Originally I wanted to write about Sadako (2019), but it is so devoid of good ideas or new ways to scare, and added absolutely nothing important to its origin, so I gave up writing it – not that there was much for me to say about it anyway.
返校 (Detention) (Blu-ray release 2020-1-30) is at the opposite end of this spectrum. It is one of the best horror movies (in terms of story and atmosphere, not scare) I have watched in years. Also it is one of the best videogame movie ever.
This movie and the game it based on is inspired by the Taiwan white terror era, where people are imprisoned for suspected opposition to the government. In this movie, we see an underground school society with two teachers and several students, who study literature that are banned due to the subject of freedom. A girl and a boy wake up in the nightmarish school. They come across a horrific form of police creature, but the true horror comes from the gradual revelation of the truth.
This movie reminds me a lot of Silent Hill movies (2006, 2012). Although those are fine entertaining movies by my standard, they did not succeed in presenting a world created by guilt. This movie does. Not only its atmosphere is as good as the Silent Hill movies, it perfectly captured a critical Silent Hill game essence that the Silent Hill movies could not.