While by no means a perfect movie, what an ambitious and stunning debut for first-time director Aneesh Chaganty. At the ripe age of just 27 years, he took a movie that many people (including the cast) thought was an impossible task while others thought would come across as a complete trainwreck and made this one of the absolute must-sees in 2018. Searching is so entuned with today’s technology, especially relating to social media, webcams, the dangers of communicating online with strangers, and the idea that an online persona can be so different than who a person is in real life. Chaganty considered that technology, including social media platforms, constantly evolves. He knew he only had a while to write, cast, film, edit, market, and release this movie that felt relevant and current.
Much in the same way that movies like The Net, Enemy of the State, and Firewall were both keen on the technology of their day and mesmerizing in how they portrayed on-screen fears that could happen to any of us, Searching does the same, but even better in my opinion (and I LOVED Enemy of the State when released in 1998). Other, more recent examples, including the 2014 Open Windows and the 2015 grizzly horror Unfriended, were less successful than the other movies previously mentioned. But, just like those three movies, Searching will be virtually unwatchable ten, five, maybe even two to three years from now because of the fantastic technological advancements. Chaganty realized this and knew the timeframe from story origin to production had to happen quickly. Had this movie been released in even 2020 rather than 2018, we could be looking at it entirely differently. But it wasn’t released too late. Instead, its release was at a time that reflected perfectly today’s social media and technology scares. Bravo to Chaganty for not only this but also for creating a memorable movie.
Also, before I forget to mention this, this is a perfect movie to watch on DVD because of all of the extras you get. Two sections, in particular, are riveting. The first is on all the clues leading to what happened to our missing character in this movie and other references to directors and films Chaganty admired growing up. After watching this extended extra, you’ll want to watch this film again to see all the missing clues. You’ll be kicking yourself. It’s SO good. The second extra was how difficult it was to create this film. It was shot entirely from iPhones and computer screens (webcams, television news recordings, social media videos, etc.).
There is never once a handheld camera that you would think of in the traditional sense. Think of a much more complicated Blair Witch Project minus the “horror…ha!” and the shakiness of the cameras. It was a decision made early in the process by Chaganty and one that even the most veteran actors in the film were wary of. It was so new age and risky that this could have been a complete hit or miss. Helping his cause, Chaganty filmed a version of this film ahead of time using just his cell phone. He was each character in the movie and was able to lay down a blueprint of what he was looking for with his cast.
But back to our story. The film’s first ten minutes is a photo and video montage of the life of the Kim family. If your attention is there from the start, it’ll be hard for some not to wake up with tears. It makes the first ten minutes of Disney’s Up feel like the year’s feel-good story. The film opens with a photo/video montage showing the life of the Kim family – father David (John Cho – Star Trek Into Darkness, American Pie), mother Pam (Sara Sohn), and only daughter Margot (Michelle La). Margot took up an interest in piano lessons from a young age. Pam was later diagnosed with lymphoma that went into remission, but she later experienced a relapse. They stood by their mother’s side until she passed away when Margot was in middle school. The opening montage was done so incredibly well that you can’t help but feel a connection to each of these characters to sympathize with the loss of life that David and Margot are going through.
We reconnect with the father and daughter left behind a year or two after Pam’s passing. David is doing his best to raise his daughter, respecting her independence, but still trying to be a father by assigning her chores and following up with her when she fails to complete them. But, as a sophomore in high school, Margot has more significant things going on. She has her friends. She participates in a nightly study group once a week. She continues to take piano lessons (a bond that she developed with her mother) once a week. She does an excellent job of checking in with her father via text, Facetime, phone, or (even occasionally) face-to-face interaction. His daughter is a good kid with her YouCast channel, where she posts live-stream videos. They have a great relationship, bonding more closely in specific ways after the passing of Pam, but also drifting away from each other in other ways as Margot finds herself needing her father less and less.
