Somehow manages to be both obnoxious and abrasive, yet in an endearing way that feels like we're being introduced to an entirely new generation of filmmaker, thanks to its frenzied and frenetic execution.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Sep 22, 2023

Kahn exploits his music video expertise in this overwhelming, joke-a-minute genre explosion. Featuring cute as a button Josh Hutcherson, the editing alone guarantees this unconventional horror comedy won't be for everyone. If it is, though, it's A+

| Original Score: 4/5 | Apr 26, 2022

If a movie was able to do several lines of cocaine before you hit play, Joseph Kahn's Detention would be that movie. It's wild, kinetic and all over the place in the best possible way.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Apr 13, 2022

It may look like a giant mess, but missing out on this would mean depriving yourself of one of the year's most entertaining films.

| Original Score: 7.7/10 | Jul 3, 2019

Detention is ambitious and its nostalgia is sincere, but it doesn't have the comedic invention or the narrative urgency to work as either spoof or slasher.

| Original Score: C+ | Feb 2, 2019

[Detention] is a genre mashup unlike anything you've ever experienced - it's a ritalin-fueled whirl of bizarre stories about aliens, time travel, body-switching, and apocalypse.

| May 23, 2018

Detention is unlike any teen slasher you've ever seen, or quite possibly will see. It's proof that fresh ideas and off the wall filmmaking are still a possibility in today's cinematic world.

| Original Score: 9/10 | Jan 16, 2013

It's hard not to admire the absolute commitment to a script that is very ambitious and totally bonkers in the plot department. And maybe its lack of focus is meant to reflect the scattered attention spans of its audience.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Sep 4, 2012

The Breakfast Club meets Scream in self-consciously quirky teen horror comedy mash-up Detention - with elements of Freaky Friday, Donnie Darko and a string of other movies thrown into the pot too.

| Aug 24, 2012

Detention is a hypnotic hipster acid trip - a brazenly irreverent jolt to the system that screams cult gem.

| Original Score: 9/10 | Aug 9, 2012

...too weird and too off-the-wall to become anything more than a mildly amusing curiosity.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Jul 31, 2012

I often fell in to the category of despising it but also kept dabbling in the area of admiration for being so unpredictable and original.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Jul 26, 2012

Its willingness to not only acknowledge but outright revel in its own shallowness is refreshing.

| Original Score: 68/100 | Jul 24, 2012

The story makes little sense, but the rapid-fire jokes are amusing at times. Sometimes they hit, sometimes they miss. Just keep plugging away and the audience may laugh a time or two.

| Original Score: D+ | May 6, 2012

Neither good enough to impress as a meta mashup of horror and comedy, nor bad enough to hoot and throw popcorn at, it slides into a gray area of unfocused ideas and unrealized potential.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/4 | Apr 26, 2012

| Original Score: 1/5 | Apr 20, 2012

An over-the-top film of boundless energy and if not empty voice then at least wholly scattershot imagination; full of robust but scrupulously manufactured eccentricities.

| Original Score: C- | Apr 17, 2012

It breaks the mold and burns the roadmap, fearlessly pushing boundaries and going into nonsensical corners most films and filmmakers wouldn't even dare of traipsing through.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Apr 14, 2012

If you're a film lover who watches movies all the time, it's nice to have a film or two out there that elevates the craft of watching a movie. I know I need to go to the next level sometimes.

| Original Score: 10 out of 10 | Apr 14, 2012

A migraine-inducing endurance test.

| Original Score: 1.5/5 | Apr 14, 2012