Detention is the story of two students - trapped in their high school overnight, desperately finding a way to escape and find their missing classmates. Set in a 1960s school during the White Terror, Detention’s political tones and exploration of Taiwan’s history has made it popular not just in Taiwan, but also internationally.
Detention originally started as a video game, released by the developer Red Candle in 2017 to an array of positive reviews. A supernatural horror, the game did not rely on jump scares or ghouls to give the player a fright, yet rather drew on the oppression and censorship of Taiwan’s martial law era.
The game soon saw a film adaption put into production – with Warner Bros. Taiwan acquiring the distribution rights and John Hsu directing. Upon its 2019 release, it enjoyed a strong reception from moviegoers and critics alike – seeing success at the box office in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, among many other Asian countries (the film was not released in mainland China).
The film’s success isn’t just measurable by awards and box office rating, however, as it was then selected for various film festivals, most notably the International Rotterdam Film Festival’s official selection. In Taiwan, the film received as staggering twelve nominations at the Golden Horse Awards – the most prestigious awards ceremony for Chinese language cinema – winning in five categories. Detention was also shown at the London East Asia Film Festival in 2020, introducing the film to UK audiences.
Whilst film has enjoyed large success, the story of Detention doesn’t end with it. In late 2020, Netflix released a television series adaption onto its streaming platform, consisting of eight episodes to accompany its growing library of Taiwanese content. The original developer for the game, Red Candle, is now producing their third game – with their second, “Devotion”, being unable to purchase due to Chinese government pressure on major video game distributors.