Plot
Four individuals sign up for a psychological research study only to discover that they are now subjects of a brutal, classified government program.
Release Year: 2009
Rating: 5.7/10 (5,092 voted)
Director:
Jonathan Liebesman
Stars: Nick Cannon, Clea DuVall, Timothy Hutton
Storyline Four individuals sign up for a psychological research study only to discover that they are now subjects of a brutal, classified government program.
Writers: Gus Krieger, Ann Peacock
Cast: Nick Cannon
-
Paul Brodie
Clea DuVall
-
Kerry Isalano
Timothy Hutton
-
Crawford Haines
Chloë Sevigny
-
Emily Reilly
Peter Stormare
-
Dr. Phillips
Shea Whigham
-
Tony Mazzolla
Anoop Kaur Sikand
-
Nurse
Bill Stinchcomb
-
Cope
Meade Patton
-
Forsythe
Luke Sexton
-
Orderly #1
Tim J. Smith
-
Orderly #2
(as T. Joel Smith)
Michael Byrnes
-
Orderly #3
Gus Krieger
-
Prisoner #1
Let me start by saying that a lot of what you're about to read may seem
like spoilers, but all of the following plot information is given
within the first 10 minutes of the movie.
In this movie, the CIA's secret "MK-Ultra" mind-control experiments of
the '70s (which really did occur) seem to still be in operation. Four
civilians answer a classified ad seeking volunteers for medical
testing, only to be locked in a room together and subjected to
psychological and some physical torture, plus a little death. This is
not "torture porn" though, and aside from a couple of run-of-the-mill
gunshots, it actually doesn't involve much graphic violence at all.
While there have been many "locked in a room together for a mysterious
and violent experiment" movies, this one is different in that it's told
primarily from the perspective of an observer: a doctor who is
interviewing for a position at the organization. She has no idea what
she's about to observe when she arrives, so she joins the audience in
horror as the various aspects of the experiment are revealed.
This movie has a lot of problems. The writing, mainly the dialog,
seemed a bit lackluster, but the competent acting compensated somewhat
for that. I also found the use of the shaky camera a little annoying,
as was the use of a few little fake-out sequences meant to make the
audience go, "Oh, she was only imagining that." You know the kind.
Also, the employees operating the experiment would communicate via
crackly radio, using lots of military mumbo-jumbo ("echo-2 commence
stimulus foxtrot, wilco"), which seemed almost laughably inappropriate,
and disproportionate to coordinating closed-room experiments. It
sounded like they were an airport tower trying to land planes in a
blizzard. It struck me as overly melodramatic, trying too hard to make
it sound like a military operation.
But for all its problems, this movie will surprise you in the end with
its relevance. I'm still feeling it sink in. The ending made this movie
entirely worth watching (if not good), which I'm glad I did. There
isn't much I can say about it without spoiling it, so I'll just say
that it's often our artists -- our filmmakers, our writers -- who tell
us where we might be headed. Sorry if that sounds cryptic. You'll have
to watch the movie. :)
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