Now, regular readers will be aware than an awful lot of our Film Gutter movies are pretty out there. Often we delve into independent films, foreign offerings or cult classics, so to find something like The Experiment feels like a mighty departure. Without wanting to sound like I’m going ‘all Hollywood’, this 2010 movie has a stellar cast, headed by Adrien Brody and Forest Whitaker, and is about as mainstream an offering as we’ve ever tackled. Then again, I still need to revisit Requiem for a Dream at some point too… *shudder*

Anyway, I’ve always been a fan of Adrien Brody’s work, and thematically this one certainly hits our brief, being a fictionalised retelling of the events of the Stanford Prison Experiment. This one always stayed with me from my days studying psychology at A-level and into degree level. The original experiment, run by Professor Philip Zimbardo, took place in 1971 and divided test subjects into the roles of either prisoner or warder to study the impact of authority and how people would react to this power dynamic and the roles they were given. The whole experiment was called off after six days after the prisoners endured psychological torture at the hands of the guards, including stripping them naked, removing their mattress, refusing to let them empty their toilet buckets, spraying them with fire extinguishers and placing them in dark cupboards for extended periods as solitary confinement. For all its flawed methodology, it’s a fascinating insight into the human condition – even Zimbardo himself said the whole thing is perhaps better viewed as a demonstration rather than a pure experiment.

So – an excellent cast, and some fascinating (and dark) real-life material to call upon. Surely The Experiment must be a banker? Well, yes and no…

Brody plays Travis, a confirmed pacifist who becomes known as prisoner number 77. Each person is taking part in the experiment to get paid ($1000 dollars a day, no less) but isn’t quite clear what the experiment actually is, apart from the fact it will last two weeks. On arrival at an out of the way location, the group is broken up into prisoners and guards and from there the mayhem simply escalates. Throughout the runtime the guards become ever more brutal and sadistic, focussing particularly on prisoner 77 and the ministrations of his nemesis Barris, played by Whitaker. What’s depicted here in the film is worse than anything from the real-life experiment, although it does largely shy away from anything too brutal – Film Gutter regular might find this one doesn’t quite have the gore or violence of some offerings, but it certainly remains an unsettling watch as the psychological warfare is played out.

So The Experiment is good, but there are still niggles that are going to hold this back from a truly exemplary grade. As an actual representation of its source material, it is very much sensationalised, although some may not find that to be a problem. Some of the characters (beside Travis and Barris) are very broadly drawn and stereotypical, which leaves a sense that there could have been more to this – nerdy comic book writer Benji feels like a prime example, and his health storyline feels like a real tack-on just to advance conflict elsewhere. Some of the guards have little to no character development, and even strong performances by Brody and Whitaker as the veneer of civilisation slips away from both of them can’t remove that feeling. I also wasn’t a huge fan of the finale, although I won’t say too much on that one for risk of spoilers. There’s a lot of elements here to suggest this could be genuinely great, but it just falls short and winds up being good.

RATING: 7/10. The Experiment is one of those films that would probably have horrified mainstream audiences, but not quite have been hard enough for an audience with more extreme tastes. There’s a lot of tension, some powerful moments and just the sort of fine performances you might have expected from the leads. However there’s enough not quite working as well as it might in the background to hold this one back from the absolute heights. Well worth a watch, but not liable to hit your top ten.

Before you even get into what a film is about, or who stars in it, or who the director is, you of course have the title. And in some cases a great title simply trumps everything else – as was the case with Debbie Does Damnation. Knowing sum total of zero about this movie before starting, I launched into it only to find that it is yet another black and white movie – what are the odds? Why do all the black and white offerings seem to have gathered together lately? Of course it’s not bad thing in its own right, but would the device – and everything else besides – work for Debbie Does Damnation?

The story begins not with Debbie at all, but with a naked young woman tied to an altar. And despite me saying that, I should clarify this film is not a porn film – although there’s no shying away from the fact there’s plenty of nudity throughout. When our captive escapes, it becomes quickly apparent that she is wandering through Hell – but don’t feel any need to get attached to this initial character. DDD is no doubt very limited on the budget front, because Hell looks rather more like a suburban house done up to be dark and grimy, although some of the imagery in the opening scene (and indeed throughout) is pretty disturbing in spite of that. Debbie is out next arrival to the bowels of the underworld, and she lasts rather longer, managing to escape the clutches of her captor and set off on a bizarre and slightly confusing mission in the very heart of a struggle for ultimate power over Hell. She is tasked with retrieving the horns of the devil, with one each being held by the respective leaders of two factions fighting for control of the underworld.

