Aneesh Chaganty | 102 mins | digital (HD) | 16:9 | USA & Russia / English |
12 / PG-13
When his 16-year-old daughter Margot goes missing, David Kim (John Cho) does the most logical thing in this day and age: he turns to her computer and social media to try to work out where she’s gone. What Searching does to really sell this concept is place us inside the tech: everything we see takes place on the screen of computers, be it searching the internet, chasing leads via video chat, or compiling evidence in spreadsheets.
It’s a conceit that is clearly innovative, but also feels like it has the potential to grow old fast. After all, it’s inherently limiting, and if the filmmakers tried to coast on the novelty factor, you’d probably grow bored within the first half-hour. Fortunately, Searching has more to offer. Indeed, long before you’ve had a chance to become fed up with the unique storytelling method, you’re absorbed in the narrative.
It works on two fronts. There’s a degree of commentary on modern society and parent/child relationships, as David begins to discover all the things Margot has been hiding from him, realising he didn’t know his daughter as well as he thought he did. In some respects this is nothing new — we’ve had decades of films and TV dramas where parents discover their perfect little darling isn’t who they thought — but here it’s cannily updated for the social media era.
Secondly, it’s an engrossing mystery. Director Aneesh Chaganty uses the visual concept perfectly to help craft a storyline with compelling characters that keeps us thoroughly engaged. Pleasingly, the film never breaks its own rules, instead finding new ways to use the limitations to tell the story. The only possible misstep comes in the final act, when some developments begin to succumb to Movie Logic and get a bit grandiose for the previously-grounded film. But the array of twists here actually had me on the edge of my seat, and, really, what more do you want from a thriller than that?
Searching is the kind of film you come to thanks to its USP, your interest piqued by seeing how they can tell a story under such limitations; but what makes you stay, and want to come back, is how well it tells that story. It’s not unconventional for the sake of it, but a new and very timely way of viewing a narrative.
Searching is available on Netflix in the UK from today.
It placed 6th on my list of The 15 Best Films I Saw For the First Time in 2019.
100Films.co.uk 
Hmm, thanks for the tip, I’ll have to give this a go. Indeed, there’s a few things on Netflix I need to catch up with- curiously this last month has largely been a Netflix-free zone, as I’ve been watching discs and catching up with stuff on the Tivo. A breath of fresh air in some respects but I’m sure Netflix will drag me back.
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I really should devote more time to discs. I’ll buy something because I very much want to see it, but then something I’m fairly interested in (but obviously not enough to buy) on Netlifx will take my time instead. Goodness knows what the psychology behind that is. I guess it’s to do with the permanence of owning something (it’s always available) vs Netflix’s library being transitory.
That said, sometimes you make a discovery. I just rented Searching for cheap on Amazon, but liked it enough I bought the Blu-ray later.
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