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Transformative Power of Confinement and Subversion of Identity in The Experiment (2010)

  • Firuze Güzel

    Firuze Güzel is an Assistant Professor in the Department of American Culture and Literature at Ege University. She is the author of Escape from Existence: Reflection of Existential Philosophy in Edward Albee’s Selected Plays (2023) and Postmodern Perception of Ethics in Contemporary American Science Fiction Novel (2022). She earned a Fulbright SUSI grant and stayed in New York as a visiting scholar at NYU during the summer of 2022. Her studies mainly focus on contemporary American novel and drama, postmodern fiction, science fiction, literary theory, American popular culture, and philosophy in literature.
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Narratives of Confinement in American Popular Culture
This chapter is in the book Narratives of Confinement in American Popular Culture

Abstract

Directed by Paul T. Scheuring, The Experiment (2010) is a powerful and thought-provoking movie about how confinement influences human psychology. The movie is based on the actual events that took place during the famous Stanford Prison Experiment conducted by psychologist Philip Zimbardo in 1971. Though fictional elements are certainly used as they might be in every adaptation, the power of the movie lies in the fact that it is based on real events, which erases doubts about the realities of human nature if it were to be represented in a completely fictional scenario. Aiming to understand the psychological situation of the prison population, the experimenters collect twenty-six volunteers to stay in a simulated prison setting for two weeks with the promise of a significant amount of payment. After a random selection, eight of these volunteers are assigned to be guardians and the rest become prisoners. The escalation of the events happens too soon: the newfound and unbalanced power of the guardians and the prisoners’ lack of free will clash right on the second day. The power dynamics of this confined space subvert the moral compass of the guardians, who begin humiliating and sadistically tyrannizing the prisoners to make them obey the rules designated first by the experimenters, then arbitrarily determined by themselves. Understandably, this abuse of power is not accepted by the prisoners, and they rebel against the guardians, which only aggravates the guards’ behaviors. In this regard, the movie powerfully demonstrates that confinement creates its own moral and Darwinist rules: confinement in prison, in this case, becomes only endurable if one is among the rule-makers of the changing conditions; otherwise, it may easily become an inferno. In this perspective, this chapter aims to examine the transformative power of confinement on its contenders and the subversion of identity in unchecked and highly motivated power dynamics within the movie The Experiment.

Abstract

Directed by Paul T. Scheuring, The Experiment (2010) is a powerful and thought-provoking movie about how confinement influences human psychology. The movie is based on the actual events that took place during the famous Stanford Prison Experiment conducted by psychologist Philip Zimbardo in 1971. Though fictional elements are certainly used as they might be in every adaptation, the power of the movie lies in the fact that it is based on real events, which erases doubts about the realities of human nature if it were to be represented in a completely fictional scenario. Aiming to understand the psychological situation of the prison population, the experimenters collect twenty-six volunteers to stay in a simulated prison setting for two weeks with the promise of a significant amount of payment. After a random selection, eight of these volunteers are assigned to be guardians and the rest become prisoners. The escalation of the events happens too soon: the newfound and unbalanced power of the guardians and the prisoners’ lack of free will clash right on the second day. The power dynamics of this confined space subvert the moral compass of the guardians, who begin humiliating and sadistically tyrannizing the prisoners to make them obey the rules designated first by the experimenters, then arbitrarily determined by themselves. Understandably, this abuse of power is not accepted by the prisoners, and they rebel against the guardians, which only aggravates the guards’ behaviors. In this regard, the movie powerfully demonstrates that confinement creates its own moral and Darwinist rules: confinement in prison, in this case, becomes only endurable if one is among the rule-makers of the changing conditions; otherwise, it may easily become an inferno. In this perspective, this chapter aims to examine the transformative power of confinement on its contenders and the subversion of identity in unchecked and highly motivated power dynamics within the movie The Experiment.

Chapters in this book

  1. Acknowledgments 5
  2. Table of Contents 7
  3. Confinement Studies in American Popular Culture 1
  4. Part I: Confinement Narratives on the Screen
  5. Cinema and TV Series
  6. The Individual vs. the Institution: Narratives of Confinement in New Hollywood Cinema 15
  7. Trapped in Bluebeard’s Castle: Disney’s Beauty and the Beast as a Self-Contradictory Story of Empowerment and Imprisonment 31
  8. (Dis)‌ableing the Confinement: Guillermo del Toro’s The Shape of Water and Mark Medoff’s Children of a Lesser God 47
  9. Transformative Power of Confinement and Subversion of Identity in The Experiment (2010) 63
  10. “Where the City Started and the Suburbs Ended”: The (Sub)‌urban Confinement of Post-Industrial America in David Robert Mitchell’s It Follows 87
  11. Never Let Me Go: Home, Family, and Confinement in Umma 103
  12. Confinement and Consciousness: Exploring the ‘ Nomadic Consciousness’ in Maid 117
  13. Documentaries
  14. Incarceration Documentaries after the Curious Eclipse of Prison Ethnography 133
  15. Dream in Place: Understanding Confinement through the Tactics of Fiction in Crystal Moselle’s The Wolfpack 151
  16. Part II: Confinement Narratives from/about American Prisons
  17. Claudia Jones and Angela Davis: Literature in Confinement 171
  18. Confined to the Margins: Necropolitics, American Identity, and Racial Separation in Assata by Assata Shakur 185
  19. Into the Lone Star Labyrinth: Texas Prison System Reflects The Death Gate Cycle Prison 201
  20. Our Time on the Rock: Narrating Voluntary Confinement in Tommy Orange’s There There 217
  21. “Have You Ever Seen a More Focused Killing Machine?” The Extreme Spectacle of Carceral Punishment in Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah’s Chain-Gang All-Stars 235
  22. Part III: Confinement Narratives within Performances
  23. Taylor Swift’s American Retreat: Covid, Cardigans, and Confinement in folklore 253
  24. In The Devil's Grip: Competing Narratives of Confinement in X: The Life and Times of Malcolm X Opera 269
  25. Index
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783111474137-006

Chapters in this book

  1. Acknowledgments 5
  2. Table of Contents 7
  3. Confinement Studies in American Popular Culture 1
  4. Part I: Confinement Narratives on the Screen
  5. Cinema and TV Series
  6. The Individual vs. the Institution: Narratives of Confinement in New Hollywood Cinema 15
  7. Trapped in Bluebeard’s Castle: Disney’s Beauty and the Beast as a Self-Contradictory Story of Empowerment and Imprisonment 31
  8. (Dis)‌ableing the Confinement: Guillermo del Toro’s The Shape of Water and Mark Medoff’s Children of a Lesser God 47
  9. Transformative Power of Confinement and Subversion of Identity in The Experiment (2010) 63
  10. “Where the City Started and the Suburbs Ended”: The (Sub)‌urban Confinement of Post-Industrial America in David Robert Mitchell’s It Follows 87
  11. Never Let Me Go: Home, Family, and Confinement in Umma 103
  12. Confinement and Consciousness: Exploring the ‘ Nomadic Consciousness’ in Maid 117
  13. Documentaries
  14. Incarceration Documentaries after the Curious Eclipse of Prison Ethnography 133
  15. Dream in Place: Understanding Confinement through the Tactics of Fiction in Crystal Moselle’s The Wolfpack 151
  16. Part II: Confinement Narratives from/about American Prisons
  17. Claudia Jones and Angela Davis: Literature in Confinement 171
  18. Confined to the Margins: Necropolitics, American Identity, and Racial Separation in Assata by Assata Shakur 185
  19. Into the Lone Star Labyrinth: Texas Prison System Reflects The Death Gate Cycle Prison 201
  20. Our Time on the Rock: Narrating Voluntary Confinement in Tommy Orange’s There There 217
  21. “Have You Ever Seen a More Focused Killing Machine?” The Extreme Spectacle of Carceral Punishment in Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah’s Chain-Gang All-Stars 235
  22. Part III: Confinement Narratives within Performances
  23. Taylor Swift’s American Retreat: Covid, Cardigans, and Confinement in folklore 253
  24. In The Devil's Grip: Competing Narratives of Confinement in X: The Life and Times of Malcolm X Opera 269
  25. Index
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