The film follows eighty foreigners (mainly Americans) working abroad for a company named Belko Industries in Bogotá, Colombia.

Mike Milch and Barry Norris, employees of Belko Industries, arrive at their office building in Bogotá, Colombia, to find unfamiliar security guards turning away local Colombian staff at the gate.

They ignore the announcement at first, believing it to be a sick prank, but after the set time ends and two have not been killed, four employees die when explosives hidden in their trackers detonate and blow their heads apart.

Barry and his group, including executive Wendell and employees Terry, Antonio and Bradley, attempt to burn off the lock of the armory in order to gain access to its weapons.

Mike and his group, including his girlfriend, Leandra Florez, Evan and employees Keith, Leota, Peggy, Vince and Roberto, try to hang banners from the roof as a call for help, but soldiers outside shoot at them.

With their group now armed, Barry and Wendell select thirty people, including Mike and Peggy, forcing them to kneel in a line.

When the two-hour time limit runs out, 31 more people are killed by their trackers, including Terry, Leota, Peggy, and Keith, leaving only 16 survivors.

James Gunn began writing the film around 2007, after waking up from a dream of an office building being enclosed in metal walls and hearing a voice instruct employees to kill each other.

"[15] Gunn moved on to other projects, including the 2010 film Super, and had "kind of forgotten about it" until he received a call from Jon Glickman at MGM asking if he would still be interested in making it.

Gunn did not have time to direct the film himself, due to his work on Guardians of the Galaxy, but he agreed to produce it, provided that he was given full creative control.

[9] More joined the cast in June, including David Del Rio, Stephen Blackehart, Josh Brener, and Rusty Schwimmer.

[22] The film was promoted through a series of four claymation shorts directed by Lee Hardcastle which, according to website io9 (where they debuted), "features exaggerated versions of The Belko Experiment's characters, and offers a taste of the level of violence and humor you'll see when the actual movie opens".

[24] In the United States and Canada, The Belko Experiment was released alongside Beauty and the Beast and was projected to gross around $4 million in its opening weekend.

The site's critics consensus reads, "The Belko Experiment offers a few moments of lurid fun for genre enthusiasts, but lacks enough subversive smarts to consistently engage once the carnage kicks in.