But David becomes worried when Margot fails to come home after a study group one night. David missed two phone calls from her. He cannot reach her at school. His worry quickly becomes dread as he fails to get her through various avenues. It turns out that he didn’t know his daughter nearly as much as he thought. While he thought he had a grip on his daughter, Pam knew all of Margot’s friends and her day-to-day activities and was the parental presence in her life. Fortunately, Pam left David all of her passwords before she died. It helps him get into Margot’s address book of friends and some of her other social media accounts (I wonder why, at 16, she hadn’t changed her passwords on at least some of these).
In any case, a laundry list of things that could have happened to Margot begins to arise. There are plenty of clues that suggest she might have run away, that she might have been abducted, was out driving, got in a car wreck, lost her phone, etc. Clues start to pile up, and, in no uncertain terms, we learn that it will be a while before we see Margot again. And if and when we see her, will she still be alive? I won’t list all of the characters here, but basically, everyone in Margot’s life is a suspect at one time or another. The most important message we can gander here is that as well as a parent might know their child, that child reaches a certain where if they want to fly under the radar and not have their parents know something (or many things) about their life, they can certainly make that happen.
The distinguished Detective Rosemary Vick (Debra Messing – NBC’s Will and Grace, Along Came Polly) is assigned the case. Messing’s return to the silver screen could have been a better one. I didn’t even know it was here until the film was over. There was a lot of overacting in this movie, mainly by Messing and some by Cho, though Cho’s job was much more difficult. He was talking to us more or less through a computer monitor most of the time. He had more of an excuse. There’s a reason why only our best actors (Leonardo DiCaprio in The Revenant, Tom Hanks in Cast Away, Will Smith in I Am Legend, and Shailene Woodley in Adrift) get movies where they control the screen time for themselves more time than not. It’s challenging to do. When it doesn’t work, it fails miserably. Cho is no DiCaprio/Hanks/Smith/Woodley. At least not yet. And it showed. But it was still okay. There was enough going on with the story, and more was going on with Chaganty’s ingenuity. And, as mentioned in paragraph two, the extras deserve to be watched after the film ends. The extras are better than the movie itself, and the movie was pretty darn good.
I don’t have to say it, but the movie quickly turns into a cat-and-mouse game. Can David, Vick, and the police department find Margot before it’s too late? Also, I have never personally been involved in a child abduction case (Thank you, God), but the relationship between David and Vick was just weird. It felt strange that they were calling each other in the middle of the night, telling each other where to meet without contacting other significant players on the search team. It’s almost like they were separated partners during an episode of The Amazing Race. The dynamic didn’t work for me. The way they interacted needed to make more sense. Sometimes, he would listen, and it would be fine. Sometimes, he wouldn’t listen, and it would be fine. Sometimes, he wouldn’t listen, and it wouldn’t be okay. Sometimes, he would listen, and it wouldn’t be fine.
There were some inconsistencies with the detective/grieving father relationship throughout Searching. There were some hidden agendas between some of our key characters, too. Would this prove to be true, or was Chaganty just teasing us? You’ll get your answers because Chaganty was a genius with what he could control with this movie (which was everything outside of the mediocre acting).
If you are reading this before 2020, say this is a film to be seen. If you read this review well after that and consider it a potential movie, I might say to pass. With all of the technological advances between now and then, it likely will feel very outdated.
Plot 8.5/10
Character Development 8/10 (David is an entirely different man by the end than he was at the beginning…in a film that shook the core of his foundation, that’s what you would expect)
Character Chemistry 6.5/10
Acting 6/10
Screenplay 9/10 (Sure, there are lots of coincidences, but that’s what is needed to keep a movie like this exciting…I couldn’t figure out the ending)
Directing 10/10 (Masterpiece for a first-time director)
Cinematography 8/10
Sound 7.5/10 (Unmemorable)
Hook and Reel 10/10 (The ten-minute montage to open the movie had me hooked. It the movie then never let up)
Universal Relevance 9.5/10 (This stuff happens every day, and it’s very disheartening)
83%
B
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