Taiwanese are boycotting a film about an unresolved part of history. Can any good come out of this?

TAIPEI – The Taiwanese film The Century Bloodshed has yet to be released, but it has already sparked intense backlash and angry calls for a boycott, becoming a “blockbuster” for the wrong reasons.

The hashtag #RefuseToWatchCenturyBloodshed began trending on microblogging platform Threads in February, with one post garnering more than 250,000 views and 12,000 “likes”.

“If we watch this film, we would be rubbing salt in the victims’ wounds. It’s too cruel,” said a comment on YouTube.

Taiwan’s Culture Minister Li Yuan criticised the project as “highly inappropriate”, saying it was “trampling on Taiwan’s history and its people”.

In a surprising turn, three of the film’s lead stars have since demanded that their names, likenesses and voices be removed – just after filming wrapped. 

Originally set for release in 2027, the thriller is based on one of the most painful and unresolved chapters in Taiwan’s martial law era (1949 to 1987): the Lin family massacre. 

In 1980, when democracy activist Lin Yi-hsiung was in custody and facing trial for his role in the Kaohsiung Incident – the 1979 political crackdown widely considered as a turning point in Taiwan’s transition from authoritarian rule to budding democracy – unidentified assailants entered his home and murdered his mother and six-year-old twin daughters. His eldest daughter, who was nine at the time, was severely injured but survived. His wife was visiting him at the time.

Despite the residence being under 24-hour police surveillance at the time, the case remains officially unsolved.

When it emerged that the producers of the upcoming film had not consulted Mr Lin – who was released from prison in 1984 – or his family before starting production, public outrage was immediate. 

It did not help that the cast members were seen laughing and joking at a Feb 1 press conference for the movie. During the event, 41-year-old actress Lee Chien-na said that their “re-examination of the case” might show that it was “not as serious or horrific” as historical accounts suggested.  

Allegations that the film had received Chinese backing further stoked anger. While Mr Li said he could not confirm such claims, he noted that the same production team had previously made The Shooting Of 319, a film that showed “extreme disdain and belittlement towards Taiwanese people”. The film also alluded to conspiracy theories about the assassination attempt on then Taiwanese President Chen Shui-bian and Vice-President Annette Lu on the eve of the 2004 Presidential Election.

Besides underscoring the challenges of Taiwan’s transitional justice journey – or how its society responds to the legacy of its massive and serious human rights violations – the controversy surrounding the film exposed the wide gap in how different generations perceive and process historical trauma. 

Today, Taiwan is known as one of Asia’s freest democracies, but from 1949 to 1987, it lived under a martial law regime initiated by Chiang Kai-shek’s Kuomintang (KMT) government to suppress political dissent – a period now referred to as the White Terror. 

For the older generation who lived through nearly four decades of brutal political purges, the Lin family massacre is a reminder of a time when the state’s shadow was inescapable. 

For many young Taiwanese, however, the freedoms of democracy are the only reality they have known, making the horrors of the period feel less relevant to their daily lives. Online, many social media users admitted that they learnt about the Lin family murders only because of the controversy. 

Taiwan’s transitional justice efforts are also often marked by deep partisan polarisation, a turn-off for many young people who are disillusioned with the island’s traditional two-party system. While the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) argues that transitional justice is necessary to expose essential truths and rectify historical wrongs, some members of the KMT view it as a tool for political retaliation aimed at destroying the opposition. 

For its part, the KMT has in recent years taken steps to atone for its history. While serving as justice minister, former Taiwanese president Ma Ying-jeou helped establish a foundation in 1995 to raise awareness of the White Terror years.

But it was only after then President Tsai Ing-wen of the DPP took office in 2016 that transitional justice efforts moved centre stage.

In 2018, her administration set up a commission to review and redress injustices committed during the period of authoritarian rule. These included exonerating wrongfully convicted individuals and going after assets illegally obtained by the KMT during its rule.

Although school textbooks cover the White Terror, critics argue that the education system’s focus on rewarding students for memorising standardised answers has reduced the dark period to a mere list of facts rather than a meaningful lesson in human rights. 

Where traditional education may have failed to engage youth on the subject, popular culture might have helped to bridge that gap. 

The critically acclaimed 2019 supernatural film Detention, based on the 2017 video game of the same name, has been credited for making the horrors of the White Terror emotionally resonant for a generation that never experienced it.

Set in a 1960s Taiwanese high school, the film explores the themes of censorship, fear and political repression, conveying the psychological terror of living under totalitarian rule. 

Similarly, the drama A Foggy Tale, which swept the 2025 Golden Horse Awards, including winning Best Narrative Feature, captured the atmosphere of fear during the White Terror by focusing on the lives of ordinary people trying to survive. Its emotionally driven story resonated with viewers through the personal journey of a 15-year-old girl.

But while Taiwanese audiences embraced such works for using fiction to process collective trauma, The Century Bloodshed’s exploitation of the tragedy of a real, living family raises serious ethical questions. 

Due to the massive public outcry, the film’s producer said on Feb 10 that its release would be postponed indefinitely. Several actors have also apologised for their involvement in the film, including Ms Shiauli Yang, who issued a 1,000-word statement apologising for causing secondary harm to the victims.

Still, some good has come out of the controversy. The backlash has sparked broader conversations about the ethical standards that creators must meet when portraying real-life trauma in art. 

It has also sparked an interest in the pursuit of historical truths, prompting many Taiwanese to research the Lin family massacre and the atrocities of the White Terror. 

Only by confronting this past head-on can younger Taiwanese appreciate how far their society has come as a democracy.