Detention (2012)

All Critics (42) | Top Critics (15) | Fresh (15) | Rotten (24) | DVD (2)

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.

April 26, 2012 Full Review | Comments (4)

Peter Howell

Toronto Star

Top Critic

Tries way, way, way too hard. A directorial drum solo that quickly wears out its welcome.

April 13, 2012 Full Review

Richard Roeper

Richard Roeper.com

Top Critic

There will be young moviegoers who proclaim this genius, and more stodgy audience members who find it torturous. If you're not tweeting and texting a combined 50 times or more per day, you're probably in the latter camp.

April 13, 2012 Full Review

Peter Hartlaub

San Francisco Chronicle

Top Critic

Here's another sardonic look at the hell of the American high school, where countless American filmmakers believe our souls are locked no matter how long it's been since we graduated.

April 13, 2012 Full Review | Comment (1)

Farran Smith Nehme

New York Post

Top Critic

Exhausting before its first few minutes of whip-pans, smash cuts, coarsely self-referential jokes and on-screen text visuals is over...

April 12, 2012 Full Review

Robert Abele

Los Angeles Times

Top Critic

In this universe people seem composed of 1 percent water and 99 percent '90s references and genre expectations.

April 12, 2012 Full Review

Nicolas Rapold

New York Times

Top Critic

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.

January 16, 2013 Full Review

Matt Donato

We Got This Covered

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.

September 4, 2012 Full Review

Eric Melin

Scene-Stealers.com

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.

August 24, 2012 Full Review

Jason Best

Movie Talk

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

August 9, 2012 Full Review

R. L. Shaffer

IGN DVD

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

July 31, 2012 Full Review

David Nusair

Reel Film Reviews

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.

July 26, 2012 Full Review

Felix Vasquez Jr.

Cinema Crazed

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

July 24, 2012 Full Review

Jeremy Heilman

MovieMartyr.com

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.

May 6, 2012 Full Review

Paul Chambers

CNNRadio

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.

April 17, 2012 Full Review

Brent Simon

Shockya.com

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.

April 14, 2012 Full Review

Fred Topel

CraveOnline

A migraine-inducing endurance test.

April 14, 2012 Full Review | Comments (2)

Scott Weinberg

FEARnet

Kahn's fast-paced, Aaron Sorkin-like "Detention" deserves cult-hit status. Just as "The Social Network" embodies our Facebook culture, this SXSW film-festival favorite rewrites today's high school movie bible.

April 13, 2012 Full Review

Adam Fendelman

HollywoodChicago.com

Bloody teen slasher ridicules genre's many stereotypes.

April 13, 2012 Full Review

Sandie Angulo Chen

Common Sense Media

Once you get past the movie's rough beginnings and adjust to its goofy spirit and episodic randomness, Detention becomes a good deal of fun.

April 13, 2012 Full Review

Ethan Alter

Television Without Pity

Sort of like The Breakfast Club meets Donnie Darko, except without a hint of subtlety.

April 13, 2012 Full Review

Michael C. Walsh

Boston Phoenix

It's as if someone vomited pastel-hued nostalgia. I must apologize for that statement: Pastel vomit would take some effort to produce.

April 12, 2012 Full Review

Mark Dujsik

Mark Reviews Movies

• 1. Riley Jones: Clapton Davis, you are more concept than reality.
  – Submitted by Janaki B (5 months ago)
• 1. Ione: You're my Ralph Macchio. Do the crane thing.
  – Submitted by Zoe C (7 months ago)
• 1. Taylor Fisher: I'm Taylor Fisher and I'm a BITCH. Beauty. Intelligence. Talent. Charisma. Hoobastank.
  – Submitted by Zoe C (7 months ago)
• 1. Clapton Davis: Your fighting style is so obnoxious.
  – Submitted by Zoe C (7 months ago)
• 1. Clapton Davis: Clapton don't dance.
  – Submitted by Zoe C (7 months ago)
• 1. Ione: I wish my mom would go to a different planet instead of being a drunken has-been who's full of shit.
  – Submitted by Zoe C (7 months ago)

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