By

Experimenter

A shocker, but in a good way

In the 60s, social psychologist Stanley Milgram divided pairs of test subjects into “teachers” and “learners.” The teacher was instructed by a guy in a lab coat to administer electric shocks to the learner, in another room and by the way an actor. No real shocks were involved. The teacher was the true subject. Milgram (a terrific Peter Sarsgaard) was trying to understand, in the wake of the Holocaust, mankind’s apparent willingness to obey authority and inflict pain on perfect strangers. Michael Almereyda’s riveting, endlessly thought-provoking, lovingly crafted film fairly brims with wisdom. See it. (98 min)