There’s no doubt DDD feels like a labour of love, and something that all involved appear to be having fun with. The story probably sounds significantly darker than it actually comes across, and there are numerous things that make that the case – some of the fight scenes look really amateurish, the visuals can be bleak and shocking but can also veer into the absurd, and probably most egregious of all is the awful dub – with the film being shot in Super 8 the dialogue was evidently added later, and performed by rather too few actors and leaning for laughs that don’t always land. There are also numerous elements of Claymation, which I’m still on the fence about – they look decent in and of themselves, but when someone ‘real’ in the movie dies we often cut to a Claymation death, which does jolt me a bit. A fully Claymation movie from this team would certainly be of interest based on this offering though.

Ultimately there’s enough here that was fun, and there were some impressive visuals given the very limited budget (I’ve seen $1000 dollars quoted in a few places) but DDD is certainly not with its flaws. If you’re a fan of utter B-movies and exploitation films, then the odds are you will get a kick out of this one, and while I’m not a great lover of the form this kept me entertained –  admittedly sometimes for the right reasons and sometimes for the wrong ones. I’d also slightly pick holes in the runtime here – while it is 63 minutes of a fashion, the main feature finishes at about 48 minutes and the rest seems to be behind the scenes footage, so it’s a push to even say this would take up an hour of your time ultimately.

RATING: 5.5/10. While critically there’s plenty to pick at, and this one is unlikely to live long in the memory, Debbie Does Damnation in many ways serves up exactly what you might expect given its title. I enjoyed it fine, despite its many flaws, and I couldn’t put you off if you want to switch your brain off for an hour and enjoy a few chuckles at a slightly silly, sometimes dark and often pretty imaginative little film curio.

Dir. Henry Xhonneux, 83 mins
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True, it may not be the first time I’ve uttered those particular words in writing this column for five or so years now, but I don’t think I’ve ever shouted it quite as loudly as I have for Marquis, a little-known late 80s production documenting (of a fashion) the Marquis de Sade’s imprisonment in The Bastille. Honestly I’m not up on my Marquis de Sade history, or indeed by reading of de Sade, so I won’t be commenting much on its veracity or historical accuracy.

Then again, bearing in mind that all the characters are depicted as human-size anthropomorphic animals, it’s probably not really trying to be a biopic per se…

So, Marquis is the deeply weird tale of the Marquis’ imprisonment, where he (in the form of a dog) is guarded by a love-struck rat called Ambert who has a strong sexual fascination with the Marquis. In the prison itself we also have the snivelling pig, Pigonou, the mysterious and seemingly important Lupino, a cow by the name of Justine who is pregnant with the king’s child after being raped, and a cowardly and conniving priest and jailor who effectively run The Bastille. My favourite character, however, probably remains Colin, the Marquis’ talking penis and main confidante throughout the runtime. Throw into that a dominatrix tormenting the submissive jailor to get favours and information and you have quite the interesting cocktail.

And god-damn it if I didn’t love every minute of this one.

It's fair to say that this is a movie that takes a little while to really tune in to, but once you’re past the initial stunned reaction this one is a huge amount of fun. The Marquis cuts a bizarre, enthralling and clearly disturbed figure who captivates the attention of many in The Bastille, and there are plenty of hilarious moments with the other characters throughout – the movie’s speciality is really its dark humour, which is certainly not going to be for everyone but tickled my funny bones just right. The performances are all well delivered, the puppetry/animatronics look really great, and because of all that the whole thing just has the feel of an absolutely out-there pantomime. The plot moves along at a really good pace, there are plenty of twists and turns en route and it has all the lewdness and strangeness that a film about the Marquis de Sade probably should. It certainly makes light of the real man’s proclivities, from what scant amount I know, and if anything presents him as the hero of the piece – a directorial choice that I expect could leave some viewers cold.

With all that said, taking Marquis in isolation as its own slice of craziness and inanity, there’s a huge amount to like here. It’s no secret that I’m a fan of originality in film, and this one certainly offers that up in spades with its surreal, twisted humour and unique visual choices. And it’s hard not to warm to the movie’s charms, despite the subject matter. Not only did I think this was a good film, I actually really enjoyed it – and those two things do not always go together in this particular column…

RATING: 10/10. Brace yourself for something utterly bonkers – the minute The Marquis starts talking to his own penis you will know exactly the sort of film that you are getting into. But even more than thirty years on from release this one looks great, it has loads of ribald comedy throughout and just has a fantastic energy and sense of fun it’s hard to resist falling for. I’ve not smiled watching a movie like this for ages – which might say more about me than is comfortable – but this one comes with the coveted top mark of 10/10.