co.uk/das-experiment-2001/)\n14. [\"Everything You Know About the Stanford Prison Experiment Is Wrong\", Time (2024)](https://time.com/7175067/stanford-prison-experiment-docuseries-real-story/)\n15. [The Experiment (2001), Metacritic reviews via IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0250258/criticreviews/)\n16. [The Experiment, Rotten Tomatoes](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1116582-experiment)\n\n---\n*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Crime, thriller, and mystery films (individual works) › 2000–2004 films › Released 2000 to 2002*\n\n*Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*\n\n*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*\n\nLicense: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license\n", "same_as": [], "url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/das-experiment", "markdown_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/das-experiment.md", "license": { "name": "Edgepedia Community License 1.0", "url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license", "summary": "Free with credit, commercial use included. AI training is open to everyone. For other uses, organizations over USD 100M in revenue or 100M monthly users license separately.", "spdx": "LicenseRef-Edgepedia-Community-1.0" }, "credit": "\"Das Experiment\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), https://www.edgepedia.org/das-experiment. Edgepedia Community License 1.0.", "credit_md": "\"[Das Experiment](https://www.edgepedia.org/das-experiment)\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), [https://www.edgepedia.org/das-experiment](https://www.edgepedia.org/das-experiment). [Edgepedia Community License 1.0](https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license).", "credit_html": "\"Das Experiment\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), https://www.edgepedia.org/das-experiment. Edgepedia Community License 1.0.", "speakable": "Das Experiment is a 2001 German psychological thriller, Oliver Hirschbiegel's feature debut, based on Mario Giordano's novel Black Box and the 1971 Stanford Prison Experiment, starring Moritz Bleibtreu as prisoner Tarek Fahd